I don’t know about anyone else, but the “new normal” looks just like the old normal. Or “new normal” clearly means different things to different people, as clearly a lot of us are living entirely different realities.
One reality is science based & cautious, masking & vaxxing and trying to ride out this mess. Another reality can be summed up thusly: “what mess?” As if 1.2Million+ US Americans haven’t died because of COVID.
“The fish stinks from the head” as the old saying goes, and in this situation, the head is the WH & the CDC, both of which are misleading us into thinking we are post-pandemic, which clearly we are not.
“It’s the new flu.” From Jan-Aug of this year (2022), 225K US Americans died of COVID—that figure is FIVE TIMES more deaths in any given year for flu deaths.
I admit to not being a “math person”; however, I understand how it should work, and in this case, the numbers should be going DOWN markedly in order to justify removing all the mitigation efforts to beat COVID into submission.
Instead, we are told lie after lie, meanwhile kids in school, people in nursing homes, as well as disabled & immunocompromised people all are being sacrificed to The New Big Lie (that the pandemic is over), all to keep the economy churning along, yet the powers that be fail to realize there are still supply chain interruptions and interruptions of service DUE TO COVID MAKING PEOPLE SICK AND MAKING THEM DIE.
Instead of the pandemic ending because it has actually become managed and endemic like the flu, the powers that be have eliminated mitigations & discontinued testing & contact tracing & reporting—simply put IGNORING & DENYING this issue still exists.
Meanwhile people continue to get infected & re-infected with (what I predict will be called respiratory HIV) COVID, get sick and either get Long COVID/disabled by it or die from it, which benefits no one. It doesn’t benefit us the people, it doesn’t benefit the economy, either. 100% it benefits people who have a vested interest in the companies that make the anti-viral meds etc.
In 2020, I was one of the first people I knew who started masking & I will no doubt be one of the last to discontinue doing so.
In “The Beforetimes” I was neurotic, risk averse, and distrustful of others, and in the 948 days since the beginning, I have become even more so.
This article only confirms what I have *witnessed* with my own eyes with people I KNOW, and further drives home so many things: I can’t trust anyone anymore, and how radically different I assess my risks than most people.
My sister (who should know better) claims she has been careful yet goes unmasked—and has caught COVID multiple times. “I guess I should’ve masked up” yet continues not to mask.
One friend has traveled internationally to developing countries that lack vaccines for their citizens. She does stand up in small venues and doesn’t mask up. She goes to super spreader events & is the only one wearing (a poorly fitting fabric mask). “I gotta live my life.”
My office manager has done air travel this year & came to the office coughing & visibly sick 10 days before my surgery, yet never considered testing herself & staying home.
My life for the last 948 days has been work, medical appointments & judicious grocery shopping (off peak days/hours in store shopping, curbside pick up where available, and delivery for as much as possible). I get the rare pedicure during off peak early time of the day with an empty salon, and controlled road trips with my UV HEPA air purifier in tow.
I am doing more than other immunocompromised people, and doing substantially less than COVID deniers.
All this cognitive dissonance is reckless & devastating to witness, and only fills me with despair & feel even more isolated. It also fills me to the brim with rage & disgust.
I think to myself “how am I to manage being around these people once all this is really a thing of the past?” And then I laugh at myself and remind myself, “don’t worry, they never gave a shit about you, and they have already forgotten about you.”
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