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| Screenshot from NY Times online Dec 13, 2021 |
Today I learned that Gen Z is "done with the pandemic" , and that nobody cares about COVID. and to stop panicking about Omicron.
You see, people are TIRED of the pandemic, and they just want to get back to their lives, without some killjoy telling them that YES, there is still a pandemic going on and their idea of risk has been so warped over the last year that they think it's actually OK that there are some 1,200 Americans dying every day of this illness, and that the numbers are increasing.
I guess it's because the elderly are not valued in this society, because what else would explain why it's OK that one out of every 100 seniors in the US has already died of COVID?
I understand young people being self centered, or developmentally not likely to be concerned about bringing a killer virus to grandma's house for the holiday, but even youth are at risk, whether they admit it or not. As of July of this year, younger people in the 28-49 year age group (Gen Z and X) became the largest demographic of hospitalized COVID patients. That's not terribly consistent with the "kids get milder cases" belief. The other thing kids get is long COVID, and what's worse, their symptoms can be neurological, and in some cases, permanent.
The next mutation of virus may or may not be more virulent, or more contagious, or more vaccine resistant, and saying one variant associated with lower severity is gaining dominance over a variant with more severe symptoms may not be the good news we wish to believe it is, because regardless of who catches this disease or what symptoms they have, as long as we see the hospitalization and the death rate rising, we're in trouble.
Also remember, hospitals filled with COVID patients may no longer have the resources for the patient arriving by ambulance after an accident, or a heart attack, or a stroke. So COVID related deaths don't just happen to people who actually have COVID.
It's a mess, and in this most wonderful time of the year, it's tempting to be in denial about the things that aren't so wonderful. But pretending that there's no wolf at the door doesn't mean the wolf isn't at the door. COVID is here. It's circulating. It's killing and disabling people. And no one, regardless of your faith in God, your vaccination status, or your age is 100% immune from this virus or the possibility that an infection would be fatal.
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