UPDATE: In the US, COVID wastewater levels are now low.
If you've been holding off getting healthcare or doing other indoor activities, now is one of the best times of the year to do these things more safely.
This will probably have to be repeated indefinitely
Only wearing masks when cases are high is how they become high in the first place, and if people see drops in wastewater levels as an opportunity to stop masking, they are creating the conditions for the next wave -- one in which they might be patient zero for a new variant
If the body could evolve the means to filter the air it needs, it would. This would be a really intelligent adaptation for the immune system to make, like RNase on skin (the stuff that destabilizes RNA on contact)
Wearing a respirator is an externalized form of this adaptation. It is quite literally adding a layer to your immune system. The immediate tradeoff is a negligible amount of breathing resistance
What good is "herd immunity" (and its desperate offshoot, "hybrid immunity") if you damage the herd? Once is heavy enough, but over and over again? Something about insanity
Why not try something different? Like mechanical prevention, since vaccines don't seem to be cutting it?
There is no negotiating with a multisystemic coronavirus. When even MarketWatch got it right... 😮💨
I suspect the chair of the Council of Chief Medical Officers of Health shall try to coerce Health Canada to follow suit of USA's CDCP evil policy decision to downgrade SARS from BSL-3 to BSL-2. Going against the evidence is totally on Dr. Henry's brand.
Tell me why that won't happen. I'd be glad to be wrong.
I wonder how N95s are holding up in places like kitchens with a lot of oily aerosols flying around -- that seems like an environment where the R or P rating would be better
At least no one can deny that #measles is airborne and that airborne precautions prevent it. Want to kill several birds with one stone in an age of immunodysregulation and vaccine evasion? #WearAMask (#WearARespirator)
“More and more people are questioning vaccines and why people need vaccines,” said Kimberlin, the University of Alabama doctor. “They’re gonna find out pretty soon.”
I am highly tempted to borrow from the French COVID cautious sphere's usage of the term #AutodéfenseSanitaire because honestly trying to avoid a plague in 2024 really does feel like employing #SanitarySelfDefense strategies — right down to facing down growing hostility from the public at large towards your very existence.
Who gets happy when they are stuck in some environmental viral stew (e.g., hospital, medical office) for some time and then have to wait out the critical incubation period and comes out the other side unscathed because they wore a respirator/N95/mask?
I do! :mastohappy: :dance_cool_doge: :monkeydance: :acnhisabelledance: 💃
DIY public health is a costly endeavour -- back when every dollar of every human's discretionary spending mattered to the owner class, it might've been enough to tip the scales toward implementation of collective public health measures.
It's increasingly becoming clear that persistence is the norm with #COVID and that the distinction with #LongCovid sufferers and recovered may just be onset and severity of symptoms.
I'm now beginning to see the LongCovid label function very similarly to the vulnerable label. Both take something that is nearly universal (with different onset and severity of suffering OFC), and turn it into something that most 'normies' would want to run away from.
Or loathe, hate even.
While they furiously deny even their own suffering -- [#AnythingButCovid]
If they admit to being vulnerable, suffer from LC, they are quickly cast aside as useless eaters. Who would ever want that?
Viruses are not the only good reason to wear a respirator outdoors in any city. Microplastics are filling the air, and tire dust is a major source. This does not bode well for our lungs with more and heavier vehicles
Would anyone have any recommendations for an elastomeric respirator that plays well with glasses? My girlfriend's 3M 7500 respirator is too big to accommodate her glasses, which makes it awkward to wear out. Would prefer a 3M respirator or one that is compatible with the same bayonet filters. 🔁️🆗️
Another Christmas will be spent at home. I am very grateful to have a spouse who agrees that it’s safer to stay here than to visit with family who refuse to take any Covid precautions.
We will have a nice quiet day to ourselves, and with our 3 cats.
Some family is upset. But I didn’t ask to be a part of the tradition they envision, one that cares more about process than people.
What embodies the Christmas spirit more than taking care of others? A great gift would be everyone protecting each other, gathering outside with proper respirators, distancing, and caution, isolating ahead of time and repeat testing, staying home when sick, positive, or potentially exposed.
I might not see you this year. That’s ok. Knowing you are safe is the best gift of all.