Thread by @nb_covid_info

Stray Friday thoughts...
If you're not from NB sorry for the last couple of days - bonkers times here. Minister of education who called parents like me "HEPA militants" and told the province in Jan that our kids wouldn't get sick resigned with a 2-page breakup letter. /1

(Fella also insisted that HEPA be studied but still bought super bogus Aerus units (which do potentially harmful air chemistry) for the 60 schools in NB lacking mech vent at a price of $3 million; but EECD won't allow parents to donate HEPA to schools that do have mech vent) /2

His BFF Lamrock wrote an awesome report in April telling PH and EECD to sort it out and bring back masks in the meantime, neither of which happened.

ANYWAY, in the breakup letter he relays an incident of Premier Higgs yelling "data my ass!" at a senior civil servant. /3

HENCE the #DataMyAss hashtags emanating from NB for the last 36 hours.

Politicians generally seem totally disinterested in reducing the burden of COVID in NB. My personal goal is to reduce the burden of COVID in NB. I don't really give a fig about the politicians at the moment.

Apart from holding them accountable for bad decisions made counter to evidence, and trying to show them valid and less biased sources of evidence with which they can make decisions for the benefit of all NBers, which is what they're supposed to be doing. ANYWAY.

On to the more fun thoughts!

We picked up playing Pokemon Go! again this week. That's a fun, fall-friendly and pandemic-conscious activity.
Also did some jumping in leaves.

I put a 1-filter DIY air cleaner in my kitchen this week. I love it. It's a darn good idea.
If your household is healthy right now...it's actually a great time to add filtration. We'll be closing our windows more. So. Great idea to filter the air that's stuck in your house.

When the new variants take hold here and more and more people are really sick again, some supplies might be hard to find or you might not be able to go get them. You may wish to get lozenges, tissues, soups, nasal spray, pedialyte, freezies, powerade, medicine now.

Not to mention respirators, rapid tests, and HEPA or materials for a #corsirosenthalbox. When someone in your home tests positive, you're going to want to be able to act right away. The time to get the HEPA or build the CR box is now.

We're on the cusp of such a difficult time (a further difficult time). Based on other areas that have grown these new variants sooner, cases and hospitalizations look poised to take off again.
It's hard for those of us fighting for better. We want to do more to help.

But because provincial governments won't acknowledge that COVID is airborne, because nobody in power will stand up for the amazing power of masks, because no province is making an honest effort on IAQ - there's nowhere straightforward for our energy to go.

There's so much we could be doing, together, to reduce the awfulness coming our way.

But at the moment so few influential people want to hear it, let alone think about it or act on any of it.

I think I speak for a few of us when I say, we're still fighting and we're still going to help, as much as we possibly can, because it really matters and we can really make a difference.
But we also need to take care of ourselves, because winter is coming and it's gonna suck.

After school today we did one of our other interests which is gardening :) worked on the compost. I hope you all have something enjoyable to engage with this fall and winter...and thank you for caring for others so relentlessly. Goodnight and have a safe, happy weekend 💖