Mid-July covid-19 check

So, how are you all doing?

-what's the situation in your state?
-do you think it will improve soon?
-what steps are necessary to protect everyone at this point in your opinion?
-should schools and businesses open up?

For me, Minnesota. It hasn't become drastically bad yet, but it's slowly trending upwards. Wisconsin's case numbers are starting to make me nervous as well. I think Walz has handled it alright, but in my opinion he caved too soon and lifted the restrictions as cases were still rising.

My work is probably the safest place I go for now (college campus, it's a ghost town). I'm most concerned for my health at grocery stores, and I still refuse to eat at restaurants. It's been most shocking to see the vast number of people not bothering with masks. I hope that doesn't continue.

We need: stay at home order reinstated, moratorium on rent/mortgage (with bailout money for banks and landlords), unemployment benefits extensions (based on severity of outbreak instead of having a hard time limit), and for schools to stay online only.

I recognize that's a big wishlist, but I foresee all those things happening eventually anyway. I'd much rather be doing them proactively instead of reactively. So what's the situation in your area?

 

In South Carolina we are having a drastic rise in cases. I am not a worrier, but this has had me uncomfortable. My office works at half staff and we have hand sanitizer stations and a thermometer at the entrance. But it seems most folks are walking around as though all is well. I rather think at the outset when everyone was quarantined folks got fed up with being isolated and now as a result are just acting normal. I wear a mask when I do anywhere, but only see about 50% of others wearing them. And the cases in my state are in the thousands each day now.

I don't know what the answer is. Staying home and hoping cash shows up in the bank account doesn't seem rational. Neither does being out and about like all is normal. Previous summers I would be out at car shows each Saturday afternoon. I haven't attended any but my friends tell me they are more well attended this year than ever before. Restaurants seem to have full parking lots. We are building new school facilities all over the state and have no idea if we will have kids in them. I don't know the answer. Obviously nobody does.

 

You're absolutely right on that. It's difficult but this is really turning out to be a marathon instead of a sprint to beat covid-19.

Do you think schools should reopen? Will they be opening next month in your state? I'm pretty worried about the potential for children to spread it between each other and to their family members personally.

 

They are saying school will reopen. And for the life of me, I don’t know how they can rationalize that. What happens when one child in a class tests positive? Do we then quarantine the class or the school? If we were in a state of decline I would be on board with school opening. We closed our schools when my state was having 100-150 cases a day. We are now shattering 2000 cases a day and we are talking about exposing our children to that next month. It’s absolutely unreasonable.

One of my favorite movies is Armageddon. If you haven’t seen it, NASA hires a group of oil rig guys to drill an oncoming asteroid. There is a scene where Bruce Willis (leader of the oil rig guys) says to the NASA administrator.. “You guys are NASA. You are the smartest guys in the world. And more smart guys backing them up and more smart guys backing them up.... And this is the best you got?”...... I keep hearing that line go through my mind as we stumble aimlessly through this mess.

 

Totally agree with you, and I think if schools do open it won't be long before they shut down again.

I have seen Armageddon, good movie! On a lighthearted note, here's a short and funny commentary Ben Affleck did on conversations with the director about the premise of the movie, somewhat related to what you're bringing up:

 

people with nothing to lose don't wear masks. This doesn't mean we should play games by opening up schools. During Pandemics schools are always the first thing we close. Trump doesn't give a damn about them and you know it

 

How's your area handling the virus?

 

141 cases in the county, under 10 deaths. problem is we have summer tourists and are seeing a spike from 4th of july parties

 

Let me ask you a question that I wonder about. You are young and in love with a new bride..... Does all this make you and your wife question whether or not you want to start a family?.... And I don’t really mean that as a personal question really. I’m not probing or anything..... The challenges that I faced as a young newlywed were keeping an old car running and making ends meet. Pretty mundane stuff considering what young couples have to consider in 2020.

 

No worries, we're not having children anytime soon, but it's always been our plan to wait for our early 30s. Which I guess is only 5 or so years away... Closer than I thought!

Hypothetically, if we were attempting to have children when covid hit, we would definitely have stopped trying though. The risk to ourselves and to a newborn with a naive immune system would be too great.

Before covid, we're still concerned about massive student debt, finding stable and gainful employment in our fields, and potentially taking on a mortgage. We're still renting, loving in the heart of Minneapolis, but would probably want to move somewhere more spacious for family life.

 

Is your town acting responsibly? What could they be doing better?

141/10 is either great or horrible, depending on the size of the county.

 

I'm seeing a lot less people wearing masks especially as time goes by. deep red county

 

We could end this pandemic in a month if everyone wore a mask outside other their house. We are a careless, selfish, spoiled people in my opinion. At lease enough of us are to make the rest of us look bad. We are doing OK in my state but we had a governor that shut things down pretty early on. It seems to have paid off. We are beginning to see spikes again because of the opening of some businesses that used to be strictly takeout and customer appointment only based operations.

Our schools are re-opening in some fashion next month but will shut down if things begin to bad.

 

My church has continued with web based services. We won't open the doors until we have three weeks of a downward trend in local cases. Nonetheless, we have three member that have contracted Covid in the last two weeks. Spoke to my granddaughter this morning. She sounds like the devil and was tested this morning. I am anxiously awaiting the results....... Our state has been on an upward trend for six weeks now. I am seriously considering not sending my daughter to school.

 

Sounds like you've all been going through a rough time. I hope your granddaughter does alright and stays healthy. I was tested recently and luckily came back negative, but it's not a fun test to get!

Do what you believe is best for your family's safety with your daughter, and I wish you all the best. This won't last forever, we will get through it. I've been hearing lots of good news from various sources on a vaccine in the near future.

 

I had an eye opening experience last night. My wife gets the groceries. I seldom go into a grocery store but last night we needed some milk. Now mind you, I am in a rural type area. The outskirts of town. We have two relatively new fully modern grocery stores a stones throw from the house. I went to the Lowes Foods, a national grocery firm. The shelves were almost bare on several isles. The cleaning supplies isle was almost entirely bare. That set me back just a bit. Being an older fellow that has grown up in a land of plenty, I almost felt a bit anxious about seeing that. I didn't know we were still facing shortages on our shelves.

 

Yeah, we're definitely still feeling the double edged sword of the shutdowns. On one hand it's saving a lot of people from dying, on the other production is slowed in a lot of areas and people panic buy when things start to look bad again. Tough situation all around.

 

This is both a public health crisis and an national economic crisis. Neither will be solved with out solving both. The fact that we are polarized with the Left calling it mostly a health crisis and the Right calling it mostly an economic crisis couldn't paint a better picture of the differences between the two sides in my opinion. But again, the fact is that this is and always has been both.

With no national strategy put forth by the Trump Administration, each state is left on its own to deal with the pandemic. That hasn't turned out well as we can see. The problem is that the longer we drag out the painful partially open, partially closed, partially open again, and on and on, the longer both the pandemic and the economic devastation will last. There is a solution that would end this outright but we don't have the national leadership to handle the problem and we really don't have the leadership we need in an election year.

The solution is a 4 week total shutdown. Shut everything down completely for four weeks. No flights, no bars, no parties, no restaurants, nothing. The pandemic would cease in a month. But we lack the courage/intelligence/political will and especially the leadership do end this once and for all.

 

It's early September. My daughter went to school three days this week and did on-line classes two days. I am old and there is very little I fear in my life. But the hopelessness I feel when I put my baby on the bus just eats me from the inside out. I can protect her from bad people and bad things. I cannot protect her from a virus and it just makes me sick....... I saw a blurb where the states were told to be prepared for a vaccination in November. Is there any truth to that?

 

I think so on the vaccination. I've been hearing a lot of positive news in science circles it will be ready by the end of 2020 or early 2021. The real question after that is how long it will take to mass-produce it. I assume vulnerable populations like the elderly and immunocompromised will get the first round of treatment. I'm pretty sure school age children will be not far behind that group, to ensure schools are safe to send kids to. Not too much longer! What a year though.