I know several people that are all trusting in people like "Your local epidemiologist" that will follow them in whatever they say. Anyone that does not believe them is a fact denier and selfish. People that will not allow non-vaccinated people in their house or to play with their kids (I know several). I know one person that would not allow their parents to come visit them unless they had 4 negative test in a week. They are in their 30s and kids are younger than 10 with no preexisting conditions.

Sadly to some Covid is about power and something else they can control. The fact that we are opening back up scares them.

Epidemiologist are afraid of this to be over for one, or at least a small portion since they will no longer have their 15 minutes of fame. Seriously on Facebook go to Your local epidemiologist page and read the post and comments.

Regarding opening up, here is a comment: "If you don't feel comfortable going out, things have adapted to get you what you need without leaving your house. I don't have a scientific argument for selfishness". Well what about Germany that is under a pretty strict lockdown and has to wear medical grade mask like N95 but their cases are rising while states that are open like Texas and Florida are dropping?

Why should someone trust you over their "Your local epidemiologist?" That's a serious question, not intended to be snarky.

Also, why do you care if someone chooses not to let an unvaccinated person in their house.

None of that means they don't want Covid to end or that they'll be upset when it does end. It means they're approaching it differently from you.

It'll be over in a couple of weeks once everyone has access to a vaccine that is 60-95% effective (I suspect Pfizer and Moderna with 94-95% efficacy will be the most commonly administered by far in this country.) Moderna has been proven to reach 90% efficacy 2 weeks after the first dose. Pfizer is probably similar but it only takes 3 weeks to get the second stab of that one. Combined with the latest reported phase 3 trial results on effectiveness of the bamlanivimab and etesevimab combo and COVID is done by April.

Assume the J&J vaccine because it's the least effective: 67% effective (and supposedly 100% effective against hospitalization but I think that's propaganda and lack of enough data).

Combined with a therapeutic that's now been proven to be nearly 90% effective in a phase 3 trial.:

https://www.foxnews.com/health/eli-lilly-covid-19-drug-combo-cuts-risk-of-hospitalizations-deaths-by-87-study

Covid will be one of the lowest risk diseases you could possible get. Basically 0 risk at all with Pfizer or Moderna vaccine + the therapeutic if you somehow still get infected.

Truly remarkable achievements by the pharmaceutical companies and researchers. What they've done in a year (really less than that, just took a year to get through phase e trials) is absolutely incredible. A virus that was very dangerous for our vulnerable population last March can now be prevented 95% of the time by a vaccine, and even if you somehow get it there is an 87% effective therapeutic.

Look at their post, "cases are spiking in 17 states", well 2 minutes of research on the CDC and Worldmeter pages says that is a lie, at the time of their post only 8 states had increases. We have epidemiologist, politicians, and scientist either lying or cherry picking stats for whatever reason.

Your have "experts" like Eric Feigl-Ding (nutrition and exercise doctor that then changed his title to COVID expert scientist) that has been maybe the largest proponent of keeping schools closed, despite all of the studies showing it is safe for kids to be doing in-person education, move his family to Australia so his kids could attend school in person.

We do not live in the 1950s where we rely on the 6 o'clock news for what is going on, we can do research on CDC, Worldmeter, Pubmed, etc. and establish our own conclusions. Sad as it is but with any expert you must follow the old Reagan saying of "trust but verify".

I do not care what other individuals do I was just stating how some people listen to these "experts" and condone anyone that does anything different. I have people at stores come up to me (which I do not get since that makes you more susceptible to getting something from me) and tell me by kids that are around 5 that they need to put a mask on for other peoples safety. Some people seem to be getting a power trip by enforcing whatever they believe.

All I care about is people getting he facts and doing what they want to with them. Not some "expert" that is pounding their drum on social media that is flat out lying and then they chastise me for going against what they say. The CDC should provide guidelines but that is all they should be. As mentioned all of the CDC studies on mask before Covid showed a 0.5% which is within a statistical chance of being effective, the 300 page document released due to the FOIA showed. But while the R0 value keeps going down we are all the sudden we need to start wearing 2 mask?

Maybe I am different but if you want to go out then go out, if you want to stay at home stay at home, if you want to wear a mask wear one, if you don't then don't. Just let us live the life we want to live. As far as to why did I care about the person requiring negative test before coming in their home is because they are relatives and it did effect my family. The week before Thanksgiving they told everyone in order to come in their house you needed 4 test, including the kids. They have a right to do what they want but that is a certain kind of special since the doctors offices were only open 3 days that week.

I'm not afraid of normal. I'm scheduled to get vaccinated tomorrow precisely to return to normal as soon as possible. But so many of you advocate for wreckless abandon over thoughtful, calculated decision making. Brazil is the perfect example of what wreckless abandon looks like. They have done far less to mitigate the pandemic than Sweden (the poster child of pretend COVID doesn't exist advocates despite Sweden performing far worse than it's analogs). Brazil is a hellhole right now, and that is not media panic like some of you wish it was. It's critical that we make sure we do not become Brazil in an effort to "return to normal" 1-2 months sooner. And it's imperative that more and more people get the vaccine. Given that Brazil is seeing significant reinfection of patients who have had COVID, we can't just throw caution to the wind. Furthermore, people need to continue to get the vaccine ASAP as we're starting to put significant evolutionary pressure on the virus to bypass our new found immunity. That is where bad mutations could possibly come from unless we more or less wipe it out. There's no reason to think either of these issues actually happens, but we still need to be aware of the potential risk for the near future. Once late Spring hits, we'll likely be much more in the clear.

There is nothing we could do now that would possibly turn us into Brazil.

ORAggieFan said:

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There is nothing we could do now that would possibly turn us into Brazil.

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Nothing is way too broad. If 40-50% of people can be reinfected by this new COVID variant and let's say it's 2x more contagious, it absolutely could cause another wave if we don't develop a booster for it. There's a decent chance that even if (we know this won't come close to happening) every adult was vaccinated without a booster that this variant would not be at herd immunity. And given that the death rate and hospitalization rate in Brazil keeps climbing, we can't just blindly assume that serious illness isn't still a threat.

Gordo14 said:

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ORAggieFan said:

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There is nothing we could do now that would possibly turn us into Brazil.

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Nothing is way too broad. If 40-50% of people can be reinfected by this new COVID variant and let's say it's 2x more contagious, it absolutely could cause another wave if we don't develop a booster for it. There's a decent chance that even if (we know this won't come close to happening) every adult was vaccinated without a booster that this variant would not be at herd immunity. And given that the death rate and hospitalization rate in Brazil keeps climbing, we can't just blindly assume that serious illness isn't still a threat.

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News Item from Bloomberg:

The Covid-19 vaccine from Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE showed a high ability to neutralize coronavirus strains first detected in Brazil, the U.K. and South Africa, according to a new study.

In lab experiments, the shot demonstrated "roughly equivalent" levels of neutralizing activity against the Brazil and U.K. strains compared with a version of the virus from early last year. It also showed "robust but lower" activity against the South Africa variant, according to a letter to the New England Journal of Medicine.

While the research needs to be validated with real-world data, it offers another reason for optimism that the Covid vaccines are generally performing well against variants of the virus.

Squadron7 said:

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Gordo14 said:

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ORAggieFan said:

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There is nothing we could do now that would possibly turn us into Brazil.

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Nothing is way too broad. If 40-50% of people can be reinfected by this new COVID variant and let's say it's 2x more contagious, it absolutely could cause another wave if we don't develop a booster for it. There's a decent chance that even if (we know this won't come close to happening) every adult was vaccinated without a booster that this variant would not be at herd immunity. And given that the death rate and hospitalization rate in Brazil keeps climbing, we can't just blindly assume that serious illness isn't still a threat.

---

News Item from Bloomberg:

The Covid-19 vaccine from Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE showed a high ability to neutralize coronavirus strains first detected in Brazil, the U.K. and South Africa, according to a new study.

In lab experiments, the shot demonstrated "roughly equivalent" levels of neutralizing activity against the Brazil and U.K. strains compared with a version of the virus from early last year. It also showed "robust but lower" activity against the South Africa variant, according to a letter to the New England Journal of Medicine.

While the research needs to be validated with real-world data, it offers another reason for optimism that the Covid vaccines are generally performing well against variants of the virus.

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I've said multiple times I'm optimistic that the vaccines will be fine against all known variants. However, that doesn't mean we should ignore the threat of certain variants like we see in Brazil, or discount the threat of evoluationary pressure on COVID in America now that immunity is growing.

I'm talking about a cautious, calculated approach not panic we're all going to die or **** Covid-19 it's 2019.

Gordo14 said:

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I'm not afraid of normal. I'm scheduled to get vaccinated tomorrow precisely to return to normal as soon as possible. But so many of you advocate for wreckless abandon over thoughtful, calculated decision making. Brazil is the perfect example of what wreckless abandon looks like. They have done far less to mitigate the pandemic than Sweden (the poster child of pretend COVID doesn't exist advocates despite Sweden performing far worse than it's analogs). Brazil is a hellhole right now, and that is not media panic like some of you wish it was. It's critical that we make sure we do not become Brazil in an effort to "return to normal" 1-2 months sooner. And it's imperative that more and more people get the vaccine. Given that Brazil is seeing significant reinfection of patients who have had COVID, we can't just throw caution to the wind. Furthermore, people need to continue to get the vaccine ASAP as we're starting to put significant evolutionary pressure on the virus to bypass our new found immunity. That is where bad mutations could possibly come from unless we more or less wipe it out. There's no reason to think either of these issues actually happens, but we still need to be aware of the potential risk for the near future. Once late Spring hits, we'll likely be much more in the clear.

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Well texas isn't a hell hole. Yet if you only read this board, you'd come away with the conclusion that many of us are reckless and are contributing to a hell hole, as we are self centered, egotistical, selfish maniacs.

You want a hell hole in America right now? Look no further than Fuhrer Newsome. We're going to be more than fine moving forward in Texas, and I say that with extreme confidence.

I think a lot of people are not going to like having to come back to work in offices and will hold onto "fear" to keep from working at home as long as possible. There's a lot of white collar work that can be done effectively at home, but plenty that can't and will require people to be back in the office, at least regularly if not 40 hours a week.

I suspect you're going to see a lot of resistance, and it will all be couched in the language of workplace safety and risk-taking. It's been primed by acceptance of the theory that if your feelings have been hurt then you are legitimately injured; it's not a leap from that to say that if you feel afraid to come back to work - even irrationally - it's your right to stay home and your job must allow for it. As more and more people get vaccinated you'll see this, where it goes from a somewhat justifiable concern for safety (before the vaccines) to absolute refusal to go back to the status quo when the risk has basically been eliminated.

jenn96 said:

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I think a lot of people are not going to like having to come back to work in offices and will hold onto "fear" to keep from working at home as long as possible. There's a lot of white collar work that can be done effectively at home, but plenty that can't and will require people to be back in the office, at least regularly if not 40 hours a week.

I suspect you're going to see a lot of resistance, and it will all be couched in the language of workplace safety and risk-taking. It's been primed by acceptance of the theory that if your feelings have been hurt then you are legitimately injured; it's not a leap from that to say that if you feel afraid to come back to work - even irrationally - it's your right to stay home and your job must allow for it.

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Or you could take a less pessimistic worldview and recognize some people don't need to sit under fluorescent lighting and use sandpaper to wipe our ass to be effective.

jenn96 said:

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culdeus said:

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jenn96 said:

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I think a lot of people are not going to like having to come back to work in offices and will hold onto "fear" to keep from working at home as long as possible. There's a lot of white collar work that can be done effectively at home, but plenty that can't and will require people to be back in the office, at least regularly if not 40 hours a week.

I suspect you're going to see a lot of resistance, and it will all be couched in the language of workplace safety and risk-taking. It's been primed by acceptance of the theory that if your feelings have been hurt then you are legitimately injured; it's not a leap from that to say that if you feel afraid to come back to work - even irrationally - it's your right to stay home and your job must allow for it.

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Or you could take a less pessimistic worldview and recognize some people don't need to sit under fluorescent lighting and use sandpaper to wipe our ass to be effective.

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I do recognize that. I'm one of those people. But I also found over the last year that training new employees in complex programs is almost impossible to do remotely. Working on team-based projects can be challenging and far less effective over Zoom than just getting people in a room together. Lots of other examples are out there. Anyone in management knows exactly what I'm talking about.

I don't think we need to get back to the way it was, where we all come to work whether we need to or not and get side-eye when you stay home for not feeling well instead of toughing it out and coming in. But there are plenty of people who need to be in the office to be effective at least sometimes and will be resistant to that because they prefer to be at home.

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Sorry. Disagree. I have a large team both here in the US and in India. No issues training new hires or collaborating on projects. Zoom video calls are great!

Obviously depends on the work.

I think you're going to see a lot of variance by industry. And within the same company, some jobs are tailor-made for remote work and some require a more physical presence. And I support that; I don't want to go back to 8-5:30 every day and no flexibility. But speaking generally, you're going to see some issues when people - say admins - want to stay home and keep working remotely and the executives that they support want them back in the office on a regular basis.

My point wasn't to argue that we need to get rid of remote work, but to answer the question of "who would ever want to be afraid of covid once they're vaccinated?" I think you'll see some people who prefer to work remotely using the safety excuse to keep from going back in, when the truth is that they just prefer working remotely. But they'll keep fearmongering because that make's it Covid's fault, and not their own choice. (See the issue we're having nationally with teachers as an example). Good companies will get on top of it and figure out how to apply the flexibility they've learned during the last year to long-term strategies. But many won't and I think you'll see "fear of Covid" kept alive to circumvent that.

Working from home sucks.

I think people like it that just want a job and not a career because it's easier to work the minimum. Even people I know as great co-workers in the past are sitting next to the pool waiting for emails to arrive to respond to.

My team was fine until we went through a reorganization in the fall because we had built relationships over the past 2 years. Now 2/3 of the people don't know each other.

Sure, "tasks" are getting done but there is zero team structure, everyone works in silo's and the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing, and 2/3 of the team has no idea who anybody is or what they do.

If you want a job just updating spreadsheets work from home is great. If you want to build a career and be a specialist in your field forget about it.

Cepe said:

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Working from home sucks.

I think people like it that just want a job and not a career because it's easier to work the minimum. Even people I know as great co-workers in the past are sitting next to the pool waiting for emails to arrive to respond to.

My team was fine until we went through a reorganization in the fall because we had built relationships over the past 2 years. Now 2/3 of the people don't know each other.

Sure, "tasks" are getting done but there is zero team structure, everyone works in silo's and the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing, and 2/3 of the team has no idea who anybody is or what they do.

If you want a job just updating spreadsheets work from home is great. If you want to build a career and be a specialist in your field forget about it.

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Hahaha. I've been working remote since 2006 and nothing you described is accurate in any way. I've helped build out a team of 100 in the US that is all remote. Been using Zoom four years now and GoToMeeting prior to that.

Open to everyone 50+ beginning 3/15

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/10/texas-opens-covid-vaccine-eligibility-to-people-50-and-older-as-it-lifts-mask-mandate.html

Cepe said:

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ORAggieFan said:

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What's not like what I think?

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Whatever - I'm sure you've checked off a lot of to do's

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No, please explain what career success is and why one can't achieve that working remote. I look forward to explain how wrong you are.

Cepe said:

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Working from home sucks.

I think people like it that just want a job and not a career because it's easier to work the minimum. Even people I know as great co-workers in the past are sitting next to the pool waiting for emails to arrive to respond to.

My team was fine until we went through a reorganization in the fall because we had built relationships over the past 2 years. Now 2/3 of the people don't know each other.

Sure, "tasks" are getting done but there is zero team structure, everyone works in silo's and the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing, and 2/3 of the team has no idea who anybody is or what they do.

If you want a job just updating spreadsheets work from home is great. If you want to build a career and be a specialist in your field forget about it.

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Oh geez. I've never read something more arrogantly inaccurate about remote work.

Gordo14 said:

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I'm not afraid of normal. I'm scheduled to get vaccinated tomorrow precisely to return to normal as soon as possible. But so many of you advocate for wreckless abandon over thoughtful, calculated decision making. Brazil is the perfect example of what wreckless abandon looks like. They have done far less to mitigate the pandemic than Sweden (the poster child of pretend COVID doesn't exist advocates despite Sweden performing far worse than it's analogs). Brazil is a hellhole right now, and that is not media panic like some of you wish it was. It's critical that we make sure we do not become Brazil in an effort to "return to normal" 1-2 months sooner. And it's imperative that more and more people get the vaccine. Given that Brazil is seeing significant reinfection of patients who have had COVID, we can't just throw caution to the wind. Furthermore, people need to continue to get the vaccine ASAP as we're starting to put significant evolutionary pressure on the virus to bypass our new found immunity. That is where bad mutations could possibly come from unless we more or less wipe it out. There's no reason to think either of these issues actually happens, but we still need to be aware of the potential risk for the near future. Once late Spring hits, we'll likely be much more in the clear.

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Good grief.......this is the nonsense that becomes the subject of jokes and terms like "Branch Covidians".

B-1 83 said:

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Gordo14 said:

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I'm not afraid of normal. I'm scheduled to get vaccinated tomorrow precisely to return to normal as soon as possible. But so many of you advocate for wreckless abandon over thoughtful, calculated decision making. Brazil is the perfect example of what wreckless abandon looks like. They have done far less to mitigate the pandemic than Sweden (the poster child of pretend COVID doesn't exist advocates despite Sweden performing far worse than it's analogs). Brazil is a hellhole right now, and that is not media panic like some of you wish it was. It's critical that we make sure we do not become Brazil in an effort to "return to normal" 1-2 months sooner. And it's imperative that more and more people get the vaccine. Given that Brazil is seeing significant reinfection of patients who have had COVID, we can't just throw caution to the wind. Furthermore, people need to continue to get the vaccine ASAP as we're starting to put significant evolutionary pressure on the virus to bypass our new found immunity. That is where bad mutations could possibly come from unless we more or less wipe it out. There's no reason to think either of these issues actually happens, but we still need to be aware of the potential risk for the near future. Once late Spring hits, we'll likely be much more in the clear.

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Good grief.......this is the nonsense that becomes the subject of jokes and terms like "Branch Covidians".

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"wreckless"??? That's not even a freaking word. Do you even have spell check, or are you too busy watching CDC videos and polishing your signed Fauci photo above your bed?