📣 Calling on UCSF for precautions 📧 California, tell the AG that remote participation is a reasonable accommodation 💊 Paxlovid fails continue.
The CDC suppresses pro-precaution twitter replies as if they are the equivalent of anti-vax misinformation.
Contents:
- Events, Actions, & Campaigns
- Pandemic field notes & “Living with the virus”
- In the News (virus & adjacent media, science, news, and op-eds)
- This is NOT Fine section (gaslighting & other outrages)
- He(a)rd Scuttlebutt (the pandemic grapevine)
California USA - KQED - Advocates Call on UCSF to Implement More COVID Protections - Published Jan 31, 2024, 12:20 PM
California USA - Action Alert: Tellttorney General Bonta that Remote Participation in Brown Act Meetings is an ADA Accommodation
by Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund: “Tell Attorney General Bonta by February 5, 2024, that remote participation is a reasonable accommodation – AND that people with disabilities who need to participate remotely should not be subjected to burdensome requirements.”
Does CDC want people protected?
If so, why does the CDC continue to promote a vaccine-only strategy so extreme that they are now attempting to suppress information about preventing infection? The CDC hid a reply on this tweet by Pantéa Javidan — a reply containing factual information about how people can protect themselves from Long Covid, by not getting covid in the first place, quite obviously by wearing a mask, as did the quoted Long Covid expert, Dr. Al-Aly at the U.S. Senate hearing. They also hid many other pro-precaution tweets, seemingly equating them with right-wing anti-vax disinformation.
Why would the CDC want to actively suppress information about self-protection? Why would the CDC want to suppress the idea of just not getting covid infections? Is it that an anti-masker has control of the CDC twitter account? Is it that they want people infected? Has the Biden administration hired the Trump “science adviser” Paul Alexander or something? Whatever the case, this is a problem, and I wrote the White House to complain about this.
I wish the Streisand Effect would work here because people deserve to have the option of Not Getting Infected at least presented.
🗞️ In the news
Forbes California Drastically Cuts Isolation Guidelines For Covid-19 Judy Stone Senior Contributor Jan 22, 2024,12:00pm EST Stanford sociologist Pantea Javidan, J.D., Ph.D., concurred, adding (via email) the new guidelines “shock the conscience.” As a sociologist and social justice advocate, she noted the policy “also fosters a culture of disregard for self and others, undermining both individual and collective health.” California has been more protective about Covid-19 than the CDC, so Aboelata was equally as taken off guard. The driver for these unexpected relaxation in protections is not entirely clear. Is it employers? Aboelata noted that there are “worker shortages in several industries, including bus drivers, teachers and health care providers.” She added, it “seems very short sighted and likely will ultimately exacerbate the problem.”
Government Executive - Interior officials defend department’s approach to telework After Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., accused the Interior Department of “abusing” telework, department leaders revealed that more than half of their workforce works in person every day, and those who do telework have experienced increased productivity, retention and employee engagement. JANUARY 18, 2024 04:45 PM ET - ERICH WAGNER “55% of the workforce are customer-facing employees who provide core mission delivery functions on public lands, recreational areas, parks and wildlife refuges, and because of the work they do, they’re generally not eligible for regular telework,” he said. “A smaller portion performs mission support roles that are not public-facing and often are able to be performed in a telework or remote work posture . . . These employees are in occupations such as IT, HR, acquisition management, financial management and other similar support jobs, and they possess highly portable skills that are in high demand in both the public and private sectors.”
This is NOT fine
Paxlovid fails continue.
This person reports a family member is being denied possibly life saving medication because their state medicaid program not only refuses to cover paxlovid closer than 12 months apart, and the rules prevent the family going outside of Medicaid to get it.
I wrote to my representative and senators about this because this shouldn’t be a thing. It’s bad enough individual doctors are confused or believe nonsense and refuse patients Paxlovid, having the rules preventing clinically indicated prescriptions is outrageous.
I Have COVID. Should I Take Paxlovid? BY DANI BLUM THE NEW YORK TIMES Jan 16, 2024 Who’s a good candidate for Paxlovid? Anyone 12 or older who is considered high-risk — which encompasses a broad swath of people. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention includes conditions such as depression, obesity, asthma and a history of smoking. “To be honest, pretty much if you’re an adult in the U.S., you can meet one of those little marks,” said Dr. Davey Smith, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, San Diego. Anyone age 50 or older is also eligible for the treatment, regardless of health status. The older you are, the higher your risk for severe illness tends to be, Smith said.
Has someone in the U.S. told you they can’t afford Paxlovid?
➡️➡️ https://www.test2treat.org/ ⬅️⬅️
Home Test to Treat is a program that offers free tests and free treatment (if eligible) for COVID-19 and Flu at home 24/7. No insurance or appointments needed! This program is funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to better understand how technologies such as at-home tests and telemedicine can improve healthcare access for individuals across the country.
NOTE: I’m not being compensated for mentioning Paxlovid, and in the U.S. I would be legally required to disclose that if I were.
He(a)rd Scuttlebutt… pandemic grapevine 🍇🌱
People have been appalled at a piece in The New Yorker where David Sedaris makes light of cajoling his supposed friend into unmasking, telling her she “needed to take it off” — causing the friend to get covid, the friend he describes as high risk and possibly disabled. I refuse to read the essay myself, but it sounds like there was a distinct absence of suitable contrition for his admitted transgression.
My household unsubscribed from the (print) New Yorker in 2022 after nearly 6 decades of continuous subscription, because of the way the publication kept minimizing or mischaracterizing Long Covid, sometimes not mentioning it at all and acting like severe illness is merely a political inconvenience, and making light of repeat reinfections with such lines as “When it comes to coronavirus infections, the third time is not the charm. What is?” The publication seemed oblivious to the many people in mourning, or still suffering, or still fighting to avoid infection or not be shut out of society. Later I felt we’d definitely made the right decision when they mocked public health advocates, asking if they were communist (disclosure, as a publicly listed volunteer of the organization targeted, it felt a bit personal — and dangerous).
I was reminded this week by Ruth Ben-Ghiat who pointed out that in 2021, David Sedaris had an essay published in The New Yorker: "Happy-Go-Lucky" which expresses relief that he could stop paying attention to politics, and entirely neglects to even mention the coup d’etat attempt a few months earlier. Never mind that there might be more work to be done. Ruth states that she does “not intend to judge Sedaris” — but I will.
Because all our problems are the same problem.
It’s not left & right, there are other axis here that people keep ignoring. And it’s entirely the reason people seem to be confused about what’s going wrong. Privileged people tend toward elite panic. And silos and echo chambers mean that I’ve encountered lefties that assume Project 2025 is… I guess just some “liberal” conspiracy theory that only centrist Democrats are concerned about, or should be. More than a couple times now I’ve even surprised people by explaining that it’s an actual publicly available detailed plan for the decimation of public health and community functioning.
“Information has been a vital component of warfare since the earliest recorded battles. In the 1469 BC Battle of Megiddo, the Hyksos King of Kadesh, who led a revolt of Palestinian and Syrian tribes against the Egyptian pharaoh, Thutmose III, was missing critical information as to the disposition of the Egyptian army. Anticipating an Egyptian attack on the stronghold city of Megiddo, the Hyksos king assessed the large Egyptian army would likely approach using one of two larger roads to the east and west of the city, and he divided his forces to intercept them. Using information gained from his scouts and discerning that the rebel leaders expected him to approach by these two broad roads, Thutmose instead chose a third, narrow road that led to the south of the city.”
— Daniel Morabito from AIR & SPACE POWER JOURNAL FALL 2021 - National Security and the Third-Road Threat. Toward a Comprehensive Theory of Information Warfare.