Lloyd (May 8th, 2022)
dneal (May 28th, 2022)
I don't "pretend" that I "always" do anything, Chuck.
"Moderating one's involvement" does not mean anything about superiority. It simply means wanting to avoid a mud fight, or at least decreasing the odds. Sometimes it means not even wanting to see others engaging in it. It becomes tiresome for some participants and spectators even. Like you said, anyone unhappy about the dynamics can use the ignore function or just view the threads less often (or even not all all).
Well, I am off to get my annual flu jab. It won't completely vaccinate me, but it will reduce my chances of getting infected, having a bad time if I do get infected, or becoming a carrier in my community. Just like the Covid vaccine really.
Lloyd (May 9th, 2022)
May seems early. In the US October is recommended.
Lloyd (May 9th, 2022)
Indeed. I've lived here for 19 years now and still get confused by having Christmas in the summer. Mind you I also still convert the currency to GBP in my head.
The White House just said to expect a rough flu season this fall with COVID. The epidemiologists tend to understand the mathmatical dynamics of these phenomena. Get ready for another wave. I will get all the shots and boosters that I can.
Attaboy!
(always wanted to say that, hard to believe this is the first opportunity to present itself)
Lloyd (May 9th, 2022)
M: I came here for a good argument.
A: No you didn't; no, you came here for an argument.
M: An argument isn't just contradiction.
A: It can be.
M: No it can't. An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition.
A: No it isn't.
M: Yes it is! It's not just contradiction.
A: Look, if I argue with you, I must take up a contrary position.
M: Yes, but that's not just saying 'No it isn't.'
A: Yes it is!
M: No it isn't!
I think Trump handled it poorly and the anti-vax loons and conspiracy mongers made things worse.
Here, for comparison:
How Australia Saved Thousands of Lives While Covid Killed a Million Americans
By Damien Cave
May 15, 2022
MELBOURNE, Australia — If the United States had the same Covid death rate as Australia, about 900,000 lives would have been saved. The Texas grandmother who made the perfect pumpkin pie might still be baking. The Red Sox-loving husband who ran marathons before Covid might still be cheering at Fenway Park.
For many Americans, imagining what might have been will be painful. But especially now, at the milestone of one million deaths in the United States, the nations that did a better job of keeping people alive show what Americans could have done differently and what might still need to change.
Many places provide insight. Japan. Kenya. Norway. But Australia offers perhaps the sharpest comparisons with the American experience. Both countries are English-speaking democracies with similar demographic profiles. In Australia and in the United States, the median age is 38. Roughly 86 percent of Australians live in urban areas, compared with 83 percent of Americans.
Yet Australia’s Covid death rate sits at one-tenth of America’s, putting the nation of 25 million people (with around 7,500 deaths) near the top of global rankings in the protection of life.
Australia’s location in the distant Pacific is often cited as the cause for its relative Covid success. That, however, does not fully explain the difference in outcomes between the two countries, since Australia has long been, like the United States, highly connected to the world through trade, tourism and immigration. In 2019, 9.5 million international tourists came to Australia. Sydney and Melbourne could just as easily have become as overrun with Covid as New York or any other American city.
So what went right in Australia and wrong in the United States?
For the standard slide-show presentation, it looks obvious: Australia restricted travel and personal interaction until vaccinations were widely available, then maximized vaccine uptake, prioritizing people who were most vulnerable before gradually opening up the country again.
From one outbreak to another, there were also some mistakes: breakdowns of protocol in nursing homes that led to clusters of deaths; a vaccine rollout hampered by slow purchasing. And with Omicron and eased restrictions, deaths have increased.
But Australia’s Covid playbook produced results because of something more easily felt than analyzed at a news conference. Dozens of interviews, along with survey data and scientific studies from around the world, point to a lifesaving trait that Australians displayed from the top of government to the hospital floor, and that Americans have shown they lack: trust, in science and institutions, but especially in one another.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/15/w...e=articleShare
I wonder if size of population (scale of problem) was part of the challenge.
But, I don't disagree with the assessment around trut in science and institutions. This has much eroded in this country (USA).
I do think we lost the battle because we trusted the wrong folks.
On other forums men say they have long Covid or just are inflected. They never admit to being vaccinated.
M: I came here for a good argument.
A: No you didn't; no, you came here for an argument.
M: An argument isn't just contradiction.
A: It can be.
M: No it can't. An argument is a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition.
A: No it isn't.
M: Yes it is! It's not just contradiction.
A: Look, if I argue with you, I must take up a contrary position.
M: Yes, but that's not just saying 'No it isn't.'
A: Yes it is!
M: No it isn't!
Maybe “we” overestimated their ability to combat it.
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