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10 Dec, 4 tweets, 2 min read
Had a lovely time volunteering at my kids' elementary school today. Got to tell the Chanukah story and read to the kids, play football and tag with the kids at recess, eat lunch in a lively cafeteria, and see the wonderful smiles of the kids all day long :)
I have rotator cuff surgery tomorrow morning so I've got a few months of PT ahead of me. It was nice to have this experience a day before getting that done.
Oh, one fun moment was talking to my daughter's first grade class about what "History" is. One girl loved to talk about Ben Franklin. So...I went ahead and blew their minds about the Lost State of Franklin and that we live where it was. (Ready for some confused parents now...) Image
Also, asked them if they knew who Sam Houston was. (The school is named for him). "He built the school!" Well...he did build a school here in Blount County, but not this one. "He was a Governor of TN and TX and President of TX and supported the Union in the Civil War." Image

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More from @AstorAaron

Aaron Astor Profile picture
12 Dec
The last logical offramp for covid restrictions for kids was the 5-11 vax. Those became available on November 3. We are now more than five weeks later. Winter break is near. Then that's it. There is no justification anywhere to keep a single mask or other restriction on kids now.
No more kicking the can down the road. No more "but what about Omicron?" No more "but what about under 5s?" or "what about immunocompromised grandparents?" No. Because there will always be an excuse to continue blocking kids from normal school. Tools are there for all now.
No more "swiss cheese" memes to justify more irregularities and disruption. (That model can work individually but not communally via mandates). If you can't let kids go back to normal now, you are effectively an anti-vaxxer. Kids have had enough disruption.
Read 4 tweets
Aaron Astor Profile picture
12 Dec
This is not the middle ground on schools at all. There is no reason to require kids to wear masks in school no matter what the case rate looks like. While I encourage kids to get vaccinated, I see no reason why they should be mandated. Why? Because covid is a lower risk for kids.
In fact, this thread assumes that kids must endure restrictions to protect their parents, even though their parents have access to vaccine and boosters to protect themselves. That is entirely backwards.
What I find strange about this set of recommendations is that it is framed in very reasonable terms, with a proper understanding of the real mental damage these restrictions cause kids. And yet, it persists as if it is standing between covid denialism and all-virtual.
Read 6 tweets
Aaron Astor Profile picture
11 Dec
Positivity and cases down in Gauteng as tests are way up. Has Omicron peaked? Keep watching next few days. Noticed earlier that cases are less concentrated among young people. Older people are more likely 2 be vaccinated (and also previously infected). Might be the brick ceiling.
Here is the comment about changing age patterns.
This would fit within pattern where previously infected (but unvaxxed) are getting reinfected with Omicron, but hybrid immunity (inf + vax) prevents much reinfection. Both groups are avoiding severity.
Read 5 tweets
Aaron Astor Profile picture
11 Dec
Covid strategies based on "stopping transmission" are useless and destructive. "Slowing the spread" is rarely effective too. The goal should be to prepare communities for the inevitable arrival of the virus and to prevent severity. That means increasing population immunity.
The safest path to immunity is vaccination. The most at-risk people in America right now are age 45-65 who were never infected and still have not gotten vaccinated. (Esp. those overweight). Florida gave us a warning about them in August. There are a LOT of them still out there.
They are not the *only* at-risk group, but they continue to fill up hospitals at a disproportionate rate. The biggest myth many of them believe is that by making it this far, they will never get infected. Too many learned that lesson the hard way here in the South in August.
Read 8 tweets
Aaron Astor Profile picture
9 Dec
What schools still do this? Silent lunch? Facing the same direction? This is “deep cleaning” and “face shields” level of stupid.
Who exactly creates idiotic policies like this? School principals? Superintendents? Public Health officials? Teacher unions? Mayors? Where does this stupidity come from?
If "Defund Public Health" takes off as a slogan, shit like this will be the reason why. It's bad enough to institute an inane policy like this. It's even worse to keep it without declaring that it will be imminently repealed.
Read 4 tweets
Aaron Astor Profile picture
7 Dec
My political worldview on social matters developed in the early 1990s in reaction to the Reagan-Bush years. That's why I have long been a civil libertarian, esp. re: crime, drugs, safetyism and "family values" morals legislation. I bet a lot of younger GenXers are similar.
What I mean by "younger GenXers" applies to older millennials too. So, basically, people born in the 1970s and early 1980s. Much of that instinct solidified in opposition to the Christian Right apotheosis under W (and early Iraq War hyper-"patriotism" excess).
This is a big reason I am so adamant about convincing fellow Dems to pull back from ultra-safetyism around covid, esp. re: mandated NPIs. I know many conservatives view it all as a natural progression of "leftism." But the liberal-tarian in me has never accepted safety panic.
Read 5 tweets

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