God damn I love living in a state run by a governor that isn’t afraid of science and data:
A spokesman for Inslee said that violation of the statewide mask order is a misdemeanor, punishable by up to 90 days in jail and up to a $1,000 fine. Violation of the Yakima County proclamation is a gross misdemeanor, punishable by up to 364 days in jail and up to a $5,000 fine.
Goes into effect on Friday.
Smoking, Acid Rain, Ozone depletion, Global warming.
I thought acid rain was a pro science outcome. Problem identified, mass public campaign, legislation passed. What am I missing?
There was a concerted anti-science effort against it. And the “experts” were the same guys who were part of the anti-anti-smoking campaign.
see Merchants of Doubt
The good guys did win, sorta, sulfer pollution from coal has been cut, but the problem has not completely gone away.
Anti-vax
I believe for acid rain the problem actually was a lot less clear cut than it was made out to be, and the efficacy of the solutions was sort of dubious.
But the idea got the Clean Air Act Amendment of 1990 passed which had monumentally more positive impacts than just acid rain.
Yeah a good result even if all of our high country ponds in NH are still dead. Which is of course a shame.
New all time highs today in Santa Clara county, on this, the day my folks leave. 
. This is with much higher testing than with previous all time highs, so the absolute case load out there is almost certainly still well off its peak, but we’re not trending down or even level. If we can’t have a level case load in a deep blue area with pretty good compliance while being not even totally opened up, I don’t know how anyone can.
My dad’s test came back negative.
Obviously I’m relieved, but I did NOT miss the opportunity to remind them to be more careful and to stay the fuck home.
Also glad they didn’t decide to retire to FL like a bunch of their friends.
Was chatting with a co-worker tonight. Our office re-opens Monday. It is opening in waves. My mind is blown.
In the next few weeks and months he has multiple bachelor parties coming up, a family beach trip, and more. No masks planned of course for any of this. Basically he is right back to pre-CV lifestyle and his entire friend group and everyone he knows is the same way. In fact, they have ostracized the single weirdo in their group that didn’t want to fly to CA for a bach party. Friends that wear masks or care about covid are pussies. The 120k deaths ? They would have died anyways.
Going to be some interesting discussions occurring in the next few weeks as myself, and many of us, are encouraged or ‘forced’ to give up WFH. Will be forced to decide when and how to die on this hill.
Where I work, less than 50% of the people are allowed to work onsite. 100% of the people onsite are wearing masks in the hallways, haven’t heard any complaints. It’s like I’m in some crazy alternative universe where people are taking this shit seriously.
How old is coworker?
Also thanks Rogan for masks = pussies. Awesome work as one of the most influential people in the country.
It’s coming from all angles right now. I heard from my sister that my BIL’s best friend was taken to a no mask rally by his girlfriend. She’s a super liberal hippy/vegan so I legit don’t get it.
This is going to be very helpful, in more ways than one.
Good job @Tilted! You’ve had a positive effect on the lives and health of the people around you, and the people in their households. People doing small things like this all over is really important, and I would also like to contradict my verbiage and point out that the impact of this is no small thing. You could very well have saved a life, saved some suffering, etc.
And then mandates that you join them in basking in ignorance when around them, aka banning masks.
This is a common element of fascism. “Disdain for intellectuals,” from this piece in the Holocaust Museum.
We’re at 100% now, by the way.
Really hope you’re not positive, both for your sake and for the sake of not proving that your level of precautions were insufficient.
She’s the woman who was fired for not being willing to manipulate/hide the data before. I’d say she’s relatively credible.
Here’s the series of tweets.
https://twitter.com/GeoRebekah/status/1275539345257218053
https://twitter.com/GeoRebekah/status/1275539491034402821
https://twitter.com/GeoRebekah/status/1275539636803244032
This would not surprise me at all. They’re going for herd immunity ASAP, they need people to keep acting normal so the cases keep on coming so that they get there sooner, so they’re going to do whatever they can to further that goal.
As I’ve been saying, Houston is not in great shape right now, and I suspect we’ll continue to see the dynamic play out of certain parts of a state leading the statewide hospital overflow time frame somewhat significantly. Hopefully the local leaders can overcome the governor’s policies and get enough of a shutdown and/or mask wearing to avoid the worst case, but they’re clearly in a scrambling mode here at this point with regards to expanding capacity.
Not a whole lot different than expected. The states that were bad continue to be bad and to be closer as expected (AZ, SC, OK, FL), but Hawaii made some of the improvements I had been expecting/predicting.
Texas, holy shit that’s not good. Slight uptick in R0, lots of new cases, they’re at 16-38 statewide, they were 18-42 yesterday. So we check in on Houston, which we now know is redirecting adult patients to a children’s hospital. We see a whopping 1,994 new cases, which takes the R0 from 1.34 to 1.49. They have a 10% reduction in available hospital beds, an 11.4% reduction in available ICU beds, and a 5% increase in available ventilators. They were on pace to tip over in 16 days, now it’s 11.4 days.
And this is why you see them shifting adults to children’s hospitals. I can’t help but to think of my friend in Houston who has not spoken to me since I called him out for being selfish, reckless, and inconsiderate of service workers for going out to eat in a restaurant there a few weeks ago. He and our third friend told me it was safe, I explained why it was not and that things were about to get very bad there. The other friend told me I was mentally unwell, neither has spoken to me since.
Orlando (Orange County) sees its R0 stay pretty high at 4.18, the 7-day number is 2.22, so it’s probably in between those. They surged capacity by 5%, but they still drop from 484 available beds to 448. This gives them 3.5 days to overflow, but if you take an R0 of more like 2.2, it goes up to almost 7 days. So you have to hope that the 4.18 is noise in the data and the real number is 2.2 and hopefully declining. That maybe buys them extra time to scale capacities. But really they’re just re-arranging the deck chairs at this point. Their ICU’s are at about 80% capacity.
Three Florida counties check in at under 10% ICU capacity remaining. Columbia (west of Jacksonville, north of Gainesville) 8.33%, Escambia (Pensacola) 5.93%, Bay (Panama City) 3.64%. There are some other big counties in bad shape. Volusia (Daytona) has less ICU capacity than Orange. Palm Beach is about the same. Broward and Miami-Dade aren’t far behind.
For overall hospital capacity, only Hardee (inland, east of Sarasota) (12% left) and Flagler (north of Daytona) (6% left) are worse than Orange (12% left).
So, yeah, things are about to get really bad in parts of Florida and Texas in addition to Arizona and South Carolina. I should also point out that there aren’t any cities I’ve drilled down into to find out that they’re okay. I haven’t even checked Austin, TX or Miami, FL, for example. I haven’t gone city level in Arizona. Granted, I’m not picking at random - I’m picking big cities and eyeballing the graphs picking ones that look bad.
Edited to Add: The Houston and Orlando data is only through 6/22, they lag by a day at the county level. So keep that in mind, too. Thus 3.5-7 days could very well be 2.5-6 if they are still on the same track.
I called Chicago the “coronavirus capital of the world” a few weeks ago, but that’s no longer the case. We have reduced cases by 70% from the peak and are reopening indoor dining Friday.
Just to put some good news in this thread.
So the underground party/camping scene I’m apart of is having a gathering. At first I was horrified, but doesn’t actually sound too bad. Long probably boring post but a look inside the weird hippy free love underground music community if for some reason that interests anyone lol.
Amidst the loneliness, grief and stress of the pandemic and our fights for racial justice, a few of us have decided to gather some friends safely in the desert for some moon-time and music-time. We feel the need to commune with nature, to express ourselves with dance and movement together.
We feel it’s important to gather because we view our health holistically, which means considering our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health. We feel that gathering under the moon, with safety precautions and discussions about boundaries and consent, is medicine for our souls.
We would like to invite you to a homie friends’ gathering in the desert this full moon, on Saturday evening July 4th, 9pm-9am
This is not a public or extended invitation gathering – . Only a few friends are putting this gathering together, and we are only inviting our nearest and dearest whom we feel would be safe and respectful to each other, while also appreciating the blessing of being able to gather. We are inviting only those we trust to not spread the word beyond your best friends in the community whom you would drive out with together, and not post info or photos on social media. We do not want to hold a large gathering, and we ask that you do not bring new people.
We are looking to gather in a way that combines safety with freedom of expression. We will be making every effort to make this gathering safe for all of us, but that means each and every person taking responsibility for themselves, and prioritizing our boundaries and respecting each others’ boundaries. There may be some people who are comfortable being near each other, but there will be many who are not. Make room for people.
The risk of spread of COVID-19 is lowest outdoors, as long as people keep a reasonable distance.
Most importantly: Do not come if you have any symptoms of illness!
· COVID symptoms can include: fever, cough, shortness of breath, muscle aches, headache, loss of taste.Precautions we will take for this gathering:
· The sound system will be set up to have a farther reach, so people can enjoy the music from distances and not need to be huddled up close on the dancefloor.
· Porta-potties will be present, but should only be used for pooping. Please pee outdoors and do not leave your toilet paper in the desert, or bottles/cans in the potties.
· We will have some masks available. We are not sure of quantity, so please bring your own masks.
· When people arrive at the “door,” we will stay at least 6 feet away from your car when discussing safety precautions and asking for donations.
· We will do our best to make sure people are not having close-up conversations on the dance floor. Speaking loudly and close together over the music is risky. A team effort on this would be great.Precautions we need everyone to take:
Ask for consent to approach anyone!! Check in with someone with body language or words from afar before approaching them. Do not approach anyone without their consent! This includes peoples’ camps, and the DJ booth. → Use hand-signals instead of approaching people! Signal each other to move off the dancefloor if you want to talk.
Respect how others define their own safety and boundaries. Take “no” for an answer, and don’t take it personally – everyone has varying comfort levels with human contact right now (and always!)
If you have granted someone permission to come close to you but then contact feels too lengthy, speak up. And – If someone tells you they are no longer comfortable with contact, give them space.
Bring hand sanitizer. Use it often.
Please wear a mask over your nose and mouth when near others outside of your normal “germ pool” (friends you have been seeing during quarantine). Cloth masks are meant to protect others from you. Please keep that in mind.
Do not leave trash anywhere! It will be extra-unsanitary and dangerous for others to have to clean up trash – especially something that has touched mouths, like drink containers.
Bring trash bags. Use them and bring all of your own trash home.
Avoid conversations and smoking on the dancefloor! Long, loud conversations are one of the most likely ways to spread COVID and smoking is a serious lung irritant to your fellow dancers).
Don’t approach people you don’t know. If you like someone’s vibe, or love the DJ’s set, a thumbs up or hands to your heart is nice.
If you are an exuberant dancer – doing strenuous exercise (like shuffling!) – please move off to the side, away from the dancefloor. Please avoid kicking up dust, and huffing and puffing near others.
Ditto for fire spinning – keep your distance from others, even more than you usually do.
Imbibe with moderation so that you are fully present and cognizant of your boundaries and others’. This is not the time to get wack-a-doodle, requiring others to take care of you, or have to work hard to avoid you.
Over the next 2 weeks, before the gathering, please be extra-cautious to avoid transmission.
Please only come out if you agree to abide by these safety guidelines, and you trust your moon homies to do the same.
Some suggestions:
· Come up with silly ways to communicate your boundaries! Tie a hula hoop around your waist, make a funny t-shirt telling people to stay away, etc. Have fun with it!
· Do not share drinks, food, joints, cigarettes, pipes, vaporizers, etc.
· The City of Los Angeles is offering free drive-through COVID testing, whether you have symptoms or not, with results in 2-3 days. If you’re a frontline worker, you can get next-day appointments. https://lacovidprod.service-now.com/rrs.If everyone is safe and respectful at this gathering, perhaps there will be options to gather again this summer.
More details to come soon.
Much love, peace and safety through these transformational times.
Your moon homies. xoxo
I guess its good that the girl who is helping put it together is a nurse pracitioner and not one of the anti-science types. She’s been fully quarantined during all this, not even working. She’s also 50, pretty cute, and has the hots for me.
These things are usually like 2k people, and the email with location that only goes out an hour before the party starts goes out to like 30k people, but this one was only sent to 150.
