Shanghai Disneyland will close in effort to contain coronavirus

Three weeks to flatten the curve.

So Easter 2020 or Fall 2021. You know. Somewhere in that timeframe.

In the absence of ability of people to play along, as they did in Australia, New Zealand and parts of east Asia, vaccination thresholds were the only logical benchmarks to follow. The outcomes are so completely obvious and achievable. I was surprised that it took until this week for the CDC to make those recommendations to the cruise industry: Vaccinate 98% of your crew and require 95% of passengers (with some mix of testing). Was there ever an alternative?

The obvious benefit to using vaccination targets is that it provides some incentive for people to actually get vaccinated. Since there's no way to give proper incentives to vaccinated people...

(I'm all for exempting vaccinated people from most of the health orders (hey, let's follow the science! What a concept!), but recognize how impractical that is with case counts still higher than they need to be. Too many ways people would cheat...)

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

You can always just order a vaccine card. You know that's what is going to happen for places that require vaccines like cruises. Most people will be vaccinated, but some won't and just have the credentials.

Solid opinion piece about how exponential decay is every bit a thing as the exponential spread we talked about last year. The TL;DR is that every vaccinated person cuts off a vector for transmission, times every person they encounter, times every person they encounter, etc. That's why even without herd immunity, case counts should crater and outbreaks will be more localized.

Good piece. It will be a lot like those hotpots of Measles cases that pop up where people choose not to vax their kids, only a broader scale.

The bottom line, though, is that reality will still suck for those that can't get vaxxed.

It will suck less if those who can, can.

Vaccinated in Florida? Our surgeon general says masks are unnecessary

That's probably true, but since no one is going around checking, I think you should keep the requirement until a certain vaccination threshold is met. Like I said, people haven't exactly been playing along, which is why we're still having this conversation at all.

I would agree it's also probably (in fact more than probably) true, but part of the point of keeping the mandates in place is for enough vaxxed people to help convince non-vaxxed people to get...well...vaxxed. It's like the 3rd grade teacher telling the whole class that no one can go outside for recess until everyone turns in their homework.

Of course, this analogy falls apart given that in this beautiful reality we live in there is a 30 percent chance the teacher himself is "anti-homework".

...And part of the problem is that if you're on the fence about getting vaccinated for any reason, the fact that there is no tangible benefit to getting immunized can make the difference between "Stab me RFN" and "Naah, I'll sit this one out." If immunization meant exemption from, in particular the mask rules, it might be possible to push a few more people over the edge. But yeah, we know the problem with that...!

--Dave Althoff, Jr.
...who notes that case counts in Ohio have been declining steadily since peaking on April 5...

No tangible benefit? You mean besides immunity?

And how does that change this theoretical person’s life in some way he can identify? After all, this has been going on more than a year, and yet I’m not sick, I don’t know anyone who has been sick, I’m low risk, and if I do get it, it’s unlikely to kill me. Heck, maybe that illness I had several months ago was COVID and now I’m immune to it anyway. Now you want to inject me with $DEITY knows what...you know that stuff is still experimental, it’s making people sick, and we don’t know the long term effects. It’s just the Government trying to exert even more control for who knows what reason, and I really don’t want to be the Guinean pig. Besides, you’re telling me that it might not even work and I still have to wear this stupid mask, and it’s not going to let me get back to normal? No thanks, I’ll wait and see what happens. You go first. Besides, this thing is going to eventually go away by itself.

(Did I leave out anything? Well, there’s that whole tracking microchip thing but that’s so far out in left field I don’t know if anyone seriously believes it)

That’s the answers I am getting when I try to encourage people to get immunized. Most people aren’t watching this thing even as closely as I am, and they’re being fed a steady diet of all the wrong facts about vaccination: about how variants might require another shot, about how more than 5,000 people have still been infected after getting the vaccine, about how immunized people might still be able to spread the virus, about how someone got the shot and died the next day, about how the J&J shot is causing blood clots...it’s all true, it’s all over both conventional and Internet media, and it’s really aggravating. Certainly I am not the only one whose social media feed includes one or more people who never fail to post all the scariest “the world is ending and there is nothing we can do about it but hide in our basements” COVID news stories, balanced by those other people who have all the reasons for not taking their shots, and keep reminding everyone why they’re not going to be talked into it...

It’s infuriating. Messaging matters, and there is way too much of the wrong stuff out there. For my part, I am changing my language. This is, I hope, the last time you will see me use the phrase, “fully vaccinated”. I’m switching to “immunized.” Let’s call it what it is. I can’t change the world myself but at least I can set an example.

And lest you even suspect I actually believe any of that stuff I said in that first paragraph... I happen to be immunized; my “return to doorknob-licking” date was last weekend. I really hope everyone in this forum agrees with me, that the benefits of immunization far outweigh all that stuff I argued up top. If you can, get immunized. It’s the absolute best thing we can do to end COVID-19.

—Dave Althoff, Jr.

This American Life has a great segment about trying to reach these people.

Florida officially declares COVID-19 is over!

Just a tad premature, but in the defense of Flori-duh, the beginning of July is a timeframe being thrown around in a lot of places.

I won't be surprised if the beginning of July (the 1st, 4th?) becomes a "here we go" date of sorts in a lot of places (or nationally). Even if it's not when we try "normal" again, I think it's a solid guess as to when we collectively lift an awful lot of what we're still doing.

Ugh. Florida has a dumb. And by the way, I suspect this goes to court immediately, the same way the schools did, and won. This is going to have people going into a McDonald's saying, "You can't make me wear a mask," when McD's is like, "**** you, we can do whatever you want, it's only local government that is restricted." Meanwhile in Orange County, hospitalizations and positive tests are up, despite the gradual reduction of case counts. Only a third of adults have been vaccinated here too, which is pretty poor compared to most major metros.

Reaching heard immunity is unlikely in the US, experts believe

This is frustrating. It doesn't have to be this way. We have all the tools, and it doesn't cost anyone a dime to get the damn vaccine. It's like everyone wanted it to end, then science gives you the out, and you're like, "Nah, I'm good."

I’m only surprised that Florida waited to do this 2 months after Texas.

Instinctively, I'm inclined to agree that this is rushed, but conversely, the vaccine is readily available and at this point, if they don't want it, the rest of us who got it shouldn't feel as obligated to protect them from their decision.

Now, I realize that's a vastly over-simplified take on things. I know there are people who can't be vaccinated for whatever reason (too young, medical conditions, etc.), and I can buy some reasons people give for being apprehensive, but a lot of people are just deciding for silly reasons to not get these shots, and I don't think it's reasonable to leave restrictions in place for their benefit.

Again, yes, I know I'm probably over-simplifying things a bit.