We went Friday to an event hosted at someone’s house. Everyone was vaccinated but we were the only ones masked. We went to another event Sunday hosted by DH’s company. The company has a vaccine mandate and a “must wear a mask in the office if you come in” policy. Again, we were the only ones masked. Wait-- one kid had a mask on for a while but when he ate he took it off and never put it back on. The CIO of the company and their family attended. Masks were at their chins. I was not happy. Our DS#2 arrives at the end of the week and his pregnant wife arrives the week later. I am NOT happy that even though we are boostered, we could have been exposed. At the Friday event one attendee told us he had breakthrough covid in August. I would not say a word to DH’s CIO, but I was really skeeved. They set aa really bad example.
This is why we have n95 equivalent masks.
It was really awkward being the onl mask wearers. Especially at the first event. they know better.
I hesitate to give my opinion.
But when I’m in the company of vaccinated people at their home or at an event, I’m not wearing a mask.
I’m trusting that my vaccine is working. If I were to get breakthrough Covid, I understand that it happens and I accept that. But the vaccine works and I trust that any breakthrough case will be mild. If I am incredibly unlucky, I guess that could happen but it’s very rare and I’m going to trust the science.
This is of course my opinion. I just cannot live the way I have the past 18 months. And if people are uncomfortable with that, then maybe gatherings with me shouldn’t happen.
That’s my point, that even vaccinated relatives who say they are very careful and wear masks and don’t ‘go anywhere’ are still working, going to stores, going to exercise classes, going to restaurants. They are most likely safer to be around than unvaxxed relatives or those who don’t claim to be careful, but there is still some risk.
A lot of people treated the vaccines as a bullet proof vest and once vaccinated they engaged in a lot of activities like travel, dining out, going to exercise glasses, going back to work and mingling with co-workers. If you are around those people, even though they are vaxxed, they might be carrying virus.
I just love @3SailAway ’s analogy of vaccines to sunscreen. It definitely helps, but no, you aren’t bulletproof. If you put it on once and lay out all day on the beach in July, you still will get burned. I try to tailor my habits and extra layers of precaution (social distancing/masks) with that in mind.
But for me, a lot of the anger comes from whether I feel in control of my risk level. Being forced into a situation (work meetings) that I feel is unsafe does not make me happy. But if I were to get sick from visiting my kid or even going to the gym, so be it. I made that choice.
It is not a perfect analogy. Some people do not sunburn as easily, so they do not need to use as much sunscreen. But it is usually fairly easy to tell how much base sunburn risk you have (take a look at how light or dark colored your skin is), whereas there is no equivalent way to telling what your base risk of bad outcomes with COVID-19 is.
Lol. That is pretty darn nickpicky. But many people do know if the vaccine might not have taken so well if they are older and/or have a compromised immune system. And like those fair skinned people, should take extra precautions accordingly.
What analogy was ever perfect?
With the Delta variant, the viral load is high enough that even a vaccinated person can get serious breakthrough case from an infected unvaccinated person, especially when exposure is as high as at a family gathering.
All of my family is vaccinated, but I would not have a holiday dinner indoors with unvaccinated people, especially if they are not taking any precautions against infection.
In fact, I would wear a mask at all times when I am around them, if I needed to be around them.
I think we all live in different micro-communities. People quickly and unconsciously accommodate to prevalent norms. When I was in Florida in Feb/March, I was stunned that the many people were eating unmasked in restaurants (in pre-vaccine times). Up here in liberal HQ, none of our friends was going to restaurants indoors (even weather permitting) in pre-vaccine times. We didn’t even have people in our house with masks on pre-vaccine. Post-vaccine, the norms really shifted. People (all vaccinated) started walking into our house unmasked and in the last couple of months hugging us. One of the key people in the Washington health arena hugged me and my wife (outside). We’re very uncomfortable with indoor eating with folks generally, so we haven’t been to restaurants and don’t remove our masks on planes. We are having people in our house briefly unmasked but we may switch back to masking.
I just spent the weekend in Saguache County CO, which is ranch / farm / former mining country. No one was wearing masks. Servers in stores and restaurants. We went to some hot pools that are covered by a greenhouse and some of the pools were packed and NO ONE was wearing a mask.
Here’s an article about a strategy of persuasion that worked: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/01/world/europe/portugal-vaccination-rate.html?searchResultPosition=1. I think it could have worked with a lot of the right wing in the US. Not sure about the blacks and Hispanics, though their numbers are way up.
@bhs1978, I think there is good reason to question your statement that “I don’t really care if people I encounter or associate with are vaccinated or not. I really don’t feel that the unvaccinated are any more risky to others than a break through case of a vaccinated individual. They may be more at risk to themselves.” I think @vpa2019 said something similar.
I had presented an explanation but @ucbalumnus said it much moe succinctly: "However, a vaccinated person is:
- less likely to get infected in the first place
- less likely to have a bad case if they do get infected
- likely to be contagious for a shorter period if they do get infected"
So, if your metric is having a lower chance of infection yourself, you probably should be more reluctant to be in the presence of unvaccinated people. Moreover, if your metric is not wanting to be a danger to others, you should prefer to be in contact with a vaccinated person rather than an unvaccinated person.
Even the Golden State Warrior star bowed to pressure and got vaccinated. He wasn’t going to be allowed to play any home games and the NBA allows the team to deduct his pay from each game not played. I guess losing million$$ was enough of an incentive.
I was referring to gatherings where everyone is vaccinated. I said that in the sentence above the one you quoted.
Gatherings in close quarters where there are unvaccinated people is different.
I talked with my relative on the phone yesterday. Her Covid test came back negative, but she definitely has something, likely a bad cold - which is what she suspected TBH.
We talked more about my fears for her and she told me she knew she would die if she ever caught Covid, so made sure she got vaxxed as soon as she could back in March. When I asked her about FB she laughingly told me she just likes to “play” with people on there. For her, it’s pure fun. My son was right next to me when she said it and just shook his head walking away. I really don’t think he was impressed.
I know I’m just relieved. She definitely would have been a candidate to die. I was supposed to see her in person yesterday to get a signature to finish my mom’s estate, but I put it off until Wednesday because I don’t want a cold - esp not the one she has. I’m now debating putting it off until Thursday just to give her one more day to get over the contagious part of it.
But still, when I muse about people sitting in their living rooms or basements coming up with things just to see how far they might go and getting their jollies out of it, she’s not one I’d have pegged to be doing it. Granted she’s not inventing them, just reposting, but - my guys put a bit of time into refuting her things. Now I don’t know that they’ll give her the time of day.
Hmmm. Sounds like a fun, caring person…
I do wonder if a lot of antivaxxers are just interested in riling people up. I mean, all those hypocrites on Fox news are vaxxed and they get paid to rile people up. They never actually say they are antivax though. They simply let others hear what they want to hear.
Another local person in their 30s passed away leaving two sons behind. She was an ER nurse and unvaccinated. I can’t help but think that vaccine mandates could save some people from themselves.
My locality is now at 1 out of every 230 people have died from covid. We look a bit better if you include the entire health district, but even that is now at 1 out of 363… I admit I just put off my dental cleaning off for another 5 weeks. We are still stubbornly at 50-60 cases/day per 100K and have a low vaccination rate. I sort of trust my dentist, but not the other people in there. I can wait. It’s been a couple of years since my last one ( 
) so what’s another month.
Let’s move on from Fox News in general as well.
I misread, my bad.
For real. I put mine off, too, and went in and got treated during the summer window, finished up some restorative work just as delta hit. Really glad I picked that time, too, because there’s a lot of vax refusal/reluctance among dentists and hygienists here. Actually had a big and eventually rather public fight with my old dentist – an excellent man with the teeth, very sorry to walk away from his skills – who’d wouldn’t let me know whether the entire staff was vaxed or no. I didn’t need to know any names or individual vax statuses, but if the answer was “we have some unvaxed, and yes you might wind up in a chair next to one” then definitely not.
Is it possible I could’ve skipped a root canal if I’d gone in earlier…maybe. Easier to fit a crown than to score a new pair of lungs tho.