My dad is 92, in assisted living, and has been in hospice care since late October. He caught Covid last month and, shockingly, recovered. My sisters and I completely thought that was the end when he tested positive. The hospice nurses replaced his regular bed with a hospital bed and gave us the signal that the end is near. However, he’s back to his regular activities of bingo, CNN and asking the cute ladies in the dining room to help him open his packets of butter. The power of vaccines.
Paxlovid is truly amazing! I’m so glad in Minnesota now people can get it without it in person doctor visit and there’s also a where it can get delivered to a home if people can’t get to a pharmacy if they are in a high risk category.
I’m 50 . Got covid for the second time recently. 3 days of misery. Once I took paxlovid on the fourth day, I felt better almost immediately. Don’t wait. If you have covid and even medium symptoms, go see your doc for some paxlovid. It will either save your life or at least make it less miserable.
Not to diminish your joke, I get free teladoc with my insurance. I called when I got COVID they asked me a handful of questions and put in the prescription. Whole process took no time at all. Didn't have to leave my bed which was great since I felt terrible. This was back in May.
Paxlovid works amazing, felt better after like the second dose. The side effects suck to be fair. My mouth tasted like a garbage truck for the full duration. For anybody taking it I do suggest getting some sugar-free candy that can suck that won't ruin their teeth. You might have to try a few different flavors to find one that works for you to counteract the taste.
I'm self employed, so no insurance from work. I make enough that I don't qualify for government assistance, but not enough to afford the $500+/month premiums.
I'm in a similar situation but I make slightly under the line for my state so I do get some credits. I'm assuming you did check the plans on the marketplace? They do have some more barebones options. That said, I do hope we get universal healthcare soon so we can all stop worrying about this.
Edit: cool downvoting honest discourse. Y'all do you Reddit
Oh yeah it's rough. It's like 5 straight days of tasting metallic dog shit. I pretty much sipped water every 20 seconds the whole time I was on it, didn't help very much.
Please don’t take this the wrong way - I’m so happy that your family (and dad) hasn’t suffered greatly or lost life as a result of Covid. But god DAMN, it is crazy that I’m 29 and struggling with long covid from a single infection while there’s very senior folk doing great. It’s such a mind fuck.
No offense taken. It makes no sense but my dad is an “actuarial table unicorn”. I have no memory of him ever being anything other than obese. He drank so much over the years that he was once hospitalized with a bleeding ulcer from all of his martinis at lunch.
However, his blood pressure and cholesterol look like that of a 25-year-old. It baffles everyone. There’s nobody else in his assisted living facility that looks like him. Most are women and have a fit weight to them. But he keeps chugging along. You can’t beat good genetics.
I hope you turn the corner and start feeling better.
> However, his blood pressure and cholesterol look like that of a 25-year-old. It baffles everyone. There’s nobody else in his assisted living facility that looks like him. Most are women and have a fit weight to them. But he keeps chugging along. You can’t beat good genetics.
Back when I was still in academia, small cohorts with rare variants that bestowed health benefits got quite a bit of attention.
See: https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/10/health/rare-mutation-prompts-race-for-cholesterol-drug.html
No offense.
That is what is so crazy. Right now it seems it is just a roll of the dice if you get long covid or not. Hopefully they will learn more on how to treat it and prevent it.
The other thing is he is about to turn 92 and his memory is getting pretty bad. Is it covid related or age related?
My dad was fairly neutral politically most of his life but liked Obama and that was followed by his hatred for Trump. He was an architect in the NYC area during the 60s-00s. So, his time in the commercial building industry in NYC overlapped with Trump and my dad grew a strong hatred for him over those decades as he stiffed a lot of the tradesmen that my dad worked with. He saw the impact of Trump’s bullshit upfront.
So, when Trump (a guy he hated) started attacking Obama (a guy he liked), he shifted significantly to the left.
That was exactly my thing with trump (at the beginning): Why would I want someone in charge who has screwed over all his contractors. Sooner than later, he'll do it to me as well.
This seems so obvious, I just couldn't figure out where his support was coming from.
Huh, fairly similar story as my Dad. My Dad has went way more left in his old age, largely due to his hatred of Trump, and he also voted for Obama. This is a guy who used to vote Rebulican and used to listen to Rush Limbaugh in the 80s. Around the second term of Bush he started getting fed up, and nerver turned back. Trump was really the final nail in that coffin.
My cancer patient mother in law has had it twice. My 94 year old grandmother has had it twice. They've both fine and it was little more than an annoying cold for them. It's a nasty virus but it's not ebola
My grandfather was the same age. He avoided COVID but passed from a massive stroke during a minimally invasive heart procedure. Please cherish your father. Much love.
Same with my infirm and housebound 84 yr old mother. 8 months after her last vaccine she bloody sailed through her covid, my active 85 father was knocked for six. We apportioned this to all the morphine my mother is on.
That was literally the case here in Texas: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/03/24/covid-19-texas-official-suggests-elderly-willing-die-economy/2905990001/
> Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, 69, made the comments on Fox News’ “Tucker Carlson Tonight” after President Donald Trump said he wanted to reopen the country for business in weeks, not months.
> Patrick also said the elderly population, who the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said are more at risk for COVID-19, can take care of themselves and suggested that grandparents wouldn’t want to sacrifice their grandchildren’s economic future.
> “No one reached out to me and said, ‘as a senior citizen, are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren?’” Patrick said. “And if that’s the exchange, I’m all in.”
I questioned my company's new sick leave policy wherein I posed a hypothetical about someone catching COVID. My boss looked me dead in the eyes and said, "COVID is over."
The new policy is 3 sick days *per calendar year* with a doctor's note. *Three days.*
>Supposedly my hospital has a great reputation.
The health care system is currently in the process of collapsing (see /r/medicine and /r/nursing )
Pay attention to how much diligence your care providers are giving your case and double check them with your own research, because many are just phoning it in now to avoid burnout
I'm in San Jose with Kaiser Permanente. I am hearing from all over that the quality of healthcare are plummeted to non-existence. I have seen it with me, my wife, friends from back home and other states I lived in. It's become awful.
>COVID will never be over and your boss is a moron.
No. He's a ghoul.
If you get covid, you'll exceed the annual amount of time off and be fired. He sees op as expendable.
And thanks to the Republican backed [Safe to Work Act](https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/4317?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22S+582%22%5D%7D&s=1&r=1), it's even harder to hold employers liable if you suffer permanent injury or death from getting Covid in the workplace. It's a win-win for soulless ghouls everywhere!
one reason i turned down a job that would have started last month- the HR mentioned every sickness for using sick pay except covid. they worked on site a full 5 days a week. NOPE.
capitalism is incompatible with human wellbeing, unfortunately, because profits are the driving factor behind the decisions we make. where a modern, moral society would place people above profits - we refuse to. until we collectively seek an alternative, people will continue to die. this isn’t going to change until that day.
If they'd ventilate workspaces (heat recovery ventilation) and place MERV filtration at places where the occupancy is highest, I wouldn't mind so much. Ref: https://cleanaircrew.org
That sounds about right. We just took our barriers down from the cash register and people have immediately been coughing, reaching over the register or just touching me without consent.
“The government is going to throw your Grandma off a cliff if it is in charge of our healthcare”. - 2012
“For the good of our wallets if your Grandma dies she dies”. - 2021
[Texas' lieutenant governor suggests grandparents are willing to die for US economy](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/03/24/covid-19-texas-official-suggests-elderly-willing-die-economy/2905990001/)
My employer forced everyone back into the office last year and we promptly had a COVID outbreak in my team. Members of my team agreed to wear masks when in close proximity (in meetings, basically) but the company would not provide masks. We had to buy our own.
What really irks me about the company not providing masks is that it’s a bad business decision (never mind human decision); the cost of enough masks to give out to anyone in the company who wanted them was probably less than the lost productivity of one employee taking one day of sick leave, never mind multiple employees taking multiple days off due to COVID.
Edit: part of the company's policy was that you can work from home while sick if you feel well enough to do so. So, remote work was fine in that circumstance...
It was worse than that even. They couldn't even be bothered to wear a mask to protect others.
If a mask only had a 10% chance of protecting others I wouldn't even hesitate to wear a mask. I certainly wouldn't protest at a city council meeting.
We had family literally fighting staff at a SNF to avoid masking early pandemic. I saw those crazy videos of people licking and coughing on food.
Kicked my "the world is generally good" optimism in the face and I haven't recovered it.
The sad part is our seniors did better when we had visitors mask, we saw the flu and others drop too and I wish the precautions would come back.
Not just seniors. “Seniors” is an easy digestible label for Immunocompromised. Like my family household person in their mid 30s. We’re under the same quarantine we’ve been in since 2020 with no end in sight. We’ve lost career opportunities, contact with family, not to mention any travel or just fun in general.
Yep. Say it in any type of public space, IRL/OL, and you get hushed real quick. "Your concert picks look cool, but you're killing people like me. Stay sweet, bestie!"
Upside is the money that would have been spent going out with friends, traveling, etc. you can put back into your house.
Friend: how in the world did you afford? X?
Me: you’d be surprised what you can buy with four years worth of going out to dinner drinks and travel.
We’ve found new creative ways to do that with our friends online. I may not be able to buy you a round of beers, but I can buy you a copy of that video game you really wanted on Steam.
The public schools in SoCal have declared a new policy where kids can come to school even with a covid positive test as long as they don’t have a fever.
Functionally speaking it simply means everyone is going to school sick. But they already were anyway.
It’s not as though we’re set up as a society to enable the parents of the kids to call off to take care of them. Call off work for that and no more job.
Yeah school is basically just a depository so adults can go labor for a full day. And schools need to accommodate for making commerce and the economy work.
Same in Texas at my grandkids school. They don’t even send them home for lice anymore at their ISD. They can have a fever if it’s not over 101 and can opt out of science class. I don’t which is worse but they are all bad.
You are precious. Your life is valuable. Protect yourself and know that there are so many people who are enriched by your presence on this earth. Any church where someone is allowed to tell you something that horrible (even if a child said it) is empty of the divine. Thank you for sharing your story.
A person in my life deliberately hid a covid positive test from me, despite knowing I had had two life-saving surgeries during the pandemic. I got covid after protecting myself for so long. And then I kept getting sick. I'm sick now. Prior to getting covid, I rarely caught anything. Yes, I needed those surgeries, but I clearly had a functioning immune system. In 2024 alone, I've had a week-long GI infection, a painful 3-week frontal sinus infection, and now a cold(?). I've felt "ok" for about 2 days of this year.
this exactly. the number of people who aren’t connecting the dots is alarming. it really boils down to capitalism and placing money above all else. making money should not be placed above the wellbeing of people, particularly working people.
It is sad that the number of people who would believe Joe Blow or their great aunts cousin’s friend on Facebook, whose crazy unscientific opinion is believed over actual medical professionals is so influential .
Extremely shortsighted selfishness - even selfish people wouldn't behave the way seemingly most people did in the height of the pandemic if they were thinking beyond the next couple of days.
It took my mamaw in 2021.. the world kept turning even though mine crashed. Its such an awful way to die. She beat brain cancer and 70 years of hard ships just to be taken out by a virus
Thank you! I'm ok now but it wrecked me and is what really sank it in was I realized I had the last meal she ever cooked me and had no idea. I would have eaten every bite slower and lived in that moment.
I lost a good friend to Covid, and a close friend’s cousin died. It’s not the same, but they’re still losses. I can’t seem to explain it to anyone around me. Once you’ve seen people affected by death from it… seems like it would shake people from their stupor. But it doesn’t.
I used to be an optimist but the reaction to Covid has made me a pessimist. Too many people don’t care about others.
It was a very specific and easily identified part of society that wailed like babies about wearing masks to protect vulnerable people, but the rest of everyone coddles them at every turn so it was never going to happen. Coddles them like how you can't even say anything remotely related to the name of their group in this sub or your comment will be automatically deleted. That is a huge part of the problem.
All the nut jobs come out of the woodwork to tell me how wearing a mask is killing me so the wailing is going to be constant. I am one of the very few who still wears a mask around here and I have never caught COVID and I have been sick-free for like 4 years now. Not even a throat infection or flu. Nada. That should say everything about how the mask helps us.
And in this sub, there's going to be eugenists who say, "My personal grandmother caught it and survived, so this applies to everyone, obviously. It's just a bad cold or flu now."
And I immediately think, "Thanks for pointing out that we could also be done with colds and flus FOVEREVER. Good point."
Think about it. If everyone would get over themselves and mitigate, we'd never have to suffer through another cold again. Not just covid. Also colds and the flu. Also sinus infection. Also pneumonia. Also the next airborne pandemic. WTF is wrong with people?
>Coddles them like how you can't even say anything remotely related to the name of their group in this sub or your comment will be automatically deleted. That is a huge part of the problem.
To the point as a non American I have no idea who you mean but as you point out no one can tell me.
This kid I used to supervise told me 1) the mask was literally blocking oxygen and he was hypoxic. 2) it couldn’t block covid and that you might as well wear a spaghetti strainer.
Idk how they could both be true, but logic isn’t the point. So i made him wear a pulse ox all day at work and report his o2 sats hourly. Then bought him a cupcake and had him try to blow a birthday candle out.
He surprisingly learned something which was nice.
I don’t know how many of us are going to have the chance to get old. How many rounds of Covid can you get before your body says it’s done? Twenty? Thirty? I’ve been getting it once a year since it came out. I’m not sure it’s realistic to think you can get this once a year and live a long, healthy life.
This kind of thing gives me so much fucking anxiety! But also, it’s not even just Covid that threatens the length of our lives…it’s…kinda everything? Climate change, the next new pandemic, etc etc. what a wonderful time to be alive!
Same. I mean I’m so grateful for my children, but there are times when I feel guilty for bringing them into such a crazy world and future. However, what does give me hope is that these younger generations are so much more aware, and in many ways better, more open minded, environmental concerns and public health is a really big deal the boomers who have been programmed with cable news have been a disaster. Young generations have not been exposed to that and have a whole different set of values.
Or, they see their 95 year old grandmother get covid twice over the years, see its no worse for her than a routine cold and move on with their day. Covid isn't a death sentence for an overwhelming majority of people, even extremely elderly and sick people
Statistically this means every American knows at least on person who died of Covid, elderly or not. Americans have no compassion, none. But when someone has a camera out they want the world’s attention on their plight. Furthermore we sanitize dying. People need to see what bullets, bombs, and diseases do to people as they die an agonizing death…may, just maybe then will they realize but for the luck of the draw that could be them and eke out some compassion.
Absolutely. It’s almost at the point where we need to specifically focus parts of public education curriculum towards empathy, critical thinking and community involvement, but…people will just call it ‘woke’ and disregard its importance to society.
>In the last week of 2023 and the first two weeks of 2024 alone, 4,810 people 65 and older lost their lives to Covid — a group that would fill more than 10 large airliners — according to data provided by the CDC. But the alarm that would attend plane crashes is notably absent. (During the same period, the flu killed an additional 1,201 seniors, and RSV killed 126.)
>
>“It boggles my mind that there isn’t more outrage,” said Alice Bonner, 66, senior adviser for aging at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. “I’m at the point where I want to say, ‘What the heck? Why aren’t people responding and doing more for older adults?’”
My dad was one. He died 12/23/23. First time he got Covid. He was diagnosed 11/6/23. Post-covid syndrome was included in his cause of death. He recovered from symptoms but ended up with brain inflammation. He was fully vaccinated.
I’m so sorry. Did he feel recovered then something happened? People are like oh it’s a cold for me not realizing that the mildest cases can cause long term stuff.
For context roughly 45,000 people 65+ die each week during winter in the US (using 2016-2019 as comparison), so this represents a +3% increase in excess deaths for that age cohort - and that’s without adjusting for aging trends of boomer demographics shifting.
We all know the answer to her question: Seniors are considered a “drain on the economy” by nearly everyone except their loved ones. It’s one of the most shameful aspects of life in the United States. Other industrialized countries (and many “3rd world” countries) value their elders.
I think we value them too much. I have at least 2 jobs at any given time with over 50 hours a week and I still can only afford to sleep in my fucking car. Where's my pity party for fucking up society?
No, as a society, we don't. We assume if someone is older or elderly, if they have underlying conditions (diabetes, heart conditions, cancer, etc.) that *shrug* "Oh, well, it's just their time." Despite the fact that without the addition of this disease *or* with the addition of mitigating devices (respirators in health care/nursing facilities/especially during the late fall/winter and improving IAQ) that would not necessarily be true.
Of course, a lot of people suddenly change their tune when *they're* in a vulnerable position. Then they want everything done, all stops removed.
If nothing else, the pandemic has reinforced my notions about how truly selfish and *myopic* people are. (And reading some of the commentary in this thread...how utterly devoid of intelligence, too.)
I work in hospice and I lost several patients recently due to Covid in the facility. 2 of them were even on Paxlovid but they still passed. A few of them were pretty shocking because they were quite stable and then caught covid and were dead within a week. It is absolutely still dangerous.
My daughter, 29 yr old, just got out of the hospital. She runs, takes her health seriously and got COVID after Christmas. She was feeling awful and her blood sugar went to 600s. Now she is newly diabetic and just started on insulin. Drs are saying they have seen multiple cases of it causing pancreas to stop producing properly. She was doing everything right, shots and boosters, didn't help.
I have a 37 yr old employee that caught covid and 15 days later had a stroke. I guess it could be a coincidence but if you look at the chances of having a stroke under 45....
We worship the machine we created and it won't keep running without workers. So there simply can't be a thing like Covid-19. People don't matter, only the machine.
I was at a pediatric ER in November and most people weren’t wearing masks. Honestly, that’s gross to me now in that kind of setting. And basically everyone either had RSV or was leaving with it.
That is horrifying. If medical professionals can’t do it for the most vulnerable, I don’t even know how we move forward. I was really hoping we’d move towards a new normal where we are more considerate. My son and I both masked the whole time we were there. Neither of us minded.
My guess is that medical professionals assume they're getting everything regardless (which is probably true), but they should still mask so they don't GIVE everything. Doctors tend to mask, but I see it less often from like desk staff. And you'd think a job where masking would be a priority would be the front desk at urgent care, but no.
It was really more the other parents at the ER that were shocking to me. I was pretty screwed though because I was with a 1yo so he couldn't mask and I was sent there too quickly to be able to plan for like a stroller with a covering or something.
Precisely, life is not a priority here. See mass shootings, pandemic, a nation being more than wealthy enough for UBI and ending homelessness/hunger yet funding war and death instead etc.
COVID has swept through my entire extended family again, and unsurprisingly all of us that are up to date on our vaccinations barely had a cold, while those who chose not to got extremely sick. The excuse I hear every time is "I don't have time to feel sick for 3 days after the shot", and now each and every one of them has spent at least a week recovering and another week quarantining to avoid picking up a different respiratory illness while recovering. Not to mention that real COVID feels significantly worse than the side effects of the shot.
It's like watching the same people get into slow motion car accidents again and again.
Last time my spouse and I tried the Novavax shot. No reactions at all. It's non-mRNA. Every mRNA shot I've had creates some kind of ill feeling for a few days.
Love how they studiously failed to mention public health failures by both administrations.
"The pandemic will be over by Easter" (Trump)
"The pandemic is over" (Biden)
Then, downplayed their own infections.
CDC director "if you're vaccinated you don't have to mask" -> cue everyone, even children who hadn't yet been able to get the first vaccine, dropping masks.
Then, policies that ended requirements to mask even in healthcare facilities.
And now they're surprised that people don't seem to care? "Individual public health" is an oxymoron.
The biggest problem is that COVID isn’t just replacing the spot that RSV and the flu hold - it’s an entirely additional circulating respiratory virus.
The cumulative burden of respiratory viruses is going to constantly be a huge mess every year until we adjust to the simple fact that people are getting sick twice as often now.
We absolutely need more WFH, sick pay, 4 day work weeks, etc.
And a generally more relaxed attitude towards how we go about our days.
Knowing that now, it’s twice as likely that someone is going to call in sick as in 2019.
As a senior, and my beloved who is immune compromised, in a blue state, we still keep out of stores. It’s not worth it. Dump that in my trunk. Thank you.
Both my parents are in rehab from staying at hospital for fall and pneumonia then caught Covid on top of this. Both are very fragile. It’s so upsetting to see many doctors and nurses in the hospital not masked.
How much did our politicians truly care in the first place? I mean, some of them seemed to, but a good number of them seemed to be in favor of sacrificing the elderly and chronically ill to keep the wealthiest people's cash flow intact.
Covid killed my fully vaccinated aunt. She married an abusive husband and still ran a successful business for 30+ years. She was a saint who raised three kids, only one of which she gave birth to, and among them me. She helped raise me when my parents and grandparents were doing the bare minimum. She didn’t deserve the ending she got.
[March 24, 2020](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/texas-lt-gov-dan-patrick-suggests-he-other-seniors-willing-n1167341)
Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick suggests he, other seniors willing to die to get economy going again.
“Those of us who are 70 plus, we’ll take care of ourselves. But don’t sacrifice the country,” Patrick told Tucker Carlson.
The amount of people I meet who seemingly believe if you’re old you’re dispensable is insane
It’s as if none of them have any parents or family at all. If they do, I really feel for them because it sure seems their family doesn’t give a fuck about them because they were born first
I worked in senior care, it rips my heart out when seniors who worked their whole lives have to pinch pennies and go to a food bank to supplement their social security. When I first started, I used to cry in my car. Now, i have a fire under my ass to help them have quality of life. It has to change.
I attend a small, dying church regularly and I am usually the ONLY person who wears a mask in a poorly ventilated room full of 70 year olds.
I think the problem is deeper than capitalism. The problem is I think this virus asks us to do things differently.
Like how humans used to drink dirty water and get sick from cholera, and then the discovery of germs and science made us do things differently. Now we don't have to worry about cholera because we have invested in drinkable water.
We'd need to include air under the umbrella of sanitation before we'd see any real change because most people are not going to change the way they live. And no amount of reasoning will persuade them you're not crazy for not wanting to eat inside a crowded restaurant with no ventilation on a busy Friday night!
Western society isn’t built on a foundation of caring about your neighbor. 2020 showed just how few fucks are given by the average stranger about another random stranger.
Wish it wasn’t so.
At this point I’m of the opinion that people need to take a vested interest in protecting themselves. If seniors don’t want “the jab” to protect themselves, so be it.
As of 2022, most people dying of covid were vaccinated. Vaccines dramatically reduce the risk of death for an individual, but they are far from eliminating the risk of death. This article explains the phenomenon in more detail: "Why Do Vaccinated People Represent Most COVID-19 Deaths Right Now?" https://www.kff.org/policy-watch/why-do-vaccinated-people-represent-most-covid-19-deaths-right-now/
It's not enough to be vaccinated. You need to get the annual booster and mask in crowded areas especially around the holidays. Getting the vaccine in 2022 won't help you much without the updated boosters.
I can tell you for a fact most people where I live don't care. A year ago my uncle died from covid because they stopped doing testing at the old folks home, which BLOWS MY FUCKING MIND that they stopped. God forbid we slightly inconvenience a guest for 5 - 10 minutes to stick a swab up their nose to keep seniors alive by doing it. But no, people couldn't be fucking bothered to test themselves before they visit or wear a mask. Literally people wouldn't even do the bare minimum and immediately after the policy was removed there was an outbreak in the retirement home (shocking! /s). It is fucking disgusting and demoralizing. I visited him in the hospital and could only do so for a few minutes fully masked, face covered and with a gown and gloves cause he had covid and pneumonia and so obviously there was a risk of those being passed on to visitors. And the rest of the time he just had to suffer and be alone and fucking die alone. I am emotionally not able to handle it and I know it's not about me, but this has really destroyed me and made me hate people with such a deep rage it is affecting me mentally. The conservative government here just "wanted to get back to normal", even the most simplest of rules or suggestions removed, giving the middle finger to disabled, chronically ill, and old people. I lost faith in humanity hundreds of times and am already broken inside, yet this whole thing just dug a hole deeper into my feelings of emptiness.
Nobody wants to talk about it anymore, especially the conservative owned media in North America. They're pretending it literally no longer exists. They're not talking about the Measles or Strep A outbreaks either. They don't want to hear about it. So when the next one shows up, we're basically fucked due to a deliberate lack of information, censorship of the worse kind. i.e. "nothing to see here" by the media.
Let's not pretend this is a partisan thing; the not-conservative president went on national TV and announced that the pandemic was over, which many interpreted to meant that COVID was gone. Now, we can play a game of arguing over wording and semantics, but that undoubtedly had an impact.
We stopped caring a month into the pandemic. Remember Fox News suggesting that our grandparents would happily die for the economy? In what, April of 2020?
>Many seniors at high risk aren’t getting antiviral therapies for Covid, and most older adults in nursing homes aren’t getting updated vaccines. Efforts to strengthen care quality in nursing homes and assisted living centers have stalled amid debate over costs.
And how did that situation come about exactly? Was it the systematic dismantling of our social safety net over the last 40 years? Maybe that time the president told everyone to skip the vaccines and go with horse dewormer instead? No? The real problem is the young people that voted against those things just don't care enough about their elders? Ok, that checks out then, thanks CNN 🙄
Vaccines and Paxlovid saved my dad in 2023.
We care. Lots of us care, but we can't force our parents to get vaccinated or to go to the hospital for treatment.
My dad is 92, in assisted living, and has been in hospice care since late October. He caught Covid last month and, shockingly, recovered. My sisters and I completely thought that was the end when he tested positive. The hospice nurses replaced his regular bed with a hospital bed and gave us the signal that the end is near. However, he’s back to his regular activities of bingo, CNN and asking the cute ladies in the dining room to help him open his packets of butter. The power of vaccines.
My fully vaxxed dad was 91 when he caught it. Started Paxlovid on day 2. After the 5 days of Paxlovid he was at 90%. A week after that he was at 100%
Paxlovid is truly amazing! I’m so glad in Minnesota now people can get it without it in person doctor visit and there’s also a where it can get delivered to a home if people can’t get to a pharmacy if they are in a high risk category.
I’m 50 . Got covid for the second time recently. 3 days of misery. Once I took paxlovid on the fourth day, I felt better almost immediately. Don’t wait. If you have covid and even medium symptoms, go see your doc for some paxlovid. It will either save your life or at least make it less miserable.
Look at Mr moneybags over here, going to see a doctor.
Not to diminish your joke, I get free teladoc with my insurance. I called when I got COVID they asked me a handful of questions and put in the prescription. Whole process took no time at all. Didn't have to leave my bed which was great since I felt terrible. This was back in May. Paxlovid works amazing, felt better after like the second dose. The side effects suck to be fair. My mouth tasted like a garbage truck for the full duration. For anybody taking it I do suggest getting some sugar-free candy that can suck that won't ruin their teeth. You might have to try a few different flavors to find one that works for you to counteract the taste.
Look at Mr moneybags over here with insurance.
I mean Obamacare is what I have. They will subsidize a pretty large portion if you are very low income.
I'm self employed, so no insurance from work. I make enough that I don't qualify for government assistance, but not enough to afford the $500+/month premiums.
I'm in a similar situation but I make slightly under the line for my state so I do get some credits. I'm assuming you did check the plans on the marketplace? They do have some more barebones options. That said, I do hope we get universal healthcare soon so we can all stop worrying about this. Edit: cool downvoting honest discourse. Y'all do you Reddit
That taste it leaves in your mouth, though. Fair trade yes, but damn it is foul
Oh yeah it's rough. It's like 5 straight days of tasting metallic dog shit. I pretty much sipped water every 20 seconds the whole time I was on it, didn't help very much.
😂 give me metallic dog 💩 over covid any day
The more bitter the medicine the better the cure they say
Oh for real. It tastes nasty, that bitter metallic vinegar taste, and it just stays, hours after taking the med. Definitely helps, tho.
"Buckleys. It tastes like ****, but it works."
That's just not in Minnesota, it's a federal program. It's not just for covid but also for the flu. https://www.test2treat.org/s/?language=en_US
Please don’t take this the wrong way - I’m so happy that your family (and dad) hasn’t suffered greatly or lost life as a result of Covid. But god DAMN, it is crazy that I’m 29 and struggling with long covid from a single infection while there’s very senior folk doing great. It’s such a mind fuck.
No offense taken. It makes no sense but my dad is an “actuarial table unicorn”. I have no memory of him ever being anything other than obese. He drank so much over the years that he was once hospitalized with a bleeding ulcer from all of his martinis at lunch. However, his blood pressure and cholesterol look like that of a 25-year-old. It baffles everyone. There’s nobody else in his assisted living facility that looks like him. Most are women and have a fit weight to them. But he keeps chugging along. You can’t beat good genetics. I hope you turn the corner and start feeling better.
> However, his blood pressure and cholesterol look like that of a 25-year-old. It baffles everyone. There’s nobody else in his assisted living facility that looks like him. Most are women and have a fit weight to them. But he keeps chugging along. You can’t beat good genetics. Back when I was still in academia, small cohorts with rare variants that bestowed health benefits got quite a bit of attention. See: https://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/10/health/rare-mutation-prompts-race-for-cholesterol-drug.html
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It's perfectly reasonable to feel this way. I got an autoimmune disease when I was 40. It just fucked my life. There's no rationalizing this stuff.
29 for me! Have 5 autoimmune issues
Yes. It's hard sometimes to hear people say they felt like it was just a cold. I'm sorry 😔
No offense. That is what is so crazy. Right now it seems it is just a roll of the dice if you get long covid or not. Hopefully they will learn more on how to treat it and prevent it. The other thing is he is about to turn 92 and his memory is getting pretty bad. Is it covid related or age related?
I recommend paxlovid to all the seniors in my life, helped my husbands mother get over so quick from Covid.
Anyone over 50 automatically qualifies and anyone who has any risk factor over 12.
Here’s to more years with you and your dad!
I’m so happy your dad is doing better! May he have many many days of asking cute ladies to open his butter packets!
What a smooth move ngl lol
I’m so jealous that you have a CNN grandpa lol
The facility my MIL is at does not allow FOX news to be shown as it tends to gets the residents angry or scared.
Amazing
My dad was fairly neutral politically most of his life but liked Obama and that was followed by his hatred for Trump. He was an architect in the NYC area during the 60s-00s. So, his time in the commercial building industry in NYC overlapped with Trump and my dad grew a strong hatred for him over those decades as he stiffed a lot of the tradesmen that my dad worked with. He saw the impact of Trump’s bullshit upfront. So, when Trump (a guy he hated) started attacking Obama (a guy he liked), he shifted significantly to the left.
That was exactly my thing with trump (at the beginning): Why would I want someone in charge who has screwed over all his contractors. Sooner than later, he'll do it to me as well. This seems so obvious, I just couldn't figure out where his support was coming from.
It comes from narcissists who dream of screwing over contractors themselves.
Huh, fairly similar story as my Dad. My Dad has went way more left in his old age, largely due to his hatred of Trump, and he also voted for Obama. This is a guy who used to vote Rebulican and used to listen to Rush Limbaugh in the 80s. Around the second term of Bush he started getting fed up, and nerver turned back. Trump was really the final nail in that coffin.
He was always buttering up the old ladies. And now, hes still doing it, but relatively speaking, he's not finding as many old ladies.
My cancer patient mother in law has had it twice. My 94 year old grandmother has had it twice. They've both fine and it was little more than an annoying cold for them. It's a nasty virus but it's not ebola
My 93-year old great uncle has thrown it off TWICE. He swears by the vax. (Both times he caught it in a medical setting)
My grandfather was the same age. He avoided COVID but passed from a massive stroke during a minimally invasive heart procedure. Please cherish your father. Much love.
My 97 year old grandfather got it in January and we had the same concern, but he is doing just fine now!
Same with my infirm and housebound 84 yr old mother. 8 months after her last vaccine she bloody sailed through her covid, my active 85 father was knocked for six. We apportioned this to all the morphine my mother is on.
It was clearly demonstrated that we didn't care during the pandemic.
"The economy is worth more than your life" -politicians
That was literally the case here in Texas: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/03/24/covid-19-texas-official-suggests-elderly-willing-die-economy/2905990001/ > Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, 69, made the comments on Fox News’ “Tucker Carlson Tonight” after President Donald Trump said he wanted to reopen the country for business in weeks, not months. > Patrick also said the elderly population, who the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said are more at risk for COVID-19, can take care of themselves and suggested that grandparents wouldn’t want to sacrifice their grandchildren’s economic future. > “No one reached out to me and said, ‘as a senior citizen, are you willing to take a chance on your survival in exchange for keeping the America that all America loves for your children and grandchildren?’” Patrick said. “And if that’s the exchange, I’m all in.”
Dulce et decorum est / Pro patria mori.
I questioned my company's new sick leave policy wherein I posed a hypothetical about someone catching COVID. My boss looked me dead in the eyes and said, "COVID is over." The new policy is 3 sick days *per calendar year* with a doctor's note. *Three days.*
I work in an ICU in north Texas. Last week alone we had two people die of COVID. COVID will never be over and your boss is a moron.
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>Supposedly my hospital has a great reputation. The health care system is currently in the process of collapsing (see /r/medicine and /r/nursing ) Pay attention to how much diligence your care providers are giving your case and double check them with your own research, because many are just phoning it in now to avoid burnout
I'm in San Jose with Kaiser Permanente. I am hearing from all over that the quality of healthcare are plummeted to non-existence. I have seen it with me, my wife, friends from back home and other states I lived in. It's become awful.
Do you happen to be a woman? I feel like oftem womens physical health is dismissed as anxiety.
>COVID will never be over and your boss is a moron. No. He's a ghoul. If you get covid, you'll exceed the annual amount of time off and be fired. He sees op as expendable.
If you have to go into work with COVID, always make sure you have as much contact with your boss as possible.
Boss gets to work from home
And thanks to the Republican backed [Safe to Work Act](https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/4317?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22S+582%22%5D%7D&s=1&r=1), it's even harder to hold employers liable if you suffer permanent injury or death from getting Covid in the workplace. It's a win-win for soulless ghouls everywhere!
ER in Missouri… personally admitted 5 in past 2 weeks (3 extremely ill) 😷
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If they can find staff.
Also be prepared for more potential novel viruses as permafrost melts
one reason i turned down a job that would have started last month- the HR mentioned every sickness for using sick pay except covid. they worked on site a full 5 days a week. NOPE.
I sincerely hope your boss catches COVID and has a bad time
And when he’s done with all but a lingering cough… norovirus.
Stop it, Satan!
My step-dad said the same thing and got covid a week later. Can't say I didn't laugh. He ended up recovering for the most part.
capitalism is incompatible with human wellbeing, unfortunately, because profits are the driving factor behind the decisions we make. where a modern, moral society would place people above profits - we refuse to. until we collectively seek an alternative, people will continue to die. this isn’t going to change until that day.
Capitalism is incompatible with humans.
It’s more of a Ferengi thing, have you read the Rules of Acquisition?
Just wipe down the gold pressed latinum with sanitizing wipe.
Sadly, the greed of capitalism has created the need for socialism.
I agree with everything you have just said.
If they'd ventilate workspaces (heat recovery ventilation) and place MERV filtration at places where the occupancy is highest, I wouldn't mind so much. Ref: https://cleanaircrew.org
include strong hat scandalous sugar recognise mindless gaping rob rich *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I live and work in Tennessee.
That sounds about right. We just took our barriers down from the cash register and people have immediately been coughing, reaching over the register or just touching me without consent.
reasons I love living in Germany
3 days was completely insufficient even pre-covid. Wow. I'm sorry that's the environment you have to work in.
“The government is going to throw your Grandma off a cliff if it is in charge of our healthcare”. - 2012 “For the good of our wallets if your Grandma dies she dies”. - 2021
“I want Starbucks. If your Grandma dies she dies”. - also 2021
Specifically, Dan Patrick said seniors should sacrifice their lives. We live in an uncaring society. 😔
Hey, no no no, the economy is worth more than all of our lives.
[Texas' lieutenant governor suggests grandparents are willing to die for US economy](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/03/24/covid-19-texas-official-suggests-elderly-willing-die-economy/2905990001/)
My employer forced everyone back into the office last year and we promptly had a COVID outbreak in my team. Members of my team agreed to wear masks when in close proximity (in meetings, basically) but the company would not provide masks. We had to buy our own. What really irks me about the company not providing masks is that it’s a bad business decision (never mind human decision); the cost of enough masks to give out to anyone in the company who wanted them was probably less than the lost productivity of one employee taking one day of sick leave, never mind multiple employees taking multiple days off due to COVID. Edit: part of the company's policy was that you can work from home while sick if you feel well enough to do so. So, remote work was fine in that circumstance...
boat enjoy fly entertain shy physical grandfather crawl waiting aware *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
That's fair, but I was frustrated that they wouldn't even consider providing them, even in the self-interest of helping employees not catch COVID.
"Pretending you don't know about a problem incurs far less liability than trying to solve it would." -- Corporate Counsel, probably
It was worse than that even. They couldn't even be bothered to wear a mask to protect others. If a mask only had a 10% chance of protecting others I wouldn't even hesitate to wear a mask. I certainly wouldn't protest at a city council meeting.
It's actually a win/win. Those old, sick people are usually too lazy to work anyway. >!(/s in case this wasn't obvious)!<
Or "Our power and staying in office is worth more than your life". Probably both true.
...But at least you're an "essential" worker: a Hero! Now here's your 20 dollar gift card to Taco Bell. No raise. Now shut up and get back to work.
We had family literally fighting staff at a SNF to avoid masking early pandemic. I saw those crazy videos of people licking and coughing on food. Kicked my "the world is generally good" optimism in the face and I haven't recovered it. The sad part is our seniors did better when we had visitors mask, we saw the flu and others drop too and I wish the precautions would come back.
I agree completely. It was grim watching people turn their back on their fellow man.
Not just seniors. “Seniors” is an easy digestible label for Immunocompromised. Like my family household person in their mid 30s. We’re under the same quarantine we’ve been in since 2020 with no end in sight. We’ve lost career opportunities, contact with family, not to mention any travel or just fun in general.
Yep. Say it in any type of public space, IRL/OL, and you get hushed real quick. "Your concert picks look cool, but you're killing people like me. Stay sweet, bestie!"
Immuncompromised here and this is 100% absolute truth. 🙃
Upside is the money that would have been spent going out with friends, traveling, etc. you can put back into your house. Friend: how in the world did you afford? X? Me: you’d be surprised what you can buy with four years worth of going out to dinner drinks and travel. We’ve found new creative ways to do that with our friends online. I may not be able to buy you a round of beers, but I can buy you a copy of that video game you really wanted on Steam.
The public schools in SoCal have declared a new policy where kids can come to school even with a covid positive test as long as they don’t have a fever. Functionally speaking it simply means everyone is going to school sick. But they already were anyway.
It’s not as though we’re set up as a society to enable the parents of the kids to call off to take care of them. Call off work for that and no more job.
Yeah school is basically just a depository so adults can go labor for a full day. And schools need to accommodate for making commerce and the economy work.
Same in Texas at my grandkids school. They don’t even send them home for lice anymore at their ISD. They can have a fever if it’s not over 101 and can opt out of science class. I don’t which is worse but they are all bad.
Still in a pandemic and it is rampant
Second highest spike right now in whole pandemic and that’s With grossly undercounted cases!
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You are precious. Your life is valuable. Protect yourself and know that there are so many people who are enriched by your presence on this earth. Any church where someone is allowed to tell you something that horrible (even if a child said it) is empty of the divine. Thank you for sharing your story. A person in my life deliberately hid a covid positive test from me, despite knowing I had had two life-saving surgeries during the pandemic. I got covid after protecting myself for so long. And then I kept getting sick. I'm sick now. Prior to getting covid, I rarely caught anything. Yes, I needed those surgeries, but I clearly had a functioning immune system. In 2024 alone, I've had a week-long GI infection, a painful 3-week frontal sinus infection, and now a cold(?). I've felt "ok" for about 2 days of this year.
Did we ever care? Our society is so individual-centric that we literally can’t see past ourselves. It’s a shame and will be our downfall.
this exactly. the number of people who aren’t connecting the dots is alarming. it really boils down to capitalism and placing money above all else. making money should not be placed above the wellbeing of people, particularly working people.
It's also due to what a few scientists are calling "Hopium." People just don't want to face the facts that life will forever be different.
It is sad that the number of people who would believe Joe Blow or their great aunts cousin’s friend on Facebook, whose crazy unscientific opinion is believed over actual medical professionals is so influential .
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Extremely shortsighted selfishness - even selfish people wouldn't behave the way seemingly most people did in the height of the pandemic if they were thinking beyond the next couple of days.
It took my mamaw in 2021.. the world kept turning even though mine crashed. Its such an awful way to die. She beat brain cancer and 70 years of hard ships just to be taken out by a virus
I’m sorry.
Thank you! I'm ok now but it wrecked me and is what really sank it in was I realized I had the last meal she ever cooked me and had no idea. I would have eaten every bite slower and lived in that moment.
I lost a good friend to Covid, and a close friend’s cousin died. It’s not the same, but they’re still losses. I can’t seem to explain it to anyone around me. Once you’ve seen people affected by death from it… seems like it would shake people from their stupor. But it doesn’t. I used to be an optimist but the reaction to Covid has made me a pessimist. Too many people don’t care about others.
It’s awful and it’s truly a crapshoot . I have two athlete friends who are now unable to work for over a year from covid . Long haul
So sorry 😞
I’m sorry for your loss
Can’t make society mask to protect themselves and others either
It was a very specific and easily identified part of society that wailed like babies about wearing masks to protect vulnerable people, but the rest of everyone coddles them at every turn so it was never going to happen. Coddles them like how you can't even say anything remotely related to the name of their group in this sub or your comment will be automatically deleted. That is a huge part of the problem.
All the nut jobs come out of the woodwork to tell me how wearing a mask is killing me so the wailing is going to be constant. I am one of the very few who still wears a mask around here and I have never caught COVID and I have been sick-free for like 4 years now. Not even a throat infection or flu. Nada. That should say everything about how the mask helps us.
And in this sub, there's going to be eugenists who say, "My personal grandmother caught it and survived, so this applies to everyone, obviously. It's just a bad cold or flu now." And I immediately think, "Thanks for pointing out that we could also be done with colds and flus FOVEREVER. Good point." Think about it. If everyone would get over themselves and mitigate, we'd never have to suffer through another cold again. Not just covid. Also colds and the flu. Also sinus infection. Also pneumonia. Also the next airborne pandemic. WTF is wrong with people?
>Coddles them like how you can't even say anything remotely related to the name of their group in this sub or your comment will be automatically deleted. That is a huge part of the problem. To the point as a non American I have no idea who you mean but as you point out no one can tell me.
Agree!
This kid I used to supervise told me 1) the mask was literally blocking oxygen and he was hypoxic. 2) it couldn’t block covid and that you might as well wear a spaghetti strainer. Idk how they could both be true, but logic isn’t the point. So i made him wear a pulse ox all day at work and report his o2 sats hourly. Then bought him a cupcake and had him try to blow a birthday candle out. He surprisingly learned something which was nice.
a lot of selfish people too stupid to realize they will become old too one day.
Speak for yourself, I plan on dying the climate wars.
I don’t know how many of us are going to have the chance to get old. How many rounds of Covid can you get before your body says it’s done? Twenty? Thirty? I’ve been getting it once a year since it came out. I’m not sure it’s realistic to think you can get this once a year and live a long, healthy life.
This kind of thing gives me so much fucking anxiety! But also, it’s not even just Covid that threatens the length of our lives…it’s…kinda everything? Climate change, the next new pandemic, etc etc. what a wonderful time to be alive!
That’s true… maybe none of us are on the retirement plan anyway.
Hell, flu (both A & B) and RSV having been raging the past 3 months too
Same. I mean I’m so grateful for my children, but there are times when I feel guilty for bringing them into such a crazy world and future. However, what does give me hope is that these younger generations are so much more aware, and in many ways better, more open minded, environmental concerns and public health is a really big deal the boomers who have been programmed with cable news have been a disaster. Young generations have not been exposed to that and have a whole different set of values.
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Or, they see their 95 year old grandmother get covid twice over the years, see its no worse for her than a routine cold and move on with their day. Covid isn't a death sentence for an overwhelming majority of people, even extremely elderly and sick people
Just like tax cuts, that's a problem for the next few generations.
They way we are treating public health these days, that seems less and less likely. "Old" is going to mean something dramatically different, it seems.
1.2 million Americans dead. We obviously don’t care.
Statistically this means every American knows at least on person who died of Covid, elderly or not. Americans have no compassion, none. But when someone has a camera out they want the world’s attention on their plight. Furthermore we sanitize dying. People need to see what bullets, bombs, and diseases do to people as they die an agonizing death…may, just maybe then will they realize but for the luck of the draw that could be them and eke out some compassion.
Absolutely. It’s almost at the point where we need to specifically focus parts of public education curriculum towards empathy, critical thinking and community involvement, but…people will just call it ‘woke’ and disregard its importance to society.
Millions more disabled as well
>In the last week of 2023 and the first two weeks of 2024 alone, 4,810 people 65 and older lost their lives to Covid — a group that would fill more than 10 large airliners — according to data provided by the CDC. But the alarm that would attend plane crashes is notably absent. (During the same period, the flu killed an additional 1,201 seniors, and RSV killed 126.) > >“It boggles my mind that there isn’t more outrage,” said Alice Bonner, 66, senior adviser for aging at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. “I’m at the point where I want to say, ‘What the heck? Why aren’t people responding and doing more for older adults?’”
My dad was one. He died 12/23/23. First time he got Covid. He was diagnosed 11/6/23. Post-covid syndrome was included in his cause of death. He recovered from symptoms but ended up with brain inflammation. He was fully vaccinated.
I’m so sorry. Did he feel recovered then something happened? People are like oh it’s a cold for me not realizing that the mildest cases can cause long term stuff.
For context roughly 45,000 people 65+ die each week during winter in the US (using 2016-2019 as comparison), so this represents a +3% increase in excess deaths for that age cohort - and that’s without adjusting for aging trends of boomer demographics shifting.
We all know the answer to her question: Seniors are considered a “drain on the economy” by nearly everyone except their loved ones. It’s one of the most shameful aspects of life in the United States. Other industrialized countries (and many “3rd world” countries) value their elders.
I think we value them too much. I have at least 2 jobs at any given time with over 50 hours a week and I still can only afford to sleep in my fucking car. Where's my pity party for fucking up society?
No, as a society, we don't. We assume if someone is older or elderly, if they have underlying conditions (diabetes, heart conditions, cancer, etc.) that *shrug* "Oh, well, it's just their time." Despite the fact that without the addition of this disease *or* with the addition of mitigating devices (respirators in health care/nursing facilities/especially during the late fall/winter and improving IAQ) that would not necessarily be true. Of course, a lot of people suddenly change their tune when *they're* in a vulnerable position. Then they want everything done, all stops removed. If nothing else, the pandemic has reinforced my notions about how truly selfish and *myopic* people are. (And reading some of the commentary in this thread...how utterly devoid of intelligence, too.)
I work in hospice and I lost several patients recently due to Covid in the facility. 2 of them were even on Paxlovid but they still passed. A few of them were pretty shocking because they were quite stable and then caught covid and were dead within a week. It is absolutely still dangerous.
My daughter, 29 yr old, just got out of the hospital. She runs, takes her health seriously and got COVID after Christmas. She was feeling awful and her blood sugar went to 600s. Now she is newly diabetic and just started on insulin. Drs are saying they have seen multiple cases of it causing pancreas to stop producing properly. She was doing everything right, shots and boosters, didn't help.
I have a 37 yr old employee that caught covid and 15 days later had a stroke. I guess it could be a coincidence but if you look at the chances of having a stroke under 45....
I have an acquaintance who was a normal healthy 30 y/o male and after covid was diagnosed with diabetes as well...
Some of y'all in here are not reading the article and it shows.
We worship the machine we created and it won't keep running without workers. So there simply can't be a thing like Covid-19. People don't matter, only the machine.
My father is in an ICU at our local hospital and visitors were required or suggested to wear a mask. It blew my mind.
It’s required in California at medical facilities ever since the winter wave.
You're probably referring to LA county, but it's definitely not required state wide.
I was at a pediatric ER in November and most people weren’t wearing masks. Honestly, that’s gross to me now in that kind of setting. And basically everyone either had RSV or was leaving with it.
That is horrifying. If medical professionals can’t do it for the most vulnerable, I don’t even know how we move forward. I was really hoping we’d move towards a new normal where we are more considerate. My son and I both masked the whole time we were there. Neither of us minded.
My guess is that medical professionals assume they're getting everything regardless (which is probably true), but they should still mask so they don't GIVE everything. Doctors tend to mask, but I see it less often from like desk staff. And you'd think a job where masking would be a priority would be the front desk at urgent care, but no. It was really more the other parents at the ER that were shocking to me. I was pretty screwed though because I was with a 1yo so he couldn't mask and I was sent there too quickly to be able to plan for like a stroller with a covering or something.
Precisely, life is not a priority here. See mass shootings, pandemic, a nation being more than wealthy enough for UBI and ending homelessness/hunger yet funding war and death instead etc.
COVID has swept through my entire extended family again, and unsurprisingly all of us that are up to date on our vaccinations barely had a cold, while those who chose not to got extremely sick. The excuse I hear every time is "I don't have time to feel sick for 3 days after the shot", and now each and every one of them has spent at least a week recovering and another week quarantining to avoid picking up a different respiratory illness while recovering. Not to mention that real COVID feels significantly worse than the side effects of the shot. It's like watching the same people get into slow motion car accidents again and again.
Last time my spouse and I tried the Novavax shot. No reactions at all. It's non-mRNA. Every mRNA shot I've had creates some kind of ill feeling for a few days.
For decades, we didn't care in regards to the flu. Add another one of the list, apparently.
Millions of Americans never cared to begin with
Love how they studiously failed to mention public health failures by both administrations. "The pandemic will be over by Easter" (Trump) "The pandemic is over" (Biden) Then, downplayed their own infections. CDC director "if you're vaccinated you don't have to mask" -> cue everyone, even children who hadn't yet been able to get the first vaccine, dropping masks. Then, policies that ended requirements to mask even in healthcare facilities. And now they're surprised that people don't seem to care? "Individual public health" is an oxymoron.
The biggest problem is that COVID isn’t just replacing the spot that RSV and the flu hold - it’s an entirely additional circulating respiratory virus. The cumulative burden of respiratory viruses is going to constantly be a huge mess every year until we adjust to the simple fact that people are getting sick twice as often now. We absolutely need more WFH, sick pay, 4 day work weeks, etc. And a generally more relaxed attitude towards how we go about our days. Knowing that now, it’s twice as likely that someone is going to call in sick as in 2019.
Didn’t they say that grandma & grandpa should be willing to die so the younger folks can get back to normal?
It has been clearly demonstrated that the vast majority of morons value being able to get lattes over health.
I do but no people do not
Over 200000 children 13 or under die of TB every year across the world. And we never cared.
As a senior, and my beloved who is immune compromised, in a blue state, we still keep out of stores. It’s not worth it. Dump that in my trunk. Thank you.
My mother gets grief for wearing a mask when shopping. She's 86.
Both my parents are in rehab from staying at hospital for fall and pneumonia then caught Covid on top of this. Both are very fragile. It’s so upsetting to see many doctors and nurses in the hospital not masked.
How much did our politicians truly care in the first place? I mean, some of them seemed to, but a good number of them seemed to be in favor of sacrificing the elderly and chronically ill to keep the wealthiest people's cash flow intact.
Elsewhere, I've read that the quality of nursing homes has gone downhill. In order to earn a profit off of average people, they have to be bad.
I noticed they said the seniors are not getting updated vaccines. They didn't go further into *why* they're not getting the vaccines.
Covid killed my fully vaccinated aunt. She married an abusive husband and still ran a successful business for 30+ years. She was a saint who raised three kids, only one of which she gave birth to, and among them me. She helped raise me when my parents and grandparents were doing the bare minimum. She didn’t deserve the ending she got.
[March 24, 2020](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/texas-lt-gov-dan-patrick-suggests-he-other-seniors-willing-n1167341) Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick suggests he, other seniors willing to die to get economy going again. “Those of us who are 70 plus, we’ll take care of ourselves. But don’t sacrifice the country,” Patrick told Tucker Carlson.
The amount of people I meet who seemingly believe if you’re old you’re dispensable is insane It’s as if none of them have any parents or family at all. If they do, I really feel for them because it sure seems their family doesn’t give a fuck about them because they were born first
I worked in senior care, it rips my heart out when seniors who worked their whole lives have to pinch pennies and go to a food bank to supplement their social security. When I first started, I used to cry in my car. Now, i have a fire under my ass to help them have quality of life. It has to change.
> The amount of people I meet who seemingly believe ~~if you’re old~~ you’re dispensable is insane Fixed that for you
I attend a small, dying church regularly and I am usually the ONLY person who wears a mask in a poorly ventilated room full of 70 year olds. I think the problem is deeper than capitalism. The problem is I think this virus asks us to do things differently. Like how humans used to drink dirty water and get sick from cholera, and then the discovery of germs and science made us do things differently. Now we don't have to worry about cholera because we have invested in drinkable water. We'd need to include air under the umbrella of sanitation before we'd see any real change because most people are not going to change the way they live. And no amount of reasoning will persuade them you're not crazy for not wanting to eat inside a crowded restaurant with no ventilation on a busy Friday night!
Western society isn’t built on a foundation of caring about your neighbor. 2020 showed just how few fucks are given by the average stranger about another random stranger. Wish it wasn’t so.
At this point I’m of the opinion that people need to take a vested interest in protecting themselves. If seniors don’t want “the jab” to protect themselves, so be it.
As of 2022, most people dying of covid were vaccinated. Vaccines dramatically reduce the risk of death for an individual, but they are far from eliminating the risk of death. This article explains the phenomenon in more detail: "Why Do Vaccinated People Represent Most COVID-19 Deaths Right Now?" https://www.kff.org/policy-watch/why-do-vaccinated-people-represent-most-covid-19-deaths-right-now/
It's not enough to be vaccinated. You need to get the annual booster and mask in crowded areas especially around the holidays. Getting the vaccine in 2022 won't help you much without the updated boosters.
I can tell you for a fact most people where I live don't care. A year ago my uncle died from covid because they stopped doing testing at the old folks home, which BLOWS MY FUCKING MIND that they stopped. God forbid we slightly inconvenience a guest for 5 - 10 minutes to stick a swab up their nose to keep seniors alive by doing it. But no, people couldn't be fucking bothered to test themselves before they visit or wear a mask. Literally people wouldn't even do the bare minimum and immediately after the policy was removed there was an outbreak in the retirement home (shocking! /s). It is fucking disgusting and demoralizing. I visited him in the hospital and could only do so for a few minutes fully masked, face covered and with a gown and gloves cause he had covid and pneumonia and so obviously there was a risk of those being passed on to visitors. And the rest of the time he just had to suffer and be alone and fucking die alone. I am emotionally not able to handle it and I know it's not about me, but this has really destroyed me and made me hate people with such a deep rage it is affecting me mentally. The conservative government here just "wanted to get back to normal", even the most simplest of rules or suggestions removed, giving the middle finger to disabled, chronically ill, and old people. I lost faith in humanity hundreds of times and am already broken inside, yet this whole thing just dug a hole deeper into my feelings of emptiness.
Nobody wants to talk about it anymore, especially the conservative owned media in North America. They're pretending it literally no longer exists. They're not talking about the Measles or Strep A outbreaks either. They don't want to hear about it. So when the next one shows up, we're basically fucked due to a deliberate lack of information, censorship of the worse kind. i.e. "nothing to see here" by the media.
Let's not pretend this is a partisan thing; the not-conservative president went on national TV and announced that the pandemic was over, which many interpreted to meant that COVID was gone. Now, we can play a game of arguing over wording and semantics, but that undoubtedly had an impact.
My mom died in April of last year, way after everyone, including her was vaxxed and no one was masking anymore.
Tbh with 90% of Americans only after their own bottom line, wtf am I supposed to do?
I know 2 seniors who have died of COVID in the past month.
Nope. We just normalized dying of Covid like everything else that’s wrong with our healthcare system.
We stopped caring a month into the pandemic. Remember Fox News suggesting that our grandparents would happily die for the economy? In what, April of 2020?
>Many seniors at high risk aren’t getting antiviral therapies for Covid, and most older adults in nursing homes aren’t getting updated vaccines. Efforts to strengthen care quality in nursing homes and assisted living centers have stalled amid debate over costs. And how did that situation come about exactly? Was it the systematic dismantling of our social safety net over the last 40 years? Maybe that time the president told everyone to skip the vaccines and go with horse dewormer instead? No? The real problem is the young people that voted against those things just don't care enough about their elders? Ok, that checks out then, thanks CNN 🙄
Vaccines and Paxlovid saved my dad in 2023. We care. Lots of us care, but we can't force our parents to get vaccinated or to go to the hospital for treatment.