Tag: COVID-19
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Herd Immunity from the Delta Variant – “Mythical”
To vax or not to vax? I’m vaccinated. I think everybody who is eligible to be vaccinated should get vaccinated. Jim Bacon makes the excellent point that people who are vaccinated may still get COVID but are far less likely to die from the virus. Others believe that vaccinations will confer herd immunity to the population…
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Public Health Policy and the New COVID Calculus
by James A. Bacon As debates rage over mask and vaccination mandates across Virginia, there is no denying that the spread of the Delta variant has created a spike in confirmed COVID-19 cases. The seven-day moving average of 1,455 (which could grow as late reports filter into the Virginia Department of Health) is only 24%…
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UVa’s Bait and Switch
by Walter Smith The University of Virginia announced its COVID-19 vaccination mandate May 20. Unless students filed for a medical or religious exemption, they had to be vaccinated this fall. If they failed to comply, they would be subject to weekly testing. No mercy for COVID survivors who had developed natural immunities. On August 6th…
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Liberals’ Nasty Authoritarian Streak
by Kerry Dougherty This, friends, is an actual headline in an actual daily newspaper. It ran yesterday over a “news story” about Tuesday’s Virginia Beach School Board meeting: After hours of vitriol and misinformation, Virginia Beach School Board votes to make masks mandatory for students, staff Misinformation? That’s liberal newspeak for any statement or point…
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Vaccine Verification Follies
by James A. Bacon The Delta variant is so easily transmitted that Virginia public health officials say it is just a matter of time before all Virginians are exposed to it. In response, employers are requiring employees to be vaccinated and businesses are turning away unvaccinated customers. Suddenly, there is a need for Virginians to…
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Time to Rein in America’s Governors
by Kerry Dougherty Hey, I think I’ve found it. I’ve discovered the one good thing to come out of our national COVID nightmare: a horrifying awareness that we’ve given our governor too much power. Far too much. As the months ticked by and draconian emergency orders were extended over and over again, it was maddening…
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Digging Deeper into Vaccine Hesitancy
by James A. Bacon There has been a lot of discussion about the causes of vaccine hesitancy: Trump-voting evangelicals are idiots, Blacks are still scarred by the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, social media is spewing disinformation, people have lost faith in the “experts,” etc. Here’s a clue: People are most influenced by their interactions with the…
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America Is Tired of Elitism
by Kerry Dougherty There is nothing that members of the corporate media hate more than being told they’re elites. Thing is, they’re so elite they don’t even realize it. Take The New York Times White House correspondent, Annie Karni, for instance. It isn’t simply her job to report what’s going on in Washington, she’s also…
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SCOTUS: Give Rochelle Walensky Something to Cry About
by Kerry Dougherty It won’t be long before the U.S. Supreme Court smacks down CDC Director Rochelle Walensky’s order that revived until October 3rd a glaringly unconstitutional eviction moratorium. I can’t wait. They’ll give the woman who was blubbering about her feelings of “impending doom” last winter something to cry about. In fact, the judiciary…
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Free Zywicki!
by James A. Bacon Virginia is now in full-blown panic mode over the Delta variant and the rebound in confirmed COVID-19 cases. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention has designated a majority of Virginia localities as “high COVID transmission areas,” and media are reporting outbreaks everywhere from child care centers to summer camps. Cities, universities…
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The Bear Truth About That Massachusetts Outbreak
by Kerry Dougherty I have a little assignment for you before you read the rest of today’s post. Google “Provincetown Bear Week.” I’ll wait. Back? Yep, it’s a gathering of burly gay men who descend each summer on this Cape Cod enclave which is renowned for its eclectic shops and studios as well as its…
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COVID: Is It Time to Start Panicking Again?
by James A. Bacon COVID-19 is moving faster than we can keep up with. The headline news from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, based on a study of an outbreak in Massachusetts, is that vaccinated people are just as likely to spread the highly contagious Delta variant of virus as unvaccinated people. The…
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Delta Dawn at JMU?
by Joe Fitzgerald More than 1 in 9 James Madison University students was infected with Covid-19 during the school year that ended in May. To date, the university has accepted little responsibility for those illnesses or for any associated spread in Harrisonburg and Rockingham County. President Alger and members of the Senior Leadership Team have…
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Vaccine Shaming Will Backfire
by Kerry Dougherty Lemme get the straight. The president wants everyone in the country to get vaccinated against Covid-19 — an admirable goal that would likely reduce the virus to a national head cold. So how is he persuading those who are reluctant to take the vaccine to get a shot? By insulting them. Just…
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Nuking the Schools
by James A. Bacon The COVID-19-related shutdowns of K-12 schools across the country have been educational disaster of historic proportions, according to data published in a new McKinsey & Company report. McKinsey doesn’t use the phrase “disaster of historic proportions,” but how else can one describe a response to the pandemic that left students on…