It Shouldn't Be This Bad

 

AP Photo Josh Reynolds

COVID's Decline

It's really good news. Better days are ahead. Though impossible to predict, the trends are, for the moment, downward.

We Trail The Rest

Refusal of the vaccine is holding us back. According to The Morning from the New York Times,

Despite all the encouraging news, one shadow still hangs over the U.S.: The pandemic does not need to be nearly as bad it is.

About 1,500 Americans have died of Covid every day over the past week. For older age groups, the virus remains a leading cause of death. And the main reason is that millions of Americans have chosen to remain unvaccinated. Many of them are older and have underlying medical conditions, leaving them vulnerable to severe versions of Covid.

For older people, the effects of vaccination are profound. In late August, near the height of the Delta wave, 24 out of every 10,000 unvaccinated Americans 65 and above were hospitalized with Covid symptoms, according to the C.D.C. Among fully vaccinated Americans 65 and above, the number was 1.5 per 10,000.

Even so, many Americans are saying no to a shot. Among affluent countries, the U.S. is one of the least vaccinated, trailing Canada, Australia, Japan, South Korea, Britain, France, Germany, Italy and others. Less vaccination means more death.

Vaccine Opposition

Why some people don't want a Covid-19 vaccine

To find out more about vaccine hesitancy, I went to a trusted news source, The BBC, instead of Social Media sources. They came up with the 5 C's. Their report cautions against lumping the majority of those with reservations with the extreme views of the fringe elements within the anti-vaxxers. 

"They're very vocal, and they have a strong presence offline and online," says Mohammad Razai at the Population Health Research Institute, St George's, University of London, who has written about the various psychological and social factors that can influence people's decision-making around vaccines. "But they’re a very small minority."

According to the article, scientists began studying vaccine hesitancy long before COVID-19 was first identified in Wuhan in December 2019. They have explored various models which attempt to capture the differences in people's health behavior. One of the most promising is known as the 5Cs model, which considers the following psychological factors:

Confidence: the person's trust in the vaccines efficacy and safety, the health services offering them, and the policy makers deciding on their rollout

Complacency: whether or not the person considers the disease itself to be a serious risk to their health

Calculation: the individual's engagement in extensive information searching to weigh up the costs and benefits

Constraints (or convenience): how easy it is for the person in question to access the vaccine

Collective responsibility: the willingness to protect others from infection, through one's own vaccination

Dialog

There are some who will never be convinced. There are others who can be through dialog. A mass message, a once size fits all marketing approach will not change the minds of those who are hesitant.

I saw a picture of a worker at the Bath Iron Works in Maine. He is among a small minority there refusing the mandate. His opposition is fueled by his politics. The sign reads, "Freedom of choice or civil war. You choose." I'm guessing this worker will never be convinced. The mantra of imminent civil war is being perpetrated by right wing extremists. His views are fueled by his extremism.

Vaccine mandate creates conflict with defiant workers

Facts matter. That's where journalism come in. The dialog needs to be informed by factual information. I've engaged in conversation with people who insist on swaying the conversation with falsehoods and misinterpretations. While I listened, I made clear my stance, and that the stance was based on evidence. I wasn't nasty, just insistent.

 

Rational Thought Wins in California

Rational Thought Worked, This Time

According to the NY Times this morning, Governor Newsom's approach to vaccinations and COVID-19 restrictions turned out to be his strength. His approach to the virus was the reason for the recall to begin with. His opponents were loud and crude, bordering on irrational. But the word got out there that his approach based on science and reasonable thought saved his governorship.

"But Newsom’s overall approach to the pandemic helped save him."

It aligned very closely with what public-health experts were urging, including the mandates for indoor masks and vaccinations, notes Soumya Karlamangla, a Times reporter based in Los Angeles. Initially, those measures hurt Newsom’s popularity, because they were cumbersome and did not seem to be making much difference. In the spring, California’s case numbers were not so different from those in Florida or Texas.

“It feels a little like he’s the perfect example of the conundrum public health officials often face,” Soumya says. “How do you get people to do something before they can see the risk is there?”

More recently, the connection has become clearer. Vaccination rates have risen high enough in much of California — and the Delta variant is contagious enough among the unvaccinated — that the state now looks very different from much of the Southeast and Mountain West, where hundreds of people are dying each day and hospitals are running out of room.

In California, COVID caseloads and hospitalizations, which were already well below the national average, have been falling for about two weeks. “Panic levels feel much lower than they did even a month ago,” Soumya says."  NY Times

Only One Battle

Attacks on rationality and truth are not over. A lie on the internet spreads so rapidly, it is hard to counter the forces behind it. The radical fringes in this country understand this all too well. So do the Russians. 

I saw a US Senator on PBS NewsHour repeat falsehoods and distortions over and over last night, while dodging substantive questions. It makes me wonder why he wasn't called out. If, as a journalist, you think you shouldn't have to challenge responses like his because it's just your job to present the interview, please rethink your stance, or find a different line of work.

Your COVID politics can be lethal

So then, putting away falsehood, let all of us speak the truth to our neighbors, for we are members of one another. - Ephesians 4:25

 It Makes No Sense

We have a raging pandemic. Now is the time to put political differences aside for the health and well-being of everyone. But not if you've sipped the Kool-Aid of Trump's Republican Party. Loyalty to the Trump line is of paramount importance to these people. And...The needs of the individual trump all needs, even if such assertions are against their best interests. 

I didn't have to go back too far to find precedent for the desire to die of COVID for a political cause.

One of the key takeaways from the 2016 election was the frustration of a widening group of lower middle income white Americans. Trump's message was particularly appealing to this group. There is a growing unease as the middle class is excluded as more wealth is concentrated in the upper caste. The stress is having a negative effect. Life span expectancy has dropped two years for white males.

In the book Caste, written by Isabel Wilkerson, asserts the widening gap is causing an increasing group of disaffected Americans. 

From the book: 

"Exclusion cost lives, up and down the hierarchy. The physician Jonathan M. Metzel, who has conducted research into the health of disaffected whites in middle America, has measured the life and death consequences of state decisions to withhold benefits seen as helping undeserving minority groups. In the state of Tennessee he found restrictive health policies may haver cost the lives of almost 4,600 African-Americans between 2011 and 2015, but also cost the lives of as many as 12,000 white Tennesseans, more than double the loss sustained by black residents."

"In his book, Dying of Whiteness, Metzel told of the case of a forty-one-year-old white taxi driver who was suffering from an inflamed liver. His life obviously threatened. Because the Tennessee legislature had neither taken up the Affordable Care Act nor expanded Medicaid coverage, the man was unable to get the expensive, lifesaving treatment that would have been available to him had he lived across the border in Kentucky. As he approached death, he stood by the conviction that he did not want the government involved."

"No way I want my tax dollars paying for Mexicans or welfare queens, he told Metzel." Ain't no way I would ever support Obamacare or sign up for it. I would rather die."

"And sadly, so he would." 

We see the same sad consequences playing out in red states today. Refusal to wear mask, refusal to keep social distancing, and refusal to get the vaccine. The Delta Variant is making the unvaccinated very ill. Yet, so many are sticking by their decision to refuse being vaccinated. A decision reinforced by misinformation fired by social media posts and conservative 'news' outlets. The argument might be something like, "If they make us take the vaccine, they'll be coming for our guns next!" 

Even Mitch McConnell is alarmed. He urging his constituencies to get the vaccine or risk shutting everything down again. Missing from this quote is mention of needless suffering , and needless death. I don't think they're listening.

The nation as it is currently constituted has never dealt with a yesterday or tomorrow where we were radically honest, generous, and tender with each other. - Kiese Laymon, Heavy (2018)

COVID in College

 Higher Ed Super Spreader

The virus is not confined to campus. According to statistics provided by the NYTimes, the rate of deadly cases has doubled in college towns. The numbers are increasing the most among the adults who live and work in the community. The students are spreading the disease beyond campus at an alarming rate.

"Some hoped a spike in coronavirus infections on college campuses this fall would be limited to students, for whom the risks are minimal. The death rate in college towns like East Lansing, Mich., above, paints a different picture.

Since the end of August, deaths from the coronavirus have doubled in counties with large college student populations, compared with a 58 percent increase in the rest of the nation, a Times analysis found. Few of the victims were college students, but rather older people and others living and working in the community.

Since the pandemic began, a Times survey has identified more than 397,000 infections at more than 1,800 colleges and universities. At least 6,629 of those reported cases are people in college sports. But the true number is most likely higher."

COVID Testing and Politics

 

Partisan Politics May Be Killing Us

There are three main reasons why we don't have easily accessible rapid testing.  

The first is out of abundant caution. The second and third have nothing to do with caution. They are about ideology. That ideology is putting all of us at risk.  Of course, the Trump administration is focused on overturning a free and fair election, instead of the health and well-being of Americans.

Why isn’t the U.S. doing more testing? There are three reasons.

1. The F.D.A. has been slow to grant approval for new tests. 
2. The Trump administration has been slow to spend the money that Congress has allocated for testing. 
3. And Congress may need to allocate more money; mass testing could cost a few billion dollars a month — still a small fraction of the cost of recent proposed virus bills.

-NYTimes

Three Observations

1. The Trump administration is focused on subverting a free and fair election, instead of the health and well-being of Americans.
2. Conservatives are more concerned about the bottom line than people's lives. 
3. A Little leadership would be nice. Set the ideology aside and do what is best.

Follow the Science

Testing will remain important going forward, Yes, we are on the verge of several vaccines, but we are months away from getting anything close to full coverage.

Dr. Fauci has spoken several times about the importance of testing. 

Importance of testing: 

Testing is the first step for contact tracing -- a tried and true public health approach that involves identifying cases quickly, isolating and treating those people, identifying their contacts and testing them to see if they need to be isolated or quarantined.

“But deep down perhaps I should have been much more vocal about saying we have really, absolutely, got to do that,’” Fauci said. “I saw that it went nowhere and maybe I should have kept pushing the envelope on that.”

Testing is important because otherwise cases spread silently, Fauci noted. “What is going on now that you don’t recognize becomes a case a few weeks later,” he said.

“That becomes a hospitalization a few weeks later. That becomes intensive care a few days later. That becomes death a few weeks later.”

Fauci said he was hesitant to talk about his regrets for fear his statements would be taken out of context as sound-bites. - Associated Press

There were over 218,000 new cases in the US on December 9th, and over 3,000 deaths according to Johns Hopkins University, 

Lacking leadership = lost opportunity.

 

Summer is ending with a lost opportunity. From the NY Times

The U.S. is averaging about 40,000 coronavirus cases a day, down from a startling peak in late July, but nearly twice the level at summer’s start, according to a Times database. Above, a testing site in Los Angeles this weekend.

The failure to control the virus deepens the dangers heading into fall: the start of the school year, flu season and cooler temperatures that will drive more people indoors.

Knowledge in The Time of #COVID-19

Check Your Sources

Ben Bradlee said, “As long as a journalist tells the truth, in conscience and fairness, it is not their job to worry about consequences. The truth is never as dangerous as a lie in the long run. I truly believe the truth sets people free."

He also said, "Everybody who talks to a newspaper has a motive. That's just a given. And good reporters always, repeat always, probe to find out what that motive is."

For journalists in public media  there needs to be an understanding that your audience has a thirst for knowledge. Besides, the echo chambers of the partisans have no place in a healthy democracy or in journalism.

The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, for the ears of the wise seek it out.
- Proverbs 18:15 (NIV)

In times of profound change, the learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.
- Eric Hoffer

Here's the point. We should constantly be seeking answers. The facts, as we know them, are not static.

Scientists search for answers based on a hypothesis, then try to prove or disprove the hypothesis. Once they reach a conclusion, they will likely come up with 10 more questions. As more is uncovered, more questions arise. Even the conclusions are not set in stone as the world in which the discoveries were made changes. 

What brought me here was watching the president react to some straightforward questions at his press conference yesterday. Because the questions seemed to challenge his talking points, he became angry and walked away. It wasn't the first time. It won't be the last.

Keep Questioning - Keep Searching

COVID-19 and Public Radio

COVID-19 means we must rethink your marketing strategy in radio. (Public radio too)

-Live and local needs to be more than a slogan. It’s the lifeblood of the industry. Radio needs to recapture its hometown zeitgeist – not just during the pandemic but 24/7/365. And it starts with developing, embracing, and empowering its talent.

-Radio sounds better with fewer commercials. Let’s keep it that way. For public radio this means less clutter.

-Stop selling just the terrestrial audience. The audience is spending less time in the car. Think apps, smart speakers and laptops.

-Digital shouldn't be devalued. Think total reach.

For more on this, click the link below to read a blog from Jacobs Media on rethinking your marketing strategy. Think of COVID-19 as an opportunity

#publicradio #publicmedia #localradio

Turning Lemons into Lemonade

#COVID-19 what is the acceptable death rate?

Let's open up and see what happens.

Some Republicans and right wing media pundits are talking about acceptable death rates from COVID-19 when talking about opening up the economy. They compare the COVID-19 numbers to the number of deaths and injuries due to automobile collisions.

3 million people in the U.S. are injured every year in car accidents.

More than 38,000 people die every year in crashes on U.S. roadways.

In a little over a month there have been over 712,000 confirmed cases and almost 33,000 deaths in the US.

These are confirmed cases. They do not reflect actual numbers because of the lack of available test kits.In the US we are currently able to test about 150,000 people per day because there aren't enough tests to go around. Complicating this is the lack of availability of testing facilities and lab capacity. If the rate of testing were to remain at 150,000 per day, everybody in the US would be tested by January 2027.