Prepare For Coming Fourth Wave

[WHITT]

States across the country are lifting restrictions, some completely, as if the pandemic is over.

Today, Florida Governor DeSantis said: 'While so many other states kept locking people down, Florida lifted people up'.


Yes, lifted people up, and into caskets.

[Initech]

1. Cases are going down, hospitalizations are going down, we have 3 working vaccines.

How much longer are we going to have to keep living like this?

[MFM008]

3. until MORE people get at least one vaccine

and the death rates show steady dropping not raising again.

[catbyte]

5. This isn't going away any time soon as long as 40% of the public refuses to be vaccinated.

[roamer65]

21. That 40 percent plus all the schools going back to in person this fall equals a big fall wave.

Just like Fall 1919 - Winter 1920.

[GulfCoast66]

23. Fuck them. And this is not aimed at you.

But once every American who wants the vaccine can get it my mask goes off. I’ve been super careful. Wear an N-95 mask with a surgical mask over it Don’t dine in restaurants. But I’m not going to keep doing this to protect the idiots among us.

[In_The_Wind]

6. Maybe another year.

I have a variety of mask to wear depending on my mood.

[bdamomma]

8. We are not

out of the woods yet, there are variants and mutations.

[moonscape]

11. The downward slope has stalled. It's

not continuing at the moment, and means as I understand it that the holiday surge is over but we are dealing with highly-transmissible variants that are responsible for the stall.

[Pobeka]

12. Think of it like this. You are trying to cross a wide, rapid flowing river...

... trying not to get swept downstream and over the falls.

You've finally got close enough to the other shore to see it, see your landing zone. You've made it 90% of the way.

And you decide to stop fighting the current, which guarantees you'll go over the falls.

That's the "give up on social distancing masks" strategy.
---

(BTW I'm not saying the "you" is actually you in my little story, please don't take that personally )

We are just starting to get shots in arms. Enough shots are not in arms. A couple of months, if we held mask and social distancing protocols in place, would make a *huge* difference, even with the new COVID variants.

These new variants are so much more contagious that giving up on masks and social distancing is a nightmare scenario. You can't vaccinate fast enough.

I'd much prefer have my health care workers giving shots rather than easing the deaths of multitudes that didn't have to die, or even get ill.

[lagomorph777]

26. Perfect analogy.

[LanternWaste]

16. The forest-fire is 25% contained? Why can't we go camping there now??!!

[Quixote1818]

17. If they just waited another month or so it would probably be okay

There is only about 30% herd immunity right now so if people go back to normal now it could still shoot up extremely fast. They just need to follow the CDC's guidelines on this. The CDC are like rocket scientists when it comes to crunching the numbers and understanding how a disease like this can spread. We need to just trust them, period.

[Initech]

19. Oh I do.

And I know people who think this is a joke, and it makes me not want to associate with those people anymore.

[bullwinkle428]

18. Worldwide, cases are going UP. Remember when we saw cases shooting up last year

in Italy and other places, before things started to hit the fan here?

[liberal_mama]

20. So why quit now when we're in the home stretch? I had a family member die of Covid19 3 weeks ago.

It's such a shame to die of Covid after being careful for a year with vaccine availability for everyone happening soon. Can't we be careful a little longer so lives can be saved?

[uponit7771]

25. Technically? Until the Positive Test Rate in states is below 4% and we can employ Track and Tracing

... with a fast follow up nationwide.

[MFM008]

2. Texas and Mississippi

the bottom dwellers.
I wish other governors would ban travel between those states,

[bdamomma]

4. He lives

up to his name DeathSentence.

[matt819]

7. Well

The 40% who are refusing the vaccine, most of them republicans, better hope they benefit from herd immunity.

[Laelth]

9. Nice to know.

Getting those vaccines into arms is another matter. Neither the Daughter (20) nor I (52) yet qualify for a vaccine. It’s March 2, 2021. We’re waiting patiently.

-Laelth

[WHITT]

10. How Did This Country

with the most advanced science-based economy on the planet, end up with so many of its citizens either ignorant or gullible in regards to science?

[stillcool]

13. we've been dumbed down for a while now...

our only intelligence is imported.

[Phoenix61]

14. We stopped funding education, increased the

education requirements for teachers and allowed text book manufacturers entirely too much say in our education system.

[roamer65]

22. Ronnie Raygun.

That is where this shit started.

[beaglelover]

15. Not necessarily.

25.5 million Americans have been fully vaccinated at this point and many of them are the most vulnerable to die if they get COVID. Cases may go up if there is a fourth wave, but the number of hospitalizations and deaths should not increase like it did with the previous waves and it is only going to get better and better!

[WHITT]

24. Hate To Burst Your Bubble

but there will be a Fourth Wave with all the removal of restrictions. The vaccines are way behind the curve. The UK variant alone is doubling every 10 days, and Texas, Florida, and some other states have at least four variants exploding in their states. This could get ugly.