As Americans again grapple with the question of whether they should dine out, public health experts and epidemiologists agree on one thing: There is no such thing as zero risk. There are only degrees of risk, no matter your vaccination status or the damage the delta variant has done to your community.

Saskia Popescu, infectious-disease epidemiologist and assistant professor at George Mason University, likes to frame the question as a risk assessment. She says you should look at three factors before deciding whether you should dine at a restaurant: your vaccination status, the level of coronavirus transmission in your community (as determined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Data Tracker) and your personal risk assessment (are you immunocompromised or do you share your home with someone who is vulnerable or can’t be vaccinated yet?).

Popescu, for example, resides in Phoenix, in Maricopa County, where the transmission rate is high, “which really sucks,” she said, “because it’s 110 degrees outside.” She doesn’t feel like dining under the summer sun where a customer can feel as fried as a bucket of chicken.

“I really am just not leaning into dining indoors right now,” Popescu said. “Being indoors is a high-risk activity when you’re dining because you’re eating and you’re drinking. You have no mask on. There’s a bunch of other people whose vaccine status you don’t really know and who are also unmasked. You’re there for prolonged periods of time. I look at all of those, and that’s how I make an informed decision. So it’s not black-and-white.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2021/08/05/restaurants-indoor-dining-delta-variant/

Source: The Oregonian

Oregon health care workers will have to get vaccinated for COVID-19 or face weekly testing, Gov. Kate Brown’s office said Wednesday, in an apparent step to fight the state’s run-away coronavirus case numbers fueled by the delta variant.

The move comes amid a nationwide push to drive up vaccination rates, both for the general public and among health care workers in particular. Brown’s intervention effectively neutralizes an Oregon law that says employers can’t fire health care workers for not being vaccinated.

Brown’s order, through the Oregon Health Authority, sidesteps the law by mandating weekly testing while allowing for an exemption from the requirement for those who can prove they’ve been immunized.

Oregon appears to be the only state in the nation with the prohibition specifically for health care workers, and one of the sponsors of the bill was perplexed by the ramifications, saying, “Why the hell did we do that?”




Read more: https://www.oregonlive.com/coronavirus/2021/08/oregon-health-care-workers-must-get-covid-19-shots-or-submit-to-weekly-testing-governor-says.html

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This law dates back to 1989.

https://www.oregonlive.com/coronavirus/2021/07/why-the-hell-did-we-do-that-how-unique-oregon-law-prevents-covid-19-vaccine-mandates-for-health-care-workers.html

and ask if they require proof of vaccine status for all of their patrons. If the answer is “No,” tell them you’re sorry, but you can’t do business with until their policy changes.

“Some people in Missouri are getting vaccinated in secret to avoid backlash from loved ones, doctor says”

So now people not getting Covid because they’ve been secretly vaccinated will only serve to confirm that vaccines are unnecessary for the vaccine science deniers.

Merde alors!

I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore! And I’m prepared to boycott entering any public gathering place that does not require them.

I live on the Left Coast and this year’s fire season may be as bad, or worse, than last year, with accompanying bad air quality.

Opinion: Drive the all-new Toyota Paranoia, Official Car of the Jan. 6 Insurrection

Opinion by
Dana Milbank
Columnist
July 6, 2021 at 4:19 p.m. PDT

Oh, what a feeling! (And it isn’t a good one.)
Approaching Tuesday’s six-month anniversary of the Jan. 6 insurrection, the liberal watchdog Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington tallied contributions corporate PACs have made to the 147 insurrectionists in Congress — those who voted to overturn the results of the 2020 election, even after the Trump mob’s deadly attack on the Capitol.

Most corporations stuck to their initial pledges and didn’t give money, at least directly, to those who stood for overthrowing democracy. But one has bankrolled the insurrectionists at a level far higher than the others: Toyota. The carmaker gave $55,000 to 37 of the insurrectionist lawmakers, CREW found — more than quadruple the runner-up, CIGNA (nine), and quintuple Koch Industries (seven).

A Toyota spokesman told me the company “supports candidates based on their position on issues that are important to the auto industry and the company.” Apparently, constitutional democracy isn’t one of those issues. This leaves me with one question: Would anybody like to buy my 2017 Toyota Sienna? I suspect I’m not the only one who won’t be buying a(nother) Toyota. Toyota likes to say its cars are “made in America” — while its actions are unmaking America.

If Toyota’s wishes to solidify its standing as the Official Car of Insurrectionists, I suggest a more comprehensive approach. Toyota should roll out a new line of vehicles, renamed and redesigned to reflect target customers. Those who attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6 should get special Three Percenter financing.
The 2022 Toyota Previous (formerly Prius). Don’t recognize Joe Biden as the legitimate president? Then transport yourself back to a time when America LED THE WORLD in covid-19 deaths and HAD THE GREATEST job losses since Herbert Hoover. Toyota’s hybrid technology will excite those who want it all: more MPGs (miles per gallon) and more MTGs (Marjorie Taylor Greenes).

But wait, there’s more…

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/07/06/drive-all-new-toyota-paranoia-official-car-jan-6-insurrection/

Today I had planned to celebrate my liberation with several vaccinated friends at a restaurant with outdoor seating. Had plans to spend 3 nights in early May at a hotel on the Oregon coast with 3 vaccinated friends.

A little over a month ago my hematologist told me it was okay for me to get vaccinated and that he believed it would give me good protection even if somewhat less than the remarkably high 94%-95% efficacy achieved by the 2-dose vaccines. When I pressed him, he said he thought it would be okay for me to do the things that the CDC guidelines indicated were safe for the fully vaccinated.

Great! Or so I thought until a friend forwarded an article to me with the title: Vaccines Won’t Protect Millions of Patients With Weakened Immune Systems. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/15/health/coronavirus-vaccine-immune-system.html

Merde! I thought, naturellement, and later in the day drove to my regular clinic to get an antibodies test. After that I found CDC information indicating that an antibodies test does not measure vaccine efficacy. Oh well...

Yesterday, at my annual physical exam, my internist, when pressed on the question, basically told me that I should keep isolating until COVID-19 cases subside and more is known about how well the vaccine protects people with compromised immune systems in general, and blood disorders in particular.

I’m still waiting to hear back from my hematologist, but am pretty sure I will need hang back for a bit longer. Meanwhile, at least I have a reason to get up in the morning - cats gotta have their breakfast! 😻😻

I can’t remember the last time I was able to cry and wondered what it would take to crush my heart, in a good way. It was this article:

The holiday is about much more than a celebration of spring.

Esau McCaulley
By Esau McCaulley
Contributing Opinion Writer
April 2, 2021

I grew up in the Southern Black church tradition, where Easter was the opportunity to don your best outfit. The yellow and red dresses and dark suits set against the Black and brown bodies of my church were a thing to behold. The hats of grandmothers and deacon’s wives jostled with one another for attention. The choir had its best music rehearsed and ready to go. Getting to sing the solo on Easter was like getting a prime spot at the Apollo.

I watched rather than participated in these festivities during most of my youth. I didn’t have the money or social standing to attract much attention. Then one year my mother cobbled together enough money to purchase a navy blue three-piece suit and a clip-on tie. Without my father around, neither she nor I could tie the real thing. I thought I had joined the elect when I showed up fresh and clean for Sunday service.

The feeling didn’t last long. During a song, a woman sitting next to me with one of the aforementioned hats got excited. Our tradition called it “catching the Holy Ghost.” In her ecstatic state, she kicked out, hit me in the leg, and ripped a hole in my brand-new pants.

That Sunday introduced me to the two Easters that struggle alongside each other. One is linked closely to the celebration of spring and the possibility of new beginnings. It is the show that can be church on Easter. The other deals with the disturbing prospect that God is present with us. His power breaks out and unsettles the world.
We like to imagine the story of the first Easter as the first of the two, a celebration of possibility. We would be wrong.

Continued here: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/02/opinion/easter-celebration.html