Coronavirus and Walt Disney World general discussion

[havoc315]

Local businesses can still require COVID protocols... except for a vaccine passport.

WDW has to negotiate with the unions with regard to what they'll do with the current protocols, and to their lawyers about whether or not to continue to follow the CDC recommendations.

All true. I don't expect masks to disappear yet from WDW.

But this potentially creates more conflict for cast members at WDW.

Here in New York, they have relaxed the outdoor mask mandate. Through the last several months, the high school tennis courts have been open for the community on weekends, but they still require a mask when on school property. Apparently, since New York relaxed the mask mandate, the school has had trouble enforcing the mask requirements at the tennis courts (I suspect a lot of this is good faith confusion -- CDC and State government both saying masks aren't required). As a result, the school has now shut down access to the tennis courts to the public.

I fear at WDW, cast members will have to deal with an increasing numbers of guests trying to skip masks. "The governor said the mask rules are all cancelled!"

 

[havoc315]

Please stop copying and pasting entire articles. A short explanation with a link to the article is all that's needed.

Copying and pasting an entire article is also a copyright violation.

 

[Incomudro]

How much do you think it is the fact that you have to get two shots and a minimum of 8 weeks to be considered fully vaccinated? I personally think that is why the J&J thing was so detrimental. I suspect there is a huge portion of the population who would be willing to get the one shot as opposed to the 2 shots + 2 months wait.

Yes, I believe that the bad reactions to the J&J shot were a huge blow to vaccine acceptance.

 

[Chomama]

Being a Mississippian and a self proclaimed Neanderthal, I have to respond. Yes we probably negatively lead the nation in vaccination acceptance. But we have the 3rd lowest Covid case rate. And we have been living mask free for a month. My youngest son has been in school the entire school year. My oldest son's small liberal arts college continually tests their students - and they have 0 positive cases in April and 5 in March. Maybe there are more variables in this equation than just vaccinations?

For the record, next week my youngest son will be the last in the family to be fully vaccinated.

Since VT's case rate is 2X MS's, I guess I should say back to you "Bless your heart".

I am a fully vaccinated Alabamian. Have you looked at the seroprevalence studies by the cdc? Alabama is 30% positive and we have 40% of adults vaccinated. Our cases have plummeted too and we have had a very similar response to Covid protocols here. I am curious if the early rapid spread led to a lower threshold needed to slow down Covid spread

COVID Data Tracker

CDC’s home for COVID-19 data. Visualizations, graphs, and data in one easy-to-use website.

covid.cdc.gov

 

[havoc315]

I am a fully vaccinated Alabamian. Have you looked at the seroprevalence studies by the cdc? Alabama is 30% positive and we have 40% of adults vaccinated. Our cases have plummeted too and we have had a very similar response to Covid protocols here. I am curious if the early rapid spread led to a lower threshold needed to slow down Covid spread

COVID Data Tracker

CDC’s home for COVID-19 data. Visualizations, graphs, and data in one easy-to-use website.

covid.cdc.gov

There are 2 overlapping factors at play in driving down cases:
Vaccinations AND seasonality.

Recall that cases have plummeted before, only to rise again later.

There is evidence that Covid "peaks" follow flu seasons and other factors.

Alabama's first spike went from June 2020 to August 2020, and then cases plummeted. Then a second spike hit in October.

So I'd watch the "deep South" in 6 weeks. I wouldn't be surprised to see cases start to rise a bit, if there isn't a higher level of vaccination. Hopefully there is enough vaccination to avoid a full big spike, but I really wouldn't be surprised to see an uptick.

 

[ABQ]

Haven't posted any fancy graphs lately, so here's this one.

US case counts at the lowest since March and very near the lowest since October.
Better yet, average daily deaths due to Covid are at an all time low since the early days of the pandemic and continue to trend down.
Most states are trending down in cases and deaths, outside of 3 areas of concern, WA, OR and CO maybe if they add vaccines to the pot brownies, things will get under control in those states?

 

[lazyboy97o]

So as I feared just the other day, Florida is now saying, "ok, we aren't at herd immunity, but we will settle for good enough"

And you can legally discriminate against the vaccinated too!

 

[mickeymiss]

A good start would be, if your are having respiratory symptoms and need to go out in public, wear a mask.

I'm hopeful people will stay home when sick more than they did before but I don't think it will happen. They're already sick so a lot of people just carry on their usual errands. We went to a restaurant once before covid and a lady literally had tissues, cough drops and theraflu on her table. We overheard her talking about being diagnosed with influenza earlier that day.

Smh.

 

[jlhwdw]

I am as far from a DeSantis supporter as they come, and have been a lifelong registered Democrat and am a DNC donor, but I don't disagree with him. The vaccines are available now to anyone that wants one. If you aren't yet vaccinated, you can be. If you choose not to, it's your choice. And if you are, it's time to get back to normal.

I support mitigation/distancing policies for another month or two at places like theme parks, stadiums, etc. But if we're still doing this come July/August/September, it's not fair to those of us that have done our part to help ourselves and others by getting vaccinated.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

I also wonder about vaccine skepticism (probably more correctly institutional skepticism) in communities of color as well as delivery to inner cities.

Well that’s legit, historical skepticism...and is an issue.

in rural or suburban “majority” areas???

it’s crap

 

[GoofGoof]

They're not just afraid - some of them are of course.
There is also an active pride of defiance that's going on, and I know some people that are engaging in it.
Resistance.
It's become a podium to stand on by both sides politically for a variety of issues.

I honestly don’t think we ever reach those people. They won’t take the vaccine because it would be admitting they were wrong and Covid is a real threat. They are more concerned with saving face on Facebook then getting out of the pandemic. Some even enjoy the attention from flaunting their non-vaccinated status. I do think we can reach some of the other people that are just apathetic and not actively resisting. That’s where the real hope comes in. Too many people have written off all the remaining unvaccinated adults as radical or seeking to resist but a large portion just don’t care and those are the people we can get. Not by threatening them but by educating, encouraging and even offering Incentives. That’s our best hope.

 

[Branman]

The July 1st date is a good date for ending all restrictions. That is 9 weeks away. This gives everyone three to four weeks to get their first shot followed by boosters in June. By July, the only adults who will not be vaccinated (with rare exception) will be those that voluntarily chose to not get the vaccine. There is no reason to have society-level restrictions in place to protect those who will not protect themselves.

 

[LittleBuford]

I like your positive outlook on this, but, that's not was generates mouse clicks, so I'm absolutely certain articles like this will dominate the next news cycle. As doom and gloom sells.
Reaching 'herd immunity' is unlikely in the U.S.

Why do you consider the article “doom and gloom”? It’s reporting the emerging scientific consensus. I see no sensationalised clickbait in what you shared.

 

[Heppenheimer]

I've given up on television news. When we cut the cord, I kept subscription to streaming TV providers for news and then just gave up.

I use NY Times, NPR, and BBC plus Apple News as an aggregator. They may not always be 100% impartial, but they are generally thorough. Not being TV, they also don't have people screaming at each other and "anchors" trying to score woke points or anti-woke points. NPR is downright respectful. No wonder they are niche programming.

And The Economist, for probably the single best English-language summary and analysis of world events.

 

[Nubs70]

Recent research of concern.

Seems spike proteins themselves are problematic. Further research is warranted.

The novel coronavirus’ spike protein plays additional key role in illness - Salk Institute for Biological Studies

LA JOLLA—Scientists have known for a while that SARS-CoV-2’s distinctive “spike” proteins help the virus infect its host by latching on to healthy cells. Now, a major new study shows that the virus spike proteins (which behave very differently than those safely encoded by vaccines) also play a...

www.salk.edu

 

[HelloConnieTX]

I am as far from a DeSantis supporter as they come, and have been a lifelong registered Democrat and am a DNC donor, but I don't disagree with him. The vaccines are available now to anyone that wants one. If you aren't yet vaccinated, you can be. If you choose not to, it's your choice. And if you are, it's time to get back to normal.

I support mitigation/distancing policies for another month or two at places like theme parks, stadiums, etc. But if we're still doing this come July/August/September, it's not fair to those of us that have done our part to help ourselves and others by getting vaccinated.

I agree with you. The vaccines are available to any adult who wants one. If you choose not to get one, its time you take your health and life into your own hands. I am so tired of people not thinking about how their behavior impacts their neighbors. Time for Darwin's Theory of Evolution to have a say at those adults who refuse the help of a vaccination out of pure stubbornness or stupidity.

 

[Sirwalterraleigh]

If there is one lesson I learned over the past year its that I have no idea where to get credible news from anymore.

it’s actually one of upsides I’ve taken out of this.

it’s not that any outlet can be trusted completely...because sensationalism = money and that’s not going away...

it’s that we have to train ourselves to search for the underlying numbers, psychology, fact, common sense behind the opinion and make conscious choices to pursue/defend that.

news is now “harder”...but that has benefits

 

[Chomama]

I agree with you. The vaccines are available to any adult who wants one. If you choose not to get one, its time you take your health and life into your own hands. I am so tired of people not thinking about how their behavior impacts their neighbors. Time for Darwin's Theory of Evolution to have a say at those adults who refuse the help of a vaccination out of pure stubbornness or stupidity.

In theory this makes sense but what about kids? Do we just let them be exposed by the adults who drop protocols? That doesn’t seem to make sense to me

 

[Nubs70]

If there is one lesson I learned over the past year its that I have no idea where to get credible news from anymore.

Find a source that is educated and follows the Scientific Method.

 

[LittleBuford]

If there is one lesson I learned over the past year its that I have no idea where to get credible news from anymore.

Why do you say that? What kinds of stories have shaken your confidence in the news this past year?