COVID surging in California. Is it time to bring back masks, hand sanitizer? What experts say
COVID surging in California. Is it time to bring back masks, hand sanitizer? What experts say
California is in the middle of its worst summer COVID wave since 2022, with virus levels and infections surging across the state.
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Bring back? Some of us never stopped.
50At least for covid, hand sanitizer is completely useless, though. It's not transmitted via smear infection (or at least very very rarely).
For other stuff it might be helpful, but even then moderation is a virtue, since that stuff dries out your skin and might create more open wounds - ask any nurse.
13May I ask why? Legit question. I still occasionally see folks masking and such in my area, but the vast majority of people have gone back to pre-pandemic behaviors. Cases still pop up here and there but most folks treat it like flu… if you get sick, stay home until you’re better.
If you’ve got an immune issue, I get it. But otherwise, why bother?
12why bother?
Because being sick is inconvenient and I’m a busy person with shit to do.
If it’s something like BART during commute hours, I wear a mask. Before the pandemic I was sick once a month from riding that stupid subway. Now that I mask in tight crowded places, that happens much less often.
60I don’t know if I’m sick, masks help reduce spread. masks seem to help a little in getting sick too.
I’ll pull mine out in the train and in other crowded indoor situations. Outdoors I won’t.
29if you get sick, stay home until you’re better.
A lot of people weren't doing that before, and still aren't now.
20Because it (n95, kf94, etc) helps protect myself from getting other airborne diseases like the flu, especially in crowded places like concerts. I also live in a place that has some type of allergen (pollen, ragweed, etc) all year round, and masking outdoors helps reduce the impact of allergies.
15I have a toddler who brings home new sicknesses every damn week, it seems, and I work in a small enclosed shop with my coworkers, customers coming and going all the time, and a 90 year-old boss who might well die if he gets sick. I'm the primary threat to all of them, so I never stopped wearing a mask at work.
13Simple for me: I loooove food. I hate colds, because then I can't taste. Between 2020-2023 I never got a cold where I'd normally get one 1-3 times a year.
I haven't gotten one in 2024 yet either. I will gladly wear a mask in public places and use hand sanitizer if it means a lower chance of getting a cold.
Others mileage may vary.
10It's an easy way to avoid getting or spreading a debilitating disease.
9COVID causes long term health problems if you're unlucky.
It's not a flu it's sars and should be treated as such.
8if you get sick, stay home until you’re better.
Some of us need to make money to pay bills and stuff...
6Depending on the venue it's absolutely straightforward sense to wear a mask. Airports, trains, concerts, generally any crowded poorly ventilated indoors.
5Besides other people 's excellent points, there's the matter of keeping loved ones from getting it who are more vulnerable. My spouse is fully vaccinated but I've seen him hospitalized too many times for what started as a cold or flu and became pneumonia. Neither of us has ever caught COVID and I intend to keep it that way.
5Uhh have you heard of long COVID? More and more people are becoming disabled because of this. Before too long it'll be more common to have it than not.
5COVID might stick around in your organs and causing a plethora of bad (even fatal) long term effects even when asymptomatic. It's not anything like flu.
Edit: wanting -> anything
2
I'm with you. I was on a plane in January and couldn't believe I was the only one.
5I never wore one, I'm still alive.
-16All those people who are so scared of masks are freaking weird man.
10Almost like my uncle. Almost, because he’s dead.
9Good for you? Over 7million people aren't.
8You're awesome 😎!
I'd love to give you a Dixie cup of apple juice and a Graham cracker, and a little square of carpet so you can be comfy with a full tum-tum during story time, but I don't know where your kindergarten is.
5
In countries that have high pollution rates, wearing a mask is normal, for pollution. Only in America is trying to take care of yourself viewed as wrong. I literally don't care if other people think I'm bizarre, I will wear a mask whenever I feel like it.
43I have never understood how people would want to get sick more, or be served by people who could get them sick. Who has time and money for all this illness?
6
Uh yeah. Those of us can't afford to be more sick that we already are never stopped wearing masks. I'm disabled and catching COVID once, while not too bad in the acute phase, has wreaked havoc on my health long term. It's not worth fucking around and finding out.
31I hate that COVID has become normal. I know it was destined to become normal the moment it spread outside of China, but I hate that it has. It wouldn't bother me if it was just COVID - it'd suck but it wouldn't be a big deal. However, the fact that COVID can be so destructive, even in mild cases, is what concerns me. The fact that someone can have a mild case of COVID but have the symptoms stick around for months, years, or even permanently, makes me wonder if COVID is going to be the next lead (alongside microplastics). The more you get it, the higher the chance it'll fuck you up, and if everyone gets COVID >10 times over their life, that's a pretty big chance to permanently fuck up your brain and body; and the damage is going to add up every time you get it.
I know that >10 cases seems like a lot for one person, but considering the vaccines don't have a 100% prevention rate and that vaccinated people can still get long-covid, I don't think it'd be far off for people who were under 20yrs old during the lockdown. I've had COVID 2~3 times (one was unconfirmed but felt like COVID) so far despite the fact that I still don't go out much, I've been trying to keep up with vaccines and I've been trying to stay masked (though I've gotten kinda lax on the latter). That means I have an average of about 0.5~0.75 times a year since COVID first happened despite trying to avoid it. Someone who doesn't bother trying to avoid it might have a significantly higher rate.
Is COVID gonna be the new dementia? It sounds like we're making some pretty big strides in figuring out dementia so I'm honestly betting that it won't really be a thing in another 20yrs (or we'll discover that it's basically impossible to prevent without another 100yrs of biotech); is COVID gonna take over as the primary cause of abnormal mental and/or physical decline?
17Already 4 million people out of work in the US because of long covid, and 8% of the population are reporting it.
Yet like dementia was a couple decades ago, it is being treated by parts of the medico-political establishment as if it is the patient’s fault, or even a mental illness.
We never learn, nearly every new chronic illness that popped up was first treated as “hysteria” or “mental” or “psychosomatic” in the past, until we figured out the pathology. From most autoimmune diseases, to peptic ulcer to epilepsy…
11
Right from the outset, my wife's coworker got her sick, which spread to my two little kids and then to me. They only work two days a week in person and it's not heavily enforced, but people still lack the fucking common sense to quarantine themself after symptoms go away but when you're still contagious. Smh
9but people still lack the fucking common sense to quarantine themself after symptoms go away but when you're still contagious. Smh
CDC says to go back to work and resume normal activities 24 hours after symptoms start to improve but they may still be present.
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2024/p0301-respiratory-virus.html
What common sense are you relying on here and why does it go against CDC guidelines?
0The CDC guidelines aren't about prevention but a trade off between prevention and economic activity.
You can very well be contagious during that period, but it's too much of a burden on the system to wait until you are definitely not contagious.
Up here in Canada when they changed the rules and had the big press conference they even explicitly mentioned that it was in part due to economic reasons and it would allow some additional spread when asked directly.
Edit: and they even recommended wearing masks to work for a few more days afterwards just in case, but of course no one did.
4While I think the CDC is correct in this particular case, you'll have to excuse those of us who no longer trust the CDC after they intentionally lied to the public numerous times during the Covid-19 pandemic and contributed to the death and permanent injuries of US Americans who became infected due to their misinformation.
2
I was recently traveling around the pacific and 20% of all chinese, australians, and americans were coughing up a storm, not a mask in sight (other than us)
7Fucking people...
1
Bring back? I never stopped using either.
6Well done! Shame not more people are doing it.
3
I think avoiding crowded indoor areas and washing your hands every time you return home, or before eating or drinking anything, are good policies in general. If more people just did those things we'd see less communicable disease overall.
Then again I'm routinely horrified by the amount of people who barely wash (or don't wash at all) their hands before exiting public restrooms...
5Recently got to help clean some piece of shit's old apartment so friends could move in. There were yellow-ish stains around the lightswitch. And plenty of other places around the loo too, but point is: some people are disgusting.
3
I flew across the pacific 2 weeks ago and people are coughing everywhere, with no masks. This is global.
2Covid is airborne so not sure why they mention hand sanitizer.
1You can absolutely become infected with Covid by having touched something someone coughed on.
7
My work has moved to a "hybrid" model, aka forcing people into office. I was in 2 weeks ago... And caught COVID. For over a week, existence has been... Not great. I do not feel like myself yet. First day in a while I even played video games, and it took a lot of effort. My breathing is way better than it was a few days ago. But my mind is still so... Cloudy isn't the right word... It's like if your brain is normally powered by your local power grid... It's now powered by a AA battery that you found in the junk drawer. There are things I can't remember to things that I know I know very well. There were days I woke up drenched in sweat so I assume I was running a high fever for a few days.
All that to say is I wish we weren't at this point we're covid still a thing. We had an opportunity to eradicate it. I did everything right. I got all my shots, I got boosters regularly, and even when I was forced into office I isolated away from people but it wasn't enough.
0He’s a good boy!
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