Coronavirus and Walt Disney World general discussion

[GoofGoof]

Right, as a condition of dropping masks at work, not as a condition of employment as the original poster was talking about.

Only a small handful of companies have come forward requiring vaccination as a condition of employment.

Right. I thought that’s what @Touchdown said. He said he would require it for work but most employers will just require proof to drop masks. I think we are saying the same thing

 

[GoofGoof]

Since Florida and some other states are not reporting numbers everyday this weekend, you cant believe the numbers the NY Times are any other organization is putting out this weekend. On Tuesday they every state will report their number so Tuesday night or Wednesday morning's report will be correct. However unless they break out the numbers per day the average daily resort will be wrong for another week.

Just look at weekly averages but wait about a week to look. Testing and reporting will be way down over a holiday weekend.

 

[GoofGoof]

I don’t have an altruistic view enough of governments to give them the right to mandate a medical treatment by law to all citizens.

All kids have vaccines mandated by the government. There are ways to get out of it for the anti-vaxx crowd but typically 95% of people comply. I wouldn’t call a vaccine a medical treatment. It’s in and out of your system within a period of a few days.

 

[Chi84]

The second article references this survey.

https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/ASU-Workplace-Commons-Phase-2-Report-4-28-21.pdf

From the survey:
60% Will require employees to demonstrate proof of vaccination

It doesn’t say they will require vaccination to work at all. A large number of employers have started requiring proof of vaccination to drop masks at work. In some states like NJ it’s a requirement. Employers must verify vaccination status to allow employees to go unmasked.

What I've noticed in local restaurants is that customers take their cue from restaurant staff. Our usual fast-casual place took the "masks required" sign off the door but still requires all staff to wear masks (the manager said corporate is still deciding what to do). Almost every customer wore masks unless at their table.

At Capitol Grille last night, the sign said that masks were no longer required for vaccinated persons. We were greeted by a manager and two hosts - only the younger host wore a mask. None of the servers wore masks, but several of the support staff did wear them. We noticed that most of the people (definitely an older crowd) did not wear masks at all. Some families split between masks and no masks.

It was such a great change from our trip to WDW a few weeks ago where servers in Disney-owned restaurants were required to wear both masks and shields. (DS restaurants required only masks). It will take awhile for people to adjust, but I definitely see them becoming more comfortable going without them.

 

[Epcotbob]

Right, because business owners would never consider letting go the employees who costs the business more money than other employees.

Oh, I’m sure they would consider it, and many companies did consider it. But I’m guessing when they looked at how that would actually play out, who and how many they would have to fire, it became untenable.

Heck, even the CEO of United Airlines, who was pushing hard for companies to fire unvaxxed employees backed down and is not requiring it for his own company.

 

[GoofGoof]

What I've noticed in local restaurants is that customers take their cue from restaurant staff. Our usual fast-casual place took the "masks required" sign off the door but still requires all staff to wear masks (the manager said corporate is still deciding what to do). Almost every customer wore masks unless at their table.

At Capitol Grille last night, the sign said that masks were no longer required for vaccinated persons. We were greeted by a manager and two hosts - only the younger host wore a mask. None of the servers wore masks, but several of the support staff did wear them. We noticed that most of the people (definitely an older crowd) did not wear masks at all. Some families split between masks and no masks.

It was such a great change from our trip to WDW a few weeks ago where servers in Disney-owned restaurants were required to wear both masks and shields. (DS restaurants required only masks). It will take awhile for people to adjust, but I definitely see them becoming more comfortable going without them.

What I’ve seen so far is large corporations are more likely to require employees to show proof of vaccination to go mask free in corporate, office settings and/or factory and warehouse settings. Many of the larger retail companies are going with the honor system. I personally know of half a dozen Fortune 500 companies who have adopted the CDC guidelines for no masks for fully vaccinated workers and are going beyond just the honor system and requiring workers to show proof. I’ve seen several large manufacturers also adopt this. The Target and Walmart type companies seem to be relying on the honor system or places like Disney are just continuing to require masks for everyone.

As I said before, I work in NJ and it’s required by state law now that if an employer wants to allow fully vaccinated workers to drop the masks they must require proof of vaccination. The honor system for employees is not allowed. For customers the honor system is OK. I think there are at least 3 other states doing something similar.

 

[GoofGoof]

Oh, I’m sure they would consider it, and many companies did consider it. But I’m guessing when they looked at how that would actually play out, who and how many they would have to fire, it became untenable.

Heck, even the CEO of United Airlines, who was pushing hard for companies to fire unvaxxed employees backed down and is not requiring it for his own company.

It’s too soon to know what the future will hold. These vaccines are all still only in EUA and there is no historical precedent for requiring vaccines that aren’t fully authorized except maybe in the military. If covid becomes endemic and sticks around indefinitely and the vaccines get full FDA authorization we may see more places requiring it going forward. It’s too soon to know if that will happen or not.

 

[Disney Glimpses]

It’s too soon to know what the future will hold. These vaccines are all still only in EUA and there is no historical precedent for requiring vaccines that aren’t fully authorized except maybe in the military. If covid becomes endemic and sticks around indefinitely and the vaccines get full FDA authorization we may see more places requiring it going forward. It’s too soon to know if that will happen or not.

Correct, it would be highly unethical and possibly illegal to require a vaccination that is not approved by the FDA for employment status.

However, full FDA approval will come later this year which will pave the way for companies to require employees to get vaccinated (whether they agree to wear a mask or not). Question is, will COVID be enough of an issue by then for companies to still be motivated to do so. All things, in the United States, point to no. Thankfully, we have the luxury of unlimited Pfizer/Moderna shots which are likely to set us apart long term from other countries using less efficacious vaccines.

Additionally, COVID appears to be endemic in the United States right now from a true epidemiology perspective (the CDC's "you're responsible for your health messaging" along with widespread use of the honor system regarding masks supports this). From a cultural perspective, endemic status is a ways away. Probably not for a year.

Re: WDW, remember, it's Florida. WDW has shown they are already willing to divorce the domestic parks on COVID-19 policies (among other things), due to varying political and cultural ideologies; and they will continue to do so.

 

[Tony the Tigger]

If I was an employer I would most certainly require my employees to be vaccinated to remain employed for these simple reasons:

1. It prevents an employee from getting Covid 19 which results in at best a long period of an employee being unable to work.

2. It saves me health insurance money by avoiding hospitalizations.

3. I can advertise to nervous customers that all my staff is vaccinated.

I would totally do it, but I think most are just going to mandate masks for all unvaccinated employees, and you need to show HR proof you are vaccinated to be exempt.

Fortunately, I did not have to face that decision. I only have a handful of employees, I know them all fairly well. I know who went for what shot when. I know who I had to schedule off the day after their second shot, etc.

I encouraged them, I went first and shared my experience, I let them know when there was an opening at a local drug store owned by a friend of mine, etc. I thought about what I would do if anyone refused to get one, but hoped there would be no decision necessary. The last one got his first shot a few days ago, so we're good.

I have not asked for proof of vaccination. It seems odd anyone in our little group would go to such lengths to pretend to go twice and so forth.

And it has given me an excuse to have a sign on the doors stating: "Masks are still required at least until all of our staff have been fully vaccinated." So we have another 6 weeks or so of that.

Easy to say when you are not actually an employer having to consider who you might have to actually fire. There is a reason hardly any employers are doing it.

Only a small handful of companies have come forward requiring vaccination as a condition of employment.

What it came down to for me was: Firing anyone would be inconsistent with how we've run the business for the last year. Nobody was vaccinated, and we did just fine. Firing them now for not being vaccinated would make no sense, especially since it's safer now. However, they would be required to continue wearing masks for a longer period of time if they didn't get vaccinated.

 

[DisneyFan32]

Correct, it would be highly unethical and possibly illegal to require a vaccination that is not approved by the FDA for employment status.

However, full FDA approval will come later this year which will pave the way for companies to require employees to get vaccinated (whether they agree to wear a mask or not). Question is, will COVID be enough of an issue by then for companies to still be motivated to do so. All things, in the United States, point to no. Thankfully, we have the luxury of unlimited Pfizer/Moderna shots which are likely to set us apart long term from other countries using less efficacious vaccines.

Additionally, COVID appears to be endemic in the United States right now from a true epidemiology perspective (the CDC's "you're responsible for your health messaging" along with widespread use of the honor system regarding masks supports this). From a cultural perspective, endemic status is a ways away. Probably not for a year.

Re: WDW, remember, it's Florida. WDW has shown they are already willing to divorce the domestic parks on COVID-19 policies (among other things), due to varying political and cultural ideologies; and they will continue to do so.

I'm scared about COVID endemic means more surges / spikes or outbreaks in the future.....masks and social distancing is here to stay for years....

 

[Disney Glimpses]

I'm scared about COVID endemic means more surges / spikes or outbreaks in the future.....masks and social distancing is here to stay for years....

Probably not. The reason masks/distancing were necessary over the last year was because we had no other way to mitigate the significantly high risk of morbidity and mortality. Cases don't drive the need for masks/distancing; deaths and hospitalizations do.

We can now get ahead of mortality significantly with vaccination; far more than our flu vaccines can. Due to highly effective vaccines, COVID mortality next year should be less than the next flu season. Thank God.

The 2019-2020 flu season resulted in an annualized rate of death of 152 per 1 million people. The current annualized rate of death of COVID-19 in the United States is 63 per 1 million people. This is why things are reopening without masks for those who remain perplexed.

However, we need to stay vigilant and continue to get vaccinated.

 

[Animaniac93-98]

The 70%-75% (approximately 60% of the total population) pulled out of the air by the Canadian government I think is both cautious, but also obtainable for that population. Which seems to be nicely driving acceptance. Whatever the right answer is, more is always better.

Speaking of which, with Canada now over 56% of the total population with at least one dose, it looks like 60% will happen before Friday and 70-75% well before July 1.

 

[AmesTARDIS]

I commend your dedication to weed through all these posts. As someone who posted from almost the beginning here I apologize for saying some of the same stuff over and over...and then changing my mind a few months later . It’s been a roller coaster ride and got pretty heated at times but it’s been therapeutic just to try to talk out the problems and try to understand where other people are coming from.

It was a lot to be sure. Lol There was a lot of skimming and scanning. This was a tough thread to just dive into. In any case, I found you to be quite reasonable. We all had preconceived ideas and ideologies. You had a position, but obviously kept an open mind. The information dump over the past year, from experts or otherwise, was a beast. I know that it took awhile for me to adjust.

 

[mmascari]

The 2019-2020 flu season resulted in an annualized rate of death of 152 per 1 million people. The current annualized rate of death of COVID-19 in the United States is 63 per 1 million people. This is why things are reopening without masks for those who remain perplexed.

Where’s that number from?

I’m having a hard time reconciling a 7 day average daily deaths over 450 yesterday with 63 per million yearly. The two don’t seem to agree. What’s the math that gets there?

 

[GoofGoof]

Probably not. The reason masks/distancing were necessary over the last year was because we had no other way to mitigate the significantly high risk of morbidity and mortality. Cases don't drive the need for masks/distancing; deaths and hospitalizations do.

We can now get ahead of mortality significantly with vaccination; far more than our flu vaccines can. Due to highly effective vaccines, COVID mortality next year should be less than the next flu season. Thank God.

The 2019-2020 flu season resulted in an annualized rate of death of 152 per 1 million people. The current annualized rate of death of COVID-19 in the United States is 63 per 1 million people. This is why things are reopening without masks for those who remain perplexed.

However, we need to stay vigilant and continue to get vaccinated.

I think you missed a decimal place there on Covid deaths. The 7 day daily average today is 550 which extrapolates to about 200,000 deaths a year or about 600 per million people. Deaths are a lagging stat but we aren’t quite there yet.

 

[BrianLo]

I’m not upset! I’m enjoying my weekend here at home here in the Orlando area. I had brunch at Old Key West this morning then went to Sea World. I’m not the one grumpy and holed up in Manitoba

Excellent! I just had in-restaurant breakfast and am waiting for a ferry in the nice weather. Things are heading the right direction nearly everywhere, not sure if we have Manitoba members, but soon they shall follow. We’re on different paths but the destination is the same.

It was a long winter for everyone.

 

[ElvisMickey]

Excellent! I just had in-restaurant breakfast and am waiting for a ferry in the nice weather. Things are heading the right direction nearly everywhere, not sure if we have Manitoba members, but soon they shall follow. We’re on different paths but the destination is the same.

It was a long winter for everyone.

Hope you have a great weekend! , genuinely...

 

[Wendy Pleakley]

Probably not. The reason masks/distancing were necessary over the last year was because we had no other way to mitigate the significantly high risk of morbidity and mortality. Cases don't drive the need for masks/distancing; deaths and hospitalizations do.

We can now get ahead of mortality significantly with vaccination; far more than our flu vaccines can. Due to highly effective vaccines, COVID mortality next year should be less than the next flu season. Thank God.

The 2019-2020 flu season resulted in an annualized rate of death of 152 per 1 million people. The current annualized rate of death of COVID-19 in the United States is 63 per 1 million people. This is why things are reopening without masks for those who remain perplexed.

However, we need to stay vigilant and continue to get vaccinated.

The concern is that removing masks and all other COVID mitigation strategies, while the vaccination process is ongoing and still in the 50% range, is that there's still potential for COVID to spike again amongst the unvaccinated portion of the population.

Hence the concern things could be moving a bit too quickly.

 

[Disney Glimpses]

The concern is that removing masks and all other COVID mitigation strategies, while the vaccination process is ongoing and still in the 50% range, is that there's still potential for COVID to spike again amongst the unvaccinated portion of the population.

Hence the concern things could be moving a bit too quickly.

Agreed, largely depends on what level of natural immunity exists in the unvaccinated population (which we really should be studying before doing anything).

 

[DisneyDebRob]

Checking in for the first time today here.. wow this thread has gone off the rails.
Didn’t your parents teach you never bring up politics or religion? Wait, I think that was for thanksgiving dinner. Never mind.