I can't believe I'm still writing these. Nineteen months of anxiety, uncertainty, disbelief, and disgust. It's become a chore, but I can't stop now. I want to see this pandemic through to the other side, whatever that is.
In recent weeks, experts have been saying COVID may never go away completely. As herd immunity builds through people getting vaccinated or sick with the virus, we'll transition from a pandemic to an endemic situation, similar to the seasonal flu. The virus will be around but won't threaten the general population and will be manageable.
But they're not saying when that will happen....
Sun., Sept. 19
- Horse owners couldn't find ivermectin, as Americans flocked to the unproven COVID cure.
- The U.S. had 2,000 deaths a day.
- There was a COVID surge in West Virginia, worse than ever.
- COVID had killed about as many Americans as the 1918-19 flu.
- A study by Pfizer showed a low dose of its vaccine was safe for ages 5-11.
- Insurers reinstated deductibles and co-payments, no longer waiving those costs for Americans with COVID.
- Johnson & Johnson announced a second dose of its shot, given eight weeks after its single-shot vaccine, increased protection against symptomatic and severe COVID.
- The Biden Administration announced it had opened a civil rights investigation into Gov. Greg Abbott's (R) mask ban in Texas school districts.
- A traveler from Hawaii to American Samoa was the U.S. territory's first coronavirus case, 18 months after the pandemic began.
- Pres. Biden had a virtual COVID summit, at which he announced the U.S. would buy 500 million Pfizer-BioNTech doses and distribute them to other countries, bringing the total of donated shots to 1.1 billion.
- Anti-vaccine activists were accused of fomenting angry crowds that mobbed the streets of Melbourne, Australia’s second-most-populous city.
- According to a WalletHub survey, Massachusetts was the safest state in regard to COVID; Vermont was second. The survey compared the rates of vaccination, transmission, test positivity, hospitalization. and death.
- CDC Director Michelle Walensky ignored advice from her own agency and went with the FDA's recommendation to authorize Pfizer boosters for high-risk workers.
- President Biden urged front-line workers, people over 65, and those with underlying health conditions who got Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine to receive a booster shot.
- Pandemic-related phishing attempts in June increased 33 percent, compared to a lull this spring and early summer, when concerns about the virus temporarily waned.
- People eligible for a third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine include those 65 and older, those who live in nursing homes, and those at high risk of severe disease owing to their jobs or medical conditions.
- In communities where few people were vaccinated, hospitals had 10 times the number of COVID patients compared to patients admitted in highly vaccinated regions.
- About 10 percent of the American population wasn't vaccinated but was open ideologically to getting a shot. The “unvaccinated but willing” faced barriers that didn't come from their politics.
- New York's vaccine mandate for health-care workers was to begin Monday, and state officials were preparing for hospitals staffing shortages as a result.
- A worldwide lack of semiconductors was worsening as the pandemic caused production delays and other bottlenecks.
- At the U.N. General Assembly, several African nations voiced displeasure with the unequal distribution of vaccines worldwide. Hage Geingob, the president of Namibia, described the situation as “vaccine apartheid.”
- Idaho morgues were running out of space.
- President Biden got a Pfizer booster shot.
- The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education extended the school mask mandate to Nov. 1, unless a school reaches 80% vaccination rate.
- About 200,000 children contracted COVID last week, for the fifth week in a row.
- YouTube blocked antivaccine posts and banned antivaxxers like Joseph Mercola and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
- Side effects from a booster shot should be the same as after a second mRNA vaccine--oh, goody!
- In one of the largest vaccine-related firings, a North Carolina-based hospital system dismissed 175 unvaccinated employees.
- In New York, possibly tens of thousands of health-care workers had refused to get immunized, which would worsen the staffing shortage already experienced by medical centers.
- With a possible government shutdown looming, the Biden Administration developed a contingency plan for the CDC to still track covid-19 cases and deaths, and about a fourth of National Institutes of Health staff to remain working.
- The lack of available child care was keeping mothers out of work. Labor Department data indicated there were 126,700 fewer workers in the child-care industry compared with pre-pandemic levels.
- The Internal Revenue Service and other federal agencies were still struggling to work through pandemic backlogs, and a government shutdown would make things worse.
- The Amherst school district became the first in Massachusetts to issue a vaccine mandate.
- Congress passed a continuing resolution to keep the government open until Dec. 3.
- Dell was commemorated in the "In America Flags" display on the National Mall. A volunteer wrote my dedication to her on one of the small, white flags: "Ardella Hultman, devoted mother, wife, grandmother, great-grandmother, and friend. Her warmth and energy drew people to her wherever she went."
- California announced it would require schoolkids to get the coronavirus vaccine pending full FDA approval, making it the first state to enact such a rule.
- Pharmaceutical company Merck and its partner, Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, announced an experimental pill (molnupiravir) that could reduce the risk of death and hospitalization from COVID.
- The patchwork quality of the country's pandemic statistics hindered progress against the virus.
- With about 85 percent of its population fully vaccinated, Portugal's vaccination campaign was nearly complete. It offered a case study of life in a well-vaccinated environment. The virus still caused cancellations and sickness, but the nation had a low death rate — nine times below that of the United States. And the country's capital, Lisbon, was thriving, with nightclubs set to reopen.
- Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh tested positive for the virus, despite being fully vaccinated, right before the start of the new Supreme Court session.
- Leaders of the National School Boards Association sounded the alarm because crowds angry over mask mandates and other politicized issues had mobbed meetings.
- The U.S. reached 700,000 dead from COVID.
- Cases were down 35% since Sept. 1.
- Police officers, along with firefighters and first responders, were not getting vaccines in the large numbers people predicted.
- Twenty-seven percent of COVID cases were kids; kids were 22% of the population.
- Millions of Indian kids had been out of school for 18 months. The break threatened decades of progress.
- The FDA approved the sale of an at-home antigen test made by Acon Laboratories.
- Johnson & Johnson requested FDA emergency use authorization for a booster.
- The White House announced it would buy $1 billion worth of rapid, at-home coronavirus tests to address ongoing shortages.
- Los Angeles enacted one of the nation's strictest vaccine mandates.
- The fourth wave was ebbing, but experts warned not to ease restrictions.
- Deaths per day in the U.S. had dropped by 15% since mid-September. New cases per day were 103,000, a drop of 40% in the last three weeks.
- Retailers were warning of shortages of toys and other gifts at Christmas, due to shipping delays from China. There was a shortage of shipping containers as ships lined up outside ports due to short staffing.
- According to a study in the journal Pediatrics, 140,000 U.S. children had lost a primary caregiver to COVID by the end of June. Two-thirds were children of color. The number was estimated to be 175,000 by now.
- More than 5.7 million children had been infected since the pandemic began, data from the American Academy of Pediatrics showed. 540 people ages 18 or younger had died.
- For the first time since early August, COVID cases in the U.S. dropped below 100,000 a day.
- Pharmaceutical companies Pfizer and BioNTech submitted an application to the FDA, seeking emergency use authorization for their coronavirus vaccine for children 5 to 11 years old. The government had purchased enough of the Pfizer vaccine to give two doses to each of the 28 million children in this age group.
- The Labor Department reported underwhelming employment figures — the economy added only 194,000 jobs in September, as economic recovery slowed amid the spread of the Delta variant.
- Florida's Board of Education was withholding salaries of school board members in districts where students were required to wear masks, and it recently voted to further withhold funds equal to federal grants meant to offset this penalty. The U.S. Department of Education, though, said this punishment may be illegal.
- Members of the nation’s largest law enforcement agency, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, were opposing the vaccine mandate for federal employees.
- The Small Business Administration's inspector general concluded a pandemic relief program designed for entrepreneurs overpaid by $4.5 billion last year.
- Mom got her Pfizer booster.
- In a tragic paradox, those who were pregnant were simultaneously more likely to experience severe illness and death from COVID and less likely to get the shot capable of preventing such suffering. Just 26 percent of pregnant Americans had received at least one dose of the coronavirus vaccine while expecting, according to CDC data. Their reluctance appeared to be driven partly by months of unclear guidance and a lack of data for the expectant, both of which persisted until this summer — a consequence of their exclusion from early coronavirus vaccine trials.
- The Boston Marathon ran for the first time since April 2019.
- Pharmaceutical giant Merck asked the FDA to grant emergency use authorization to its experimental COVID antiviral treatment – an oral medication that could be promising in the global fight against the coronavirus pandemic. The treatment, a pill named molnupiravir that cut hospitalizations and deaths by about half in early trials, could be an especially important tool in poor countries, where vaccine supply was low.
- AstraZeneca submitted for FDA review its antibody cocktail that, the company said, decreased risk of death and hospitalization by about half in at-risk patients with coronavirus infections.
- While traditional Halloween celebrations last year were discouraged by federal health agencies, this year Americans could look forward to enjoying the spooky fun of outdoor trick-or-treating, said Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious-disease doctor.
- Of the most critically ill COVID patients in England, nearly 20 percent were unvaccinated pregnant women, according to data from the National Health Service.
- Sydney, Australia, ended a 106-day COVID lockdown.
- Gov. Baker activated the National Guard to help with COVID testing in schools and correctional facilities.
- Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signed an order forbidding businesses to require vaccination of employees or customers.
- The Biden Administration announced the Canada border would reopen in November.
- Pres. Biden reached agreement with the Port of Los Angeles to stay open 24/7 to help supply-chain problems. There was still a shortage of truck drivers. Forty-percent of goods coming into the U.S. come through the ports of L.A. and Long Beach. There were 52 container ships waiting offshore.
- Congress approved a 5.9% cost-of-living increase in Jan. for Social Security beneficiaries, the largest in four decades.
- Gas prices were up 42% from a year ago; groceries were up 4.5%.
- The World Health Organization named 26 scientists to a new advisory body devoted to understanding the origins of the coronavirus and other future outbreaks, marking a significant change in approach by the world’s top global health body to one of the most politically sensitive issues of the pandemic.
- The CDC downgraded Hampshire County from "high" transmission to "substantial." Cases were down 71% in the last two weeks.
- A National Institutes of Health study showed people who got the Johnson & Johnson vaccine did better with a Pfizer or Moderna booster than with a J&J.
- One in five American households had postponed a needed surgery during the pandemic due to hospitals being full of COVID patients.
- Florida issued a $3.5 million fine to Leon County for its vaccine mandate.
- An FDA advisory panel recommended a half-dose Moderna booster for those over 65 or with other health problems.
- I went shopping at Big Y-Amherst while Sarah was at gymnastics. I saw an employee approach two college-aged men and ask them to put on masks because a customer had complained. A few minutes later, I crossed paths with them. One was wearing his mask under his chin, and the other wasn't wearing one. I had had it. I walked up to them and said, "You two are so selfish that you can't wear masks for a few minutes while you shop? How sad." They started arguing with me and accused me of reporting them before. I told them it wasn't me but I saw them asked nicely to comply, and they refused. I called them punks(!). I went to an employee to report them again, and the employee said he couldn't do anything but call the police, and they'd be gone by then. I let it go. I'm so sick of selfish people!
- An FDA advisory panel recommended a booster for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine for everyone 18 and older, two months after the first shot.
- A Gallup poll showed nearly half of Americans were actively job searching. So many workers quitting or retiring all at once was leading to what was being called the Great Resignation.
- The Biden Administration announced the U.S. would lift travel restrictions Nov. 8 for fully vaccinated overseas visitors — including those from more than two dozen nations who had been barred from entering the country since the start of the pandemic.
- More than half a million clinicians and other workers had left health care since February 2020.
- Launched initially in Brevard County, Florida, to support “parental rights” in public schools, Moms for Liberty chapters had spread nationwide. Its leaders hoped to convert brawlish pandemic-era cultural divisions into lasting political power.
- Everywhere from offices to factories, Italian workers faced a new requirement for entering and earning a paycheck: They had to first flash the QR code of a government-issued health pass.
Sat., Oct. 16
- Don got his Pfizer booster and annual flu vaccine at Walmart.
- Vaccination rates had risen by more than 20 percentage points after multiple institutions adopted vaccine requirements, while case numbers and deaths from the virus are down. Roughly 66 million eligible Americans still were not vaccinated, but that was a huge improvement from 80 million or so before Biden rolled out his directive on vaccine mandates in early September.
Once again, we seem to be headed in the right direction (not Idaho, but oh well). I thank my lucky stars that I don't live there, or Florida, or Texas...pretty much anywhere other than New England. Some people have taken leave of their senses...over something so simple as wearing a mask to protect themselves and others. Trump's toxic legacy goes on and on.
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