💉 Where's a real vaccine drive? 💻 Prioritize telework for federal employees 🇺🇸 Letter campaign for a U.S. covid national task force 📧
So, healthcare workers are still donning PPE to protect themselves from the toxic treatments of cancer patients, but they can't put on a mask to protect the cancer patients from viruses?
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)
USA Letter Campaign to the White House - Prioritize Telework for Federal Workers
By Chloe Humbert - Telework should be prioritized for our future, to mitigate climate change and infectious disease in the ongoing pandemic.
https://actionnetwork.org/letters/prioritize-telework-for-federal-workers/
USA Letter Campaign - Tell your Senator: We need S.1489's Covid Task Force
By Marked By Covid, supporting S. 1489, A bill to establish the National Task Force on the Response of the United States to the COVID-19 Pandemic.
The goal should be to have as many people as possible vaccinated.
CNN - FDA advisers recommend that Covid-19 boosters for fall should drop original strain. By Meg Tirrell, CNN Updated 4:55 PM EDT, Thu June 15, 2023 Dr. Paul Offit, a vaccine scientist and professor of pediatrics in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and a member of the advisory committee, emphasized before the meeting that it’s important to discuss who needs an updated vaccine this fall. “What’s the goal of the vaccine?” he asked. “If the goal of the vaccine is the stated goal, which is protection against severe disease, do you really need a yearly vaccine for otherwise healthy people less than 75? I mean, is this the flu model? Because I would argue it shouldn’t be.”
This is the public comment I submitted to the ACIP June 21-23 meeting_05.05.2023 Posted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on May 5, 2023
The goal should be to get as many people vaccinated as possible. Why has this been forgotten? Why is covid vaccination being restricted? And if we’re supposed to take individual responsibility, why are we not being allowed as citizens to decide what the goal of vaccination should be and therefore allowed to get the vaccine on a schedule that provides maximum benefits? I do NOT want the government deciding that reducing my risks is “not worth it” on some “30,000 feet view” of “good enough” - that’s an egregiously immoral standpoint. I value my life and my health. And I expect my representative government to represent me and the fact that my life has value! Vaccination has shown a reduction in risk of not just death and hospitalization, but a reduction of transmission and a reduction of the risk of long covid. Flu vaccination has been shown to reduce the number of sick days out of work for working age adults, why would you restrict vaccine access to old people only? Even if your only goal is catering to The Economy, restricting vaccines is counterproductive. I’m also concerned that restricting covid vaccines to the very very old, people who are most likely to be hospitalized or die, despite vaccination, will further erode the possible effectiveness of those vaccines, and undermine the public’s view of it, because it will look like vaccination doesn’t work, when in fact, it does work if it’s broadly distributed in a schedule that the data warrants. Vaccines should be offered to all adults on a 6 month schedule according to the data of waning effectiveness, so we can protect ourselves.
It’s too late to submit a comment to the ACIP meeting, but it’s not too late to write to President Biden about this. I’m also sending this as a letter to the White House, and to my US Senators and Representative in Congress. Because I am seriously wondering if the FDA is actively trying to undermine the vaccine drive with these restrictions. If it’s accidental, we need the board replaced with more competent professionals. If it’s on purpose, there needs to be a criminal investigation to see if there’s been an anti-vax infiltration. I wish this was just paranoia, but one of those doctors repeats anti-vax talking points.
Here is a public comment from a medical professional supporting 6 month boosters:
A Precautionary Path with Kaitlin Sundling, MD, PhD Public comment to CDC's vaccination recommendation committee ACIP JUN 16, 2023 As a physician-scientist, I support increasing the frequency of COVID boosters to at least every 6 months broadly, not just for selected groups such as the elderly or immunocompromised.
🗞️ In the news
🔎 Ground Truths - New diabetes post-acute Covid (PASC, Long Covid), an inconvenient truth. A new study adds to 11 others for increased risk of Type 2 diabetes by ERIC TOPOL, APR 18, 2023 The increased risk compared with controls ranges widely from 17% to 235% with only 1 of these studies not showing a significant increase in a subgroup (among women in a Veteran Affairs report). The CDC published a MMWR on a cohort less than age 18 which did not partition Type 1 and 2 diabetes, but overall showed a 31% increased risk. Indeed, a previous systematic analysis reported an increased risk for either Type 1 or 2 diabetes after Covid in 12 of 14 studies, ranging from 11% to 276%.
🇺🇸 Boise State Public Radio News - Judge issues civil arrest warrant for Ammon Bundy, who has ignored St. Luke's lawsuit for nearly 1 year | By Audrey Dutton, James Dawson, Published April 18, 2023, Updated April 19, 2023 Rodriguez took the opportunity to use that open door last month, when he made his own demand that St. Luke’s provide him with the legal evidence to which he is entitled as a defendant. The evidence he requested includes: - “security footage from the Ambulance Bay during the dates and times noted where St. Luke’s alleges to have needed to lockdown the hospital because of an alleged imminent danger from protestors.” - records of his grandson’s medical care, case files, meeting notes and financial records to show how much money St. Luke’s was paid during his grandson’s stay at the hospital. - data and records related to COVID-19 medical treatment. - the number of minors who have died at St. Luke’s hospital annually for the last 10 years. - detailed information about COVID-19 vaccines and St. Luke’s policies regarding the vaccines. - “details of any and all complaints issued against St. Luke’s hospitals for medical malpractice, medical negligence, or any other lawsuits, complaints, referrals, or likewise demonstrating incompetence, errors, or problems with St. Luke’s doctors, nurses, or staffs.” Judge Norton on Tuesday issued an order that blocks Rodriguez and other defendants from sharing the information they receive from St. Luke’s.
🇺🇸 Bloomberg - Workers Resisting the Office Grind Are Suddenly Lonely at Home. Staff are increasingly unsure about working at home — but don’t share their bosses’ love of offices. By Irina Anghel, June 15, 2023 Sorrell, whose company employs almost 9,000 people in 32 countries, now fears that corporate culture is being eroded as workers stay at home. “If you are paying people to look at a screen, they’ll end up going to the highest bidder. There’s no glue.” Corporate return-to-office mandates are multiplying, and they’re coming with extras. Google last week told staff to head into the office three days per week, with attendance to be taken into account during performance reviews. A union representing staff quickly pushed back against the ruling.
🏢 Wall Street Journal - Interest-Only Loans Helped Commercial Property Boom. Now They’re Coming Due. Landlords face a $1.5 trillion bill for commercial mortgages over the next three years. By Konrad Putzier, June 6, 2023 Many of the commercial landlords on the hook for the loans are vulnerable to default in part because of the way their loans are structured. Unlike most home loans, which get paid down each year, many commercial mortgages are known as interest-only loans. Borrowers make only interest payments during the life of the loan, with the entire principal due at the end. Interest-only loans as a share of new commercial mortgage-backed securities issuance increased to 88% in 2021, up from 51% in 2013, according to Trepp. Typically, owners pay off this debt by getting a new loan or selling the building. Now, steeper borrowing costs and lenders’ growing reluctance to refinance these loans are raising the likelihood that many of them won’t be paid back. Many banks, fearful of losses and under pressure from regulators and shareholders to shore up their balance sheets, have mostly stopped issuing new loans for office buildings, brokers say. Office and some mall owners are facing falling demand for their buildings because of remote work and e-commerce.
🇺🇸 No Telework Cuts for Weather Service Employees, Under Union Settlement. Commerce Department employees represented by the National Weather Service Employees Organization are exempt from recent cuts to telework, though labor leaders bemoan deteriorating relationship with management. JUNE 13, 2023 - by ERICH WAGNER Richard Hirn, an attorney representing the union, said the Commerce Department agreed to a settlement on the day before the Federal Labor Relations Authority was scheduled to hear the unfair labor practice case. The settlement exempts all NWSEO employees from the new telework policy. Hirn described the recent changes to telework as “noxious,” noting that the Office of Personnel Management’s guidance to agencies on reentry encouraged management to preserve expanded availability of telework. “In essence, the policies they spelled out were more restrictive than what was in the Department of Commerce policy before [the pandemic],” he said.
This is NOT fine
Who gets safety precautions in healthcare?
SciShow - The Return of Thalidomide - Jun 14, 2023
Hank Green on Youtube: As I'm making this video, I'm actually taking chemotherapy right now. And it's wild. They give you the chemo, but before they do they dress up to make sure none of it gets on their skin because it’s dangerous for people. And then they put it in my veins. Sorry if that's how you found out I have cancer. It's a pretty treatable kind. We're doing good.
So, healthcare workers are still donning PPE to protect themselves from the toxic treatments of cancer patients, but they can't put on a mask to protect the cancer patients from infectious diseases? Viruses that might undo the whole purpose of the cancer treatment.
Kashif Pirzada, MD @KashPrime posted on twitter 11:32 PM · Jun 12, 2023
“Shouldn’t she be in an isolation room?” someone asked. Good question. “What’s the point. Isn’t our hospital mask mandate ending soon?” someone else said. Ah, now we get to the point. If we were actually following the science, we would have screened her to a separate zone, away from the other patients in the waiting room. She could have infected any number of children, chemo patients, pregnant patients. Instead, we and every patient are now expected to make our own decisions on how to protect ourselves. You could roll into a cancer clinic and cough on every single patient in the waiting room, and not violate policy now.
Hospitals need better policies than that.
He(a)rd Scuttlebutt… pandemic grapevine 🍇🌱
You agree to get covid, all ye HVAC professionals who enter here
I sometimes hear people erroneously say it’s not worth it to write their elected representatives because they’re ghoulish corporate toadies who won’t listen to them anyway, or something along those lines. The staff has to register your letters though. If enough people write to your representative about the X that he’ll never support - at least the representative might be hesitant to go as hard against it if he realizes it’s very popular. They’re making a tally one way or another.
So I have one question:
WHY MAKE IT SO EASY FOR THEM TO IGNORE YOU?
One should not believe anyone who asserts that we would need authoritarian lockdowns with people being beaten or such things, in order to have masks mandated in healthcare. These assertions are lockdown revisionism, and a right-wing propaganda talking point to convince liberals to unmask by saying mandates are bad. And there’s a distinct PR spin being done to try to propagandize lefties to believe any public health measure is tantamount to a carceral state or some shit. Masking to not give a patient covid is just basic human decency, and rules around this are how civilizations communicate standards of care. Most people obey stop signs without fearing they’ll get beaten if they don’t, and most people obey indoor smoking bans without any hoopla. Back in the 1990s many of us thought smoking would never be banned in taverns, but they are now.
The loss of several pandemic era data gathering tools such as pre-symptomatic and asymptomatic testing in healthcare also means that we should assume periods of moderate to high transmission in healthcare settings at all times given the unique circumstances of combining infected patients with vulnerable patients in the same setting, and consider a maximal approach to PPE.
Shimi Sharief MD MPH - Public comment at the CDC HICPAC Meeting June 2023