I'm going to keep wearing a mask for awhile and it has nothing to do with virtue signaling. I can get high quality masks now that offer me good protection on short shopping trips. Here in the South vaccination rates are abysmal and I'm not risking going without one unless infection rates drop very low.
The UK has been reporting days with zero COVID deaths lately. Why? Everybody is getting vaccinated there. The shit works.
When customers come into my shop, I tell them I'm fully vaccinated and am comfortable without masks but will put one on if it makes them feel more at ease. No one has asked me to put one on, half leave theirs on (if they're wearing one) and half have a sigh of relief and take theirs off. The gym moved all their equipment back inside and signs on the door say masks are required. It was about a 50/50 split who was wearing them. I tried wearing one but it lasted about half a set. All the hard breathing just made a swamp under my mask. Gross. I'll take my chances that vaccine will do it's job.
We know. Unfortunately a good chunk of the people around me are YEC types who think science is evil or something.
COVID has changed some things for me and I'm not sure when they'll go back to feeling normal. I will probably do some form of intermittent mask-wearing for the foreseeable future. I like the mask for some environments, like the grocery store where it's climate controlled, there's no inconvenience since I don't need my mouth exposed, and I'm in close proximity to a whole lot of people. Feels like some free protection from the flu or seasonal colds. I also feel like it's a very small inconvenience in a lot of situations where it's simply providing comfort for everyone around. Maybe that's virtue signaling to some, but my comfort level goes up when I see everyone around me being conscientious, and that's driven in large part by the anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers. If I see someone being thoughtful about their mask wearing, it's likely that I don't have to worry about them. If there were some other indicator that I could trust (or if we were at herd immunity vaccination levels), that'd be great, but there isn't so here we are. As vaccination rates go up (and since I, personally, am vaccinated), I've been extremely relieved to be able to stop wearing a mask while outside. The gaiter is convenient to put on and take off quickly, but it makes my neck sweat, and regular masks are a pain if you don't have both hands free. I'm still not quite there with restaurants and bars. Being densely packed, inside and unmasked makes me very uncomfortable - yes, the vaccine works, but no vaccine is 100% and we aren't even close to herd immunity levels yet. I have no idea when I'll attend another concert or similar type of gathering.
The one benefit was the ever present face covering during cold months. I forget scarves and gloves all the time in the winter. Bone chilling cold was the only time wearing a mask alone in my car made sense. My gym took down the big mandatory mask signs and put up two small ’no mask required for fully vaccinated’ yesterday. I haven’t seen a single person wear one both days now.
A local pharmacist I know is 100% anti-vax and swears this is "all about controlling us." Of course it doesn't stop him from administering them to others in his shop. I still have to wear one for work but if I don't have to wear one into the store or whatever, I don't. No agenda, no judgment for those who do, it's just my decision. But I also avoid large crowds or close contact with strangers as much as possible. That said, I will consider wearing one at work during flu season, because this is the longest I have gone without so much as a non-allergy related sniffle and it's been wonderful. Little kids are walking petri dishes.
This worries me. I work in a very secure DOD facility and there is discussion about not allowing anyone to wear masks after the order is lifted "For security reasons." I'm not going to address the issue if/until it actually happens though. I would really prefer to keep wearing mine. On a side note, it's very refreshing to hear different viewpoints about all this without the name-calling and general asshattery that I am used to.
I’m generally curious why people here are still so reticent about getting back in the flow of crowds? Say you, and your loved ones, are fully vaxxed, the odds of severe illness and long haul cases are reduced to points you shouldn’t really worry. Why still so restrained? I admit as we’ve opened back up there were a few times bigger crowds felt weird and a little jarring as it was out of the norm that was set but I cannot wait to go to a music festival and football tailgates. I would go this minute if they were happening. I just don’t understand the underlying apprehension some here have. The most apprehensive person I knew throughout the epidemic was my mom and she went to a restaurant the night she got her second shot. Immunocompromised?
I'm not immunocompromised, I'm just acknowledging the reality of the vaccine's effectiveness. It's not 100% effective, we still don't have a great understanding of the effectiveness against active variants, we don't know enough about the duration of the effectiveness, and our vaccination rates are not high enough to ensure that coming into contact with a COVID carrier is an unlikely event. Breakthrough cases are not well-studied yet, so while the symptoms are better, the long-term outcomes aren't well understood. Asymptomatic (unvaccinated) patients were still showing heart and lung abnormalities. Combine this with a fairly scary set of chronic symptoms that some people are affected with, and I'm just doing the mental risk calculation that suggests caution. I have a Moderna vaccine, which is ~94% effective. 6% is sure a lot better than pre-vaccination, but it's also not nothing. If wearing a mask and eschewing crowds means that maybe I don't have to live with lungs that look like a 20 year smoker... that seems okay to me. As the studies continue and vaccination rates go up, I'm sure my risk calculation will shift.
This makes all the sense in the world. It's practically a cliché that just visiting a hospital leaves you sicker than when you went in. Why would you not wear a mask inside a building full of people who are in there because they're sick? I plan to keep mine handy for any indoor public gatherings, not so much for shopping unless I notice the parking lot is particularly busy. But for outdoor stuff, it's gone.
I still plan to mask when I'm public spaces with crowds for a while, and my biggest apprehension is for variants. With the number of people that clearly won't be getting the vaccine there's likely to be variants floating around eventually. I also spend a fair amount of time with my nephews who are too young to be vaccinated. I would hate for there to be a variant that kids are more susceptible to and to accidentally give it to one of them. There's also a courtesy issue for people who work with the public. With the whole atmosphere around COVID there's no guarantee that a person not wearing a mask who comes into your store has been vaccinated. I think I'll ease up as the summer goes on, more people are vaccinated and the numbers bottom out. We're not quite there yet in my opinion. At work and other places where I feel comfortable that people have been vaccinated I don't wear a mask anymore.
Partially, because I live in this area... https://www.yahoo.com/news/waiting-happen-california-region-where-100038690.html
Honestly I’ve never been really fond of big crowds to begin with. And I think we’re still in some unchartered waters here, vaccinated or not.
Same here. PTSD, I don't like big crowds and this is the very excuse I need to avoid them, and I will use it until the wheels fall off. Also, we're going to Legoland in Florida in about a week, because fuck what I want apparently.
I'd be really upset if the POS dies. Really I would. https://www.nydailynews.com/coronav...0210601-owrcu2t4xnfffi6f3sgrghkixy-story.html
he literally said “I’m going to be one of the survivors.” yeah, you’re not. Also I’m getting my first vaccine in a few hours!!! Small chance it makes all this long haul shit go away, great chance it completely fucks me up, either way it’s the right thing and finally marks the beginning of the end of this shit for me. After I get the second dose, whatever long haul shit is left, I’m stuck with and I’ll deal with. But at least modern medicine gave me the opportunity to try to get rid of this
Just be prepared, When I got my second shot it fucked me up for 7-10 days. Brought back the worst of my long haul symptoms.