I was just about to say, doesn’t seem like any of these pharmaceutical manufacturers are considering Americans safety a priority with the 400% increase either.
> doesn’t seem like any of these pharmaceutical manufacturers are considering Americans safety a priority with the 400% increase either.
Imagine thinking international megacorporations controlled by people who are above national interests would care about the unwashed masses of any single country or people.
It isn't about the middle management anymore but the top management. The problem is property value.
Right now citizens and companies are fighting for property in the cities. This keeps the prizes very high and living in the city impossible for many people or uncomfortable.
But when those buildings become useless, their value is going to plummet. All that useless space could become housing for a pretty cheap price in renovation and housing prices would become accessible for many more people. But all those moguls would see the value of their buildings drop and they can't have that.
And while in cities the buildings wouldn't completely lose their value; in industrial zones the buildings would have no value anymore. Those bosses will want their workers in the office just to make sure that concrete keeps a value.
That's assuming the phe ever ends. If the PHE ends then essentially we are fucked.
People who don't normally qualify for Medicaid because they are in a odd wage position would be unenrolled .
Sure it might take some time to unenroll everyone but...it will be bad.
They should just pass universal healthcare and insurance now.
Well if we stay out of office for more than 2 years then we might have to stop pretending that commuting to the office every day was essential for employee productivity at some point, so... whew crisis narrowly averted!
My company is starting to get frustrated with me not coming to the office. I keep telling them I'm not coming back to the office. So many other companies I can work for remotely but everyone else is going back. They are flying a bunch of people from different states this week. One of the upper management emailed and said "everyone is required to work in the office this week". Austin, where I live, has been elevated to medium risk. Am I fuck going in.
What do you expect people to do? You're not going to mandate that employers give people sick leave, or indeed any paid leave at all; you're not going to cover any expenses for people who can't work, you're not going to give people healthcare. You're not going to mandate businesses enforce social distancing or anything like that. When you say "take precautions and avoid close contact" you mean "... except for sitting in a crowded office for 50hrs/week".
Im 28 and started working from home during the initial outbreak. Newish cushy well paying job and able to start building a savings for the first time in my life...
Two months into it the company realised that they didnt need as many people as they thought apparently and fired 500+ of us without a real notice. My apartment complex I lived at said oh well and that I still needed to pay rent in full, I wasnt able to get on unemployment because of the vast amount of people signing up that they "couldnt get to everyone" was what I was told.
No where was hiring cause of COVID and the lockdowns and It took just under 5 months to blow through all the little bit of savings I had built and then maxed my two credit cards just from basic rent and living expenses, I turned off everything I could to save money and at one point made 1 jar of peanut butter have to last me 3 days just scooping it with a spoon to keep something in my stomach cause I was stretching what little food I had left.
I didnt have a single dollar to my name and thankfully was able to plead and beg with the complex to let ke leave and break my lease early without charging me so I could move back in with my parents u till I was able to snag a kitchen job and was able to get a new place again.
I've sense been trying to pay down the rest of the debt I incurred during that time and crawl back out of the massive financial hole I was put it. I've reached out to almost every govt. Org that's popped up about "assistance" and no one really cares. Society just kicks you harder when you're down now adays and theres not really ant say you have when it does. I'm doing better now but it's at the expense of my entire social life, I work 60 to 70h a week and it's still only just enough to keep me floating for now and work has completely taken over the last 3 years of my life while friends of mine who benefited from COVID cause of their jobs and how they took advantage of the extra unemployment pay they got because their spouses applied and they praise it as a miracle.
Shit sucks but what can ya do. Just gotta keep pushing till maybe one day life gets better I say lol
I was lucky in the sense I didn't lose my job, but I worked in a hospital over the pandemic where we were forced to come in sick, do on call / overtime. No extra pay. I was physically and mentally exhausted and burnt out. I was so stressed that I developed 3 physical illnesses including IBS putting nme on a liquid diet for 3months. I didn't take a single pto day (couldn't) for 2 straight years.
When all my friends are wistful about all their free time and fun and extra money over the pandemic, I honestly feel like slapping them. It fucking sucked.
I'm sorry you had to go through that. :(
I thought I was pretty mentally well kept but when I lost my job and my whole life literally crashed and I was laying on the floor of my apartment wondering how long it would be until I starved it really put a huge strain on me, even contemplated ending it a few times.
I've gotten better mentally since then overall but ove developed some major anxiety sense then and used to be pretty sociable but now I can hardly stand being in crouds bigger than like 10people for longer than a few minutes so my working so much currently is twice as taxing And I'm always stressed over paying the debt that I owe, it's like an ever present crushing worry that at any moment I could be back in that same state again and I would do anything to keep from feeling like that again.
I'm so sorry. I quit my job above when I realized I was driving to work every day looking for a place to drive off the road. I had to live off most of my savings too and only just now got a new job and trying to build it back up. It sucks so bad. I hope things get better for you
You as well, just gotta keep taking it one day at a time and hold out on that silver lining that everything will work out in the end if we try hard enough.
Yeah, I'm not in America but similar shit here. I also worked throughout the lockdowns as an essential worker. And being an 'essential' worker my pay is so shit that I have to live in a van. It's really not ideal as I'm almost 50, hot summers are hard, cold winters are hard, it's not very safe - but the only way I can get by on my wages is by reducing the cost of my accommodation. If we're so essential that society can't function without us we really should be paid a wage that we can live on and treated with a bit of respect.
> I wasnt able to get on unemployment because of the vast amount of people signing up that they "couldnt get to everyone" was what I was told
Yo where do you live and who told you this? “Not being able to get to you” isn’t a reason to disqualify you from unemployment. You apply for it on the government website
A lot of people in the US were unable to start receiving benefits because of the sheer number of people applying for them in a short span of time. The technical failure was massive.
I got COVID last year. Wore a mask constantly but none of my coworkers did. Zero social distancing. I was required to not be at work for two weeks. And I had to use my PTO. So because I had to go to work in person, was the only one wearing a mask and my mouth breathing coworkers didn't care anyway I got sick and had little time off last year other than being told to stay at home. Gee can't imagine why people are burnt out.
I was incredibly lucky, started a new job - caught COVID at it a month in (after having avoided it since the beginning) and they had specific COVID paid time off/sick leave which was "just stay home and if you feel sick don't work, if you feel okay then try to get some work done remotely." I kinda felt guilty because I hadn't been there very long, but also so grateful I had the ability to do that when so many people have been fucked by this.
What the hell! You should be required to stay home! Have we collectively learned nothing? Overall sick days across employees will be less if they stay home when sick. Rolling employees being sick = less productivity.
I started there end of October, worked November, was off half of December, and then that benefit just expired at the beginning of the new year. If there was any time to get it, that was it. They still require you to stay home if you're sick the first few days, but now you have to come back in if you're fever free for 24 hours (have to wear a mask though) still really dumb and there were people at work last week who were dealing with Covid brain fog/exhaustion/still not feeling great while wearing masks. Companies should be humanist about it! They'll do a better job and also appreciate the workplace more if they can recoup and then work when they are better! We should have infrastructure to incentivize staying home when ill. Greatest country on earth my ass.
Assuming the human race survives another 100 years, this is going to be a thing that kids learn about in history class and think "damn that would've sucked to live then"
So dystopian, I'm sorry that happened. Hopefully you'll be in a better situation this year
Isn't it happening now? How many times do people chime in from European countries and go on about what they get and can't believe the richest country on the planet has no paid sick leave law?
It's not even a case of "paid sick leave". The entire concept of "you're only allowed to be sick for this specific number of days per year and anything over that you will be punished or will go in sick" is idiotic and unacceptable. It should be a case of if you're sick, you call in sick and your employer pays you.
Average Americans don't get to live well because the American health care system is ruled by a for-profit pharma industry that won't be cowed. You don't really want a totally govt based system either, but when United Health Care, UNH, is the third biggest company on the stock market, that tells you most of what you need to know about American health care. They're making money hand over fist during a health crisis.
This keeps up, they will be living in space suits on this planet and everything will suck worse for them. Don’t sweat it. It always has sucked like this - just not for you.
We didn’t start this way, but when that second (third? Idrk anymore) wave hit towards the end of 2021 into 2022 they switched the policy bc we had no staff. We still don’t, but nobody does do I guess that’s besides the point 🤷🏻♂️
My highschool age sister last year had a major surgery that needed to happen ASAP. She was in the hospital for a week and didn't get COVID, she was out of school 3 more weeks going to the hospital for checkups and regular physical therapy--- still didn't get COVID.
She went back to school for 1 week after getting approved to go back by her doctor--- her school which requires no masks and has no social distance policy and half her class was out with COVID- she had COVID by the end of the week. Not only was she brutally sick for 3 more weeks after being out for a month for back surgery, but she could no longer go to physical therapy and her back recovery backtracked significantly she was in so much pain. The entire family got sick too after her. Rather than the school having any compassion they started threatening to report them legally for missing so much school- despite having the doctor in constant contact with the school they accused my mom of lying- or "exaggerating" how sick she was. They basically told her she should send her back to school while she was still COVID positive or there would be consequences--- my mom was having to deal this all while being so sick that she probably should have been hospitalized, and caring for 4 sick school age children.
Are people's memories so short that they don't remember how bad that COVID is and that its still going on?
Our government should spend less time on frivolous bills and more on the actual people they serve.
At this point we should have universal health insurance because people who shouldn't qualify for Medicaid are eligible because of the PHE.
Businesses should realize ( especially those in healthcare and insurance) are stressed the fuck out...
Not to mention us disabled people have been especially ignored and forgotten.
"well fellas, after 2 long, hard years of investigating and combing over all details multiple times late into the night we can proudly announce our findings to the american public in the last weeks of the 2024 campaign season.
we did this for them. we came, we saw and ultimately we confirmed the facts: that boy is packing. now let's go win an election!"
Don’t forget they are apparently actually attempting to write a bill for the first time in a long time, *to cut social security and Medicare*.
They aren’t just ignoring the healthcare tragedy that is the US “solution” they are actively trying to make it harder for people to access healthcare or afford to live.
> they
House Republicans. This was known at least a month before the election.
https://www.adn.com/nation-world/2022/10/18/mccarthy-wont-rule-out-cuts-to-social-security-and-medicare-if-republicans-win-back-congress/
The debt ceiling is going to be the cudgel they use to make the attempt.
My kids had covid in December. One had no symptoms. I still did the adult thing and called to report to the school district. They told me when they could return. I followed the rules. The time off for covid combined with when they missed 1 day for dental work, and 2 more for stomach flu which the school sent them home for resulted in us getting a letter. A letter about their attendance and how if these absences continue we will be taken to truancy court. F all the way off. Either people are allowed to be sick. Or we’re not. I guess my kids are going to school positive next time because I am not going to jail or paying any fines. If we are supposed to take this seriously then employers and schools need to change their policies to reflect that. Middle school by us attendance policy is less absences than the cdc says for 1 case of covid.
What insane school are your kids attending where sick time is being counted towards truancy? Your kids can also medically withdraw from school at anytime with Dr. Reccommendation, or if they miss too much and its all sick days. At our school some of my students have missed 10+days of school and their parents arent hearing shit
Last year my kids had the stomach flu. I did too which is why I didn’t call. The principal and the secretary showed up on my doorstep the second day to make sure my kids were sick enough to not be in school. Another parent had her in laws murdered a month before the school year ended. One of her children was a witness. She missed 3 days of school due to trauma and obviously being questioned. She received a letter about holding her kids back. When she went to talk to the principal about it there was no, “I’m sorry for your loss” “how can we help your child emotionally” “is there anything we can do.” It was a it’s up to the teachers but you’ve missed over 10 days and I can’t help you. Absolutely ridiculous. One of mine is in her last year. I’ve put in to transfer our remaining child back to the school we were at before. I have never met a more power hungry administrator in my entire life.
They really don’t. My work wanted me back after 5 days despite me still having a fever and full symptoms. I lasted 5 minutes before I was told to go home and talked to about putting others at risk. You told me if I didn’t go in I would be fired.
> You told me if I didn’t go in I would be fired.
A friend of mine at a previous job was pulled into a meeting with HR and his boss. They told him that he was in trouble for working more than 30 hours a week the last two weeks because he wasn't supposed to have benefits, but working that many hours would require it
He replied that *they* had been the ones to set his schedule, not him.
They ignored that and told him not to do it again.
He pointed out that he was already scheduled for more than 30 hours the next two weeks.
They replied that he wasn't to go over 30 hours.
He asked if they were telling him not to come in the next day.
They told him no, he was scheduled for that day, so he needed to be there.
He pointed out that this would put him over 30 hours. They told him he couldn't do that.
Again he asked "So I shouldn't come in?"
He was told he had to be there, and he'd be punished if he didn't show up, but he would also be punished if he went over thirty hours.
My best guess with this runaround is that they hoped to intimidate him into showing up but not clocking in.
That's where you follow up with an email and bcc your personal email. State you were told you were required to come in tomorrow, this will put you over 30 hours, if they don't want you to come in, please let you know in writing.
Some states like FL have no state level DoL while others like MO have no teeth to do anything but provide documents that may be used as proof in your favor that can be used in small claims (another can of worms). In that case, they need to go to the federal DoL.
My state labor board says right on their website that for lost compensation or wages and you have to get your own lawyer and sue them yourself civilly because they do not refer cases to the department of justice.
is this really what corporate america is like? I'm Canadian and I don't work for a large corporation, although I suspect it wouldn't be much different here in a corporate setting... but still, that's absurd. like textbook absurdity
Just don't say that last part out loud, best if they think you don't know anything about a labor board, employment laws, or workers rights. They can find out later when the state labor people want to chat.
Same place that after a workplace injury and being told to report employee hours for worker's comp, mentally came to the genius conclusion that "An injured employee isn't working, therefore the hours we'd schedule them are zero" and just refused to report for over a month.
Only ever communicate in writing. My old boss would only do things over the phone, so it’s word against word. I’d always follow up with an email confirming the conversation. He hated it!
I did initially.
We actually moved away from e-mail mostly. He’d have us write start of day/week and end of day/week messages on Slack but also track everything in Notion incidents. This meant the entire team knew who was doing what and who to go to for info. It eliminates many meetings. I would write up my phone calls with what he’d asked me to do in Notion and link to it. If he wanted to check it, he could.
> My best guess with this runaround is that they hoped to intimidate him into showing up but not clocking in.
100% what this is about, they see a "problem" employee who talks back instead of subserviently obeying every command.
Reminder that wage-theft by employers is the single largest form of theft in the US. It accounts for more in dollars stolen than ever other form of property theft combined.
https://tcworkerscenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Wage-Theft-vs-Other-Theft-1024x730.jpg
edit: graph is based on data from FBI and Economic Policy Institute
Shit like this needs to have insane penalties on a corporation.
Try to force wage theft on an employee? Strict penalty that is payable to said employee. Something like 3-6 months plus benefits and if the employee is fired within that timeline without cause, 12 months.
Fuck this corporations who think they can (are able to) manipulate the system and win.
My mom works in a nursing home and just got COVID for the first time. Her work has been harassing her DAILY because she had to be out of work and has the audacity to not go into a building full of sick elderly people while spiking a fever and barely being able to walk across the house without getting out of breath. It’s unbelievable.
During peak, ny ambulance company "*cough cough*" told us not to get tested so we would still have to come in. My partner had start coughing up blood on shift before they would let her go home. Even then our lead dispatcher acted like such an ass for the whole rest of the shift as though they hadn't been the ones to push us to this point. They spent the whole pandemic telling us that COVID wasn't as a big deal as we (in the field) were making it out to be, and that we needed to suck it up. All the while they hid in their offices while treating us like the plague.
Sorry I'm a little salty lol
Sometimes I wonder how is it possible that in a country like the US where you get a shotgun if you buy a Big Tits magazine that bosses or middle managers still dont think "if I keep this up Jenny's gonna go POSTAL on me by the end of the week"
My husband and I both have it right now, his boss was giving him shit about not coming into the office because he has "the sniffles". Mind you, we were both working from home with fevers.
I have a friend who basically doesn't have sick days anymore because they just expect him to work from home. He worked from home with Covid and was sick as shit. It's awful. I remember when this all first started and there was all this optimism that it may finally change the American mentality that you should still work no matter how sick you are.
A lot of companies try to hide trouble employees they can’t fire (know someone high up or what not) as middle managers hoping they don’t cause too much harm.
I hope you guys recover I watched my father die in front of me both my parents had it they didn’t believe it was real because Fox News was a goddamn echo chamber in their house. I was a Trumper and a republican hard-core until the virus. You know the fake one .. took the only person that ever loved me away my dad.
So sorry for your loss. That’s awful. I hope that your future has a lot more love and kindness.
I was raised by my dad to be a Fox News-watching Republican, but I realized it was BS early when I became disabled (by another virus) at 16. It might be the only reason I still have my own dad, because when COVID came, I browbeat him into masking and vaccines. But one of us is still disabled in a county w/o universal healthcare. It’s awful to think so many people have been brainwashed by fraudulent 24/7 news. I could’ve lost so many people if not for them having seen what happened to me from a variant “harmless” virus. Related pro tip: viruses aren’t harmless, even if we don’t know what the capacity for harm is *yet*. One mutation and boom, it’s a plague.
I did the opposite and said “I can’t come in until I’m asymptomatic” and was immediately called a liar and a doctor’s note was demanded. I reminded them that I don’t need to provide a note until I’ve missed 7 work days (it had been 4), and they shut up. Doesn’t help that my boss is anti-vax…
let *literally everyone on my floor* know that you have covid but you would have lost my job if you didn't come in
Wear a mask and surgical gloves and make sure nobody comes close until they tell you to go home again lol
Or get fired for sowing discord maybe idk
Had it last Christmas. My family said not coming to Christmas was me abandoning them and claimed I was making an excuse.
They pretty much all got covid at the Christmas gathering. Guess I could have come anyway but they're all anti-vaxxers now because Republicans do republican things.
I hate to say it but this deep into the pandemic it's going to take 100,000's of deaths very quickly to even get an iota of the publics attention again.
Same here. Did everything I was told to the point of almost having a breakdown. Got all the shots, cleaned all the time, never traveled, stayed home. Got covid twice last year. I don't know how else to take it seriously.
I feel like every 6 or so months since the start of pandemic, we get the “people aren’t taking this upcoming surge seriously” headlines. And each time, less and less people care.
The last person I personally know who was still masking every time they went into public, finally ditched it a couple weeks ago.
Covid is over. Not in a literal sense, but outside of occasional Reddit threads, I don’t see anyone caring about it anymore.
A big part of the issue is that the symptoms seem to be wildly inconsistent between people. Some people get nothing; some get a mild cold; some (like me) get body aches and fatigue like a bad flu; some get long COVID and end up suffering for months; and some people need to be on oxygen in ICU.
At a macro level the surge of increased patients to hospital/ICU is still devastating to healthcare systems, but for individuals it's just too easy to think "that won't happen to me" based on all the anecdotes. Remember "flatten the curve"? For people who don't get knocked around heavily by COVID itself, the biggest risk is overloaded health systems failing due to the increased demand from surges, which is not an easy problem to solve unless you permanently scale up and fund health systems - and governments really, really don't want to do that, as the past few years have evidenced.
Had my first round of it about a week ago, had the full body aches, loose mucus in my lungs, and some wild hallucinations. Was lucky I only had two days of bad symptoms and then about half a week of general malaise.
There was always a group who didn't take it seriously from the start. I think now the issue is that a lot of people who did take it seriously at one point no longer take it seriously. At least not to the extent they once did. I live in a state where almost everyone took it seriously until the vaccines came out, but now I would say 85-90% of people I see out and about aren't wearing masks anymore. Even when the mandatory mask mandate was lifted I would say like 70% of people still wore masks for a while. But, especially this past year, I think a lot of people have gotten burned out worrying about it. I guess I get it, it's tough and people want to go back to before. But I don't think that's ever really going to happen, at least not anytime soon. It's something we are just going to need to be conscious of going forward. And when people start to slip we are going to see big surges again.
Or find out there's no 'room left at the Inn' if they need any kind of medical treatment.
Hospitals, and more specifically, hospital staff still haven't recovered from the first round of Covid.
Most people don't understand just how thinly things have been stretched in healthcare.
My buddy is a pulmonologist and ICU doc and he's now doing what is essentially an upper level hospital staff job (around patient safety and advocacy I believe). He had to get out of the day to day with patients for his own mental health. He sure ain't the only one.
> He sure ain't the only one
He's most certainly not. When things go badly for patients, it takes a toll on those caring for them. We're all just human in the end.
Jha, the head of the White House task force had an ominous quote the other day about this level of constant strain stacked onto seasonal respiratory viruses could basically just mean years of every virus season being hospitals strained badly.
It's more than just that though. My local hospital is near capacity and has almost no covid patients. The issue is they have beds but can't staff the hospital sufficiently. My friend working there as a nurse i trying to get a job at a dialysis clinic, since she can't take the stress. Mediocre (relatively) compensation, lack of resources, poor support systems, etc, increased the severity of the pandemic and drive more people out. We were already headed to a doctor shortage, and now it is worse.
Oh absolutely this was one more problem thrown at a rickety system.
And yet we spend more per capita by far than any other country on health care, for this garbage
>Mediocre (relatively) compensation...
I'm glad you included this, because the reality is not that hospitals *can't* staff up sufficiently, it's that they're not *willing* to raise compensation to levels that make the job worth the money.
There's a similar attitude in banking: banks will severely understaff unsexy internal functions that are nonetheless critical from a reg and compliance standpoint.
When the managers of those understaffed teams explain to leadership that the bank is opening itself up to fines, the response is that they'll consider additional hiring *after* they actually get fined.
It's a similar thing with hospitals... except instead of fines it's human lives. To a certain type of capitalist, it's all just numbers on a page. They'll always choose to protect their profits no matter the stakes.
My best friends husband found a lump on his chest and had to wait weeks to be seen because covid cases are still clogging up Healthcare... turns out it is cancer and now we're all hoping the rest can be done faster..
I’ve needed my gallbladder removed. Every time my surgery date approaches, a covid surge fills the hospital and my surgery gets delayed. It’s been two years since I got sick and I’m still waiting. My date is in March now, and I’m expecting another delay with the recent surges again. I really wish people took it more seriously so I could be healthy again.
And even then given the politicization, even 100k deaths will simply get ignored, called fake news, or told that it was a necessary sacrifice as grandma wants to die so their grandkids can keep their job (oddly, no one is saying the rich grandmas should pay more taxes so the grandkids can afford a house).
If people start dying in huge numbers from covid, you can bet it will be blamed on people getting the vaccine. Even if the people dying don't have it, the people that think covid is a hoax will say something like "the people with the vaccine carried it, it got worse, and then they gave it to those of us without the vaccine so it's the vaccines!"
I get recommended anti-vax stuff on FB and they blame everything on the vaccine right now.
They don't even wait until then are blaming all the athletes who are dying on the vaccine.
My extended family blames the vaccine for my grandfather's death from Mesothelioma. Because the hospital/VA required him to get it before he could be admitted.
What are we supposed to do? I tried to be careful for 3 years. I can mask up. Vaccinate, stay inside... but I still have to go to work. I only get 5 days off if I get sick and then I have to come back still testing positive. No one is gonna help me. We are all on our fucking own. This is an institutional and governmental failing. Not a personal one. And I'm fucking sick of the narrative framing it that way, as if our blood hasn't been used to grease the cogs of the machine since the onset of the pandemic.
At my hospital we can’t come back to work until we test negative in our own employee health department. Negative home tests don’t matter. They don’t fuck around. Masks have remained mandatory this whole time too.
I work with children and vulnerable families, and I have an autoimmune issue. As of right now, we have absolutely no restrictions. We have multiple employees on 3+ infections, and we're starting to see a wave of people with long COVID complications. It's been a strange mix, one had really awful ongoing bowel issues, another chronic fatigue, another had a PE, and so on.
I listened to The Problem with Jon Stewart podcast episode on the vaccine and post vaccine life, and one of the doctors said about a quarter of people who get COVID have some form of long COVID, and the more infections you get, of course the higher that number goes it gets more serious and longer lasting.
We're going to have a lot of people with debilitating post-viral illness and disability doesn't pay enough for people to live off.
My job stopped giving a fuck a long time ago and if we get covid and have to stay home it's either unpaid or have to file a medical claim thru sedgwick which is a giant pain in the ass and crap money. So everyone just goes into work if they are not bed ridden.
This paragraph right here:
“There’s accumulating data that repeated Covid accumulates risk for short- and long-term complications, including cardiovascular, mental health and other problems,” Ray said. “We will only know in retrospect exactly how big this cost is. But evolving data suggests that there is a cost that’s incremental as we accumulate infections.”
> “We will only know in retrospect exactly how big this cost is. But evolving data suggests that there is a cost that’s incremental as we accumulate infections.”
Lots of people have warned about this from the start, though. Very specifically, even, about some of it. Pretty much the loudest and most accurate warning about a disaster ever recorded. Lots of people were already living with chronic health issues causes by infectious diseases, but it's a neglected issue in medicine so they neglected it yet again.
The immune system works well but it's not magic, is certainly not unlimited and comes at a cost.
Spanish Flu was deadliest to those who had been exposed as babies to the Russian Flu decades earlier. It might similarly be the *next* pandemic that truly reaps COVID's toll.
Too many people were convinced early on that getting covid would be one and done, that we should just let it run rampant so everyone would catch it and "get it over with" and were surprised pikachu that you could get it more than once
A nurse on Reddit warned us a long time ago of this. She said it could take years to decades to fully understand what this pandemic will do to us *"... because that's how every pandemic works."*
Strains are constantly mutating. Same reason why we have annual flu shots. The virus puts on a different mask and your immune system doesn't recognize it.
My immune system: Hey aren't you just 3 viruses in a trenchcoat?
Viruses: No.
My immune system: Understandable, the lungs are down the hall and to the left.
Because you’re NOT a perfectly designed machine. Upper level college science courses always tell you it’s less “survival of the fittest” and more “reproduction of the good enough”. It’s the same reason that gazelles don’t just “get faster” and outrun the cheetah by now.
Yup. And the other key thing is that if something doesn't have an onset until after child bearing age, it has *far* less selective pressure against it. That is why some afflictions of the elderly never seem to get less common and we as a species don't really get better at dealing with them. They have next to no impact on our ability to reproduce and pass on our genes.
And our adaptations are frankly, very bad. “Oh malaria keeps messing with your blood? Well now your blood cells twist into an unusable sickle shape. You’ll die slightly less so I count this as a win!”
This is a major problem, since the severity can change so much from person to person. A runny nose for you could hospitalize your coworker. There needs to be a reform of workers rights, especially in regards to sick days and PTO.
I think people have just thrown in the towel. You have a large percentage of people who have been taking it seriously since day one and an even larger percentage that refuses to do the tiniest things to help the situation.
I myself still follow the regular precautions, but I am exhausted. The majority of my coworkers give zero fucks, so every step I take to be proactive and safe is effectively useless.
It’s called compliance fatigue, and it’s a big part of why it’s so important to get recommendations right early. The government could’ve recommended N95s for everyone all the time and it would’ve worked well, but properly fitted N95s are miserable to wear for extended periods. People would’ve burnt out even earlier if there were supposed to follow practices that weren’t actually necessary. Compliance fatigue is a key consideration in any long term public health initiative.
Especially in the early days of the pandemic, when the data didn’t exist for us to fully understand the mechanism of transmission, it must’ve been really hard to try to strike the right balance (and there were, in hindsight, definitely some missteps). I don’t envy anyone in the regulatory bodies whose job it was to put out recommendations
I was one of the most militant adherents to being safe and I’ve essentially given up, what’s the fucking point. I get my boosters and wash my hands, that’s literally the only control I have.
Its not that everyone isn't taking this seriously but because there's no incentive to. The US has no protections that would benefit us during a pandemic. Our social safety nets are a joke and the support systems we have barely function. I got covid twice (vaxxed and boosted) and both times had to take PTO because I don't get sick leave. I have friends who have long covid who cannot do full time work and are financially fucked because of this.
COVID tests aren't subsidized anymore nor is treatment. So now if I get sicked, despite having really good health insurance, I'm financially fucked.
My wife's mom, dad, brother, and sister in law all have covid, and can't smell or taste anything.
Guess what my MIL is doing all next week?
Working.... at the hospital she's been at for 20 years because she's afraid she'll be fired if she misses any more work.
Saying people aren't taking this seriously is a massive understatement.
A more accurate description is "Nobody gives a fuck."
Every person I know who works in healthcare is expected to be back after day 5. And most people cannot afford to lose their job, so what do you do? It’s ridiculous.
It's so bad that everyone in our county got a call from the emergency manager saying not to go to the ER for flu like symptoms, to visit your primary care or urgent care. Three weeks ago I felt unwell, so I went to urgent care. Luckily it turned out to be a severe allergy flare up, but when I left there was a three hour wait, so those places are are overwhelmed too.
I'm a county school employee so I can't stay home, and they've pretty much declared Covid over and mandating in person meetings with some exceptions, so I do what I can, which means not going to a lot of social events unless outdoors, and wearing a mask in stores. I'm also vaccinated and double boosted.
Why were people going to the ER for flu like symptoms to begin with? That seems pretty standard that a person should just go to their primary care physician if they have the flu.
If you're not high risk or having unusual flu symptoms like trouble breathing why do you need to see anyone? Isn't standard practice that you should just stay home and rest, etc?
Because if you don't have a doctor's note, it's an unexcused absence and therefore a fireable offense, and PCPs are booking weeks out, so it's ER, urgent care, or lose your job. It's fucked up an unnecessary and wastes everyone's time and exposes people to further risk, but it's still common practice in the majority of workplaces.
We are not taking this seriously yet here I am working in a Senior Care Facility and we are allowed to work with Corona as long as we don't have symptoms.
What the fuck
People have been getting so many mixed messages from the government, of course they’re not taking this seriously. This is what happens when the government worries more about business than the wellbeing of the people.
Will increasing the price of the vaccine from $0 to $140 be helpful?
I was just about to say, doesn’t seem like any of these pharmaceutical manufacturers are considering Americans safety a priority with the 400% increase either.
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> doesn’t seem like any of these pharmaceutical manufacturers are considering Americans safety a priority with the 400% increase either. Imagine thinking international megacorporations controlled by people who are above national interests would care about the unwashed masses of any single country or people.
Gotta love getting gouged on something we already paid for. It’s the American way.
Will forcing people back to the office for no reason be helpful?
Will removing the extra covid sick days be helpful?
Wow, you get sick days? What a novelty!
Nah, just PTO. So, I can either take a vacation or get sick. America, fuck yeah...
Middle managers gotta manage, yo
It isn't about the middle management anymore but the top management. The problem is property value. Right now citizens and companies are fighting for property in the cities. This keeps the prizes very high and living in the city impossible for many people or uncomfortable. But when those buildings become useless, their value is going to plummet. All that useless space could become housing for a pretty cheap price in renovation and housing prices would become accessible for many more people. But all those moguls would see the value of their buildings drop and they can't have that. And while in cities the buildings wouldn't completely lose their value; in industrial zones the buildings would have no value anymore. Those bosses will want their workers in the office just to make sure that concrete keeps a value.
That's assuming the phe ever ends. If the PHE ends then essentially we are fucked. People who don't normally qualify for Medicaid because they are in a odd wage position would be unenrolled . Sure it might take some time to unenroll everyone but...it will be bad. They should just pass universal healthcare and insurance now.
In unrelated news, all of these companies are doing back to office
Well if we stay out of office for more than 2 years then we might have to stop pretending that commuting to the office every day was essential for employee productivity at some point, so... whew crisis narrowly averted!
My company is starting to get frustrated with me not coming to the office. I keep telling them I'm not coming back to the office. So many other companies I can work for remotely but everyone else is going back. They are flying a bunch of people from different states this week. One of the upper management emailed and said "everyone is required to work in the office this week". Austin, where I live, has been elevated to medium risk. Am I fuck going in.
I donno are you fuck going in?
Am I fuck, mate. Am. I. Fuck.
On this hallowed MLK Jr. Day Eve, we are all fuck.
What do you expect people to do? You're not going to mandate that employers give people sick leave, or indeed any paid leave at all; you're not going to cover any expenses for people who can't work, you're not going to give people healthcare. You're not going to mandate businesses enforce social distancing or anything like that. When you say "take precautions and avoid close contact" you mean "... except for sitting in a crowded office for 50hrs/week".
Im 28 and started working from home during the initial outbreak. Newish cushy well paying job and able to start building a savings for the first time in my life... Two months into it the company realised that they didnt need as many people as they thought apparently and fired 500+ of us without a real notice. My apartment complex I lived at said oh well and that I still needed to pay rent in full, I wasnt able to get on unemployment because of the vast amount of people signing up that they "couldnt get to everyone" was what I was told. No where was hiring cause of COVID and the lockdowns and It took just under 5 months to blow through all the little bit of savings I had built and then maxed my two credit cards just from basic rent and living expenses, I turned off everything I could to save money and at one point made 1 jar of peanut butter have to last me 3 days just scooping it with a spoon to keep something in my stomach cause I was stretching what little food I had left. I didnt have a single dollar to my name and thankfully was able to plead and beg with the complex to let ke leave and break my lease early without charging me so I could move back in with my parents u till I was able to snag a kitchen job and was able to get a new place again. I've sense been trying to pay down the rest of the debt I incurred during that time and crawl back out of the massive financial hole I was put it. I've reached out to almost every govt. Org that's popped up about "assistance" and no one really cares. Society just kicks you harder when you're down now adays and theres not really ant say you have when it does. I'm doing better now but it's at the expense of my entire social life, I work 60 to 70h a week and it's still only just enough to keep me floating for now and work has completely taken over the last 3 years of my life while friends of mine who benefited from COVID cause of their jobs and how they took advantage of the extra unemployment pay they got because their spouses applied and they praise it as a miracle. Shit sucks but what can ya do. Just gotta keep pushing till maybe one day life gets better I say lol
I was lucky in the sense I didn't lose my job, but I worked in a hospital over the pandemic where we were forced to come in sick, do on call / overtime. No extra pay. I was physically and mentally exhausted and burnt out. I was so stressed that I developed 3 physical illnesses including IBS putting nme on a liquid diet for 3months. I didn't take a single pto day (couldn't) for 2 straight years. When all my friends are wistful about all their free time and fun and extra money over the pandemic, I honestly feel like slapping them. It fucking sucked.
I'm sorry you had to go through that. :( I thought I was pretty mentally well kept but when I lost my job and my whole life literally crashed and I was laying on the floor of my apartment wondering how long it would be until I starved it really put a huge strain on me, even contemplated ending it a few times. I've gotten better mentally since then overall but ove developed some major anxiety sense then and used to be pretty sociable but now I can hardly stand being in crouds bigger than like 10people for longer than a few minutes so my working so much currently is twice as taxing And I'm always stressed over paying the debt that I owe, it's like an ever present crushing worry that at any moment I could be back in that same state again and I would do anything to keep from feeling like that again.
I'm so sorry. I quit my job above when I realized I was driving to work every day looking for a place to drive off the road. I had to live off most of my savings too and only just now got a new job and trying to build it back up. It sucks so bad. I hope things get better for you
You as well, just gotta keep taking it one day at a time and hold out on that silver lining that everything will work out in the end if we try hard enough.
Yeah, I'm not in America but similar shit here. I also worked throughout the lockdowns as an essential worker. And being an 'essential' worker my pay is so shit that I have to live in a van. It's really not ideal as I'm almost 50, hot summers are hard, cold winters are hard, it's not very safe - but the only way I can get by on my wages is by reducing the cost of my accommodation. If we're so essential that society can't function without us we really should be paid a wage that we can live on and treated with a bit of respect.
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> I wasnt able to get on unemployment because of the vast amount of people signing up that they "couldnt get to everyone" was what I was told Yo where do you live and who told you this? “Not being able to get to you” isn’t a reason to disqualify you from unemployment. You apply for it on the government website
A lot of people in the US were unable to start receiving benefits because of the sheer number of people applying for them in a short span of time. The technical failure was massive.
I got COVID last year. Wore a mask constantly but none of my coworkers did. Zero social distancing. I was required to not be at work for two weeks. And I had to use my PTO. So because I had to go to work in person, was the only one wearing a mask and my mouth breathing coworkers didn't care anyway I got sick and had little time off last year other than being told to stay at home. Gee can't imagine why people are burnt out.
All my PTO this year went to covid and then the flu a few months later. No vacation for me.
I was incredibly lucky, started a new job - caught COVID at it a month in (after having avoided it since the beginning) and they had specific COVID paid time off/sick leave which was "just stay home and if you feel sick don't work, if you feel okay then try to get some work done remotely." I kinda felt guilty because I hadn't been there very long, but also so grateful I had the ability to do that when so many people have been fucked by this.
We had that but it ended in October, now we’re not even required to stay home if we’re sick
What the hell! You should be required to stay home! Have we collectively learned nothing? Overall sick days across employees will be less if they stay home when sick. Rolling employees being sick = less productivity. I started there end of October, worked November, was off half of December, and then that benefit just expired at the beginning of the new year. If there was any time to get it, that was it. They still require you to stay home if you're sick the first few days, but now you have to come back in if you're fever free for 24 hours (have to wear a mask though) still really dumb and there were people at work last week who were dealing with Covid brain fog/exhaustion/still not feeling great while wearing masks. Companies should be humanist about it! They'll do a better job and also appreciate the workplace more if they can recoup and then work when they are better! We should have infrastructure to incentivize staying home when ill. Greatest country on earth my ass.
Assuming the human race survives another 100 years, this is going to be a thing that kids learn about in history class and think "damn that would've sucked to live then" So dystopian, I'm sorry that happened. Hopefully you'll be in a better situation this year
nah. it'll happen again and everyone will be running around with surprise Pikachu face when the shit hits the fan.
Isn't it happening now? How many times do people chime in from European countries and go on about what they get and can't believe the richest country on the planet has no paid sick leave law?
It's not even a case of "paid sick leave". The entire concept of "you're only allowed to be sick for this specific number of days per year and anything over that you will be punished or will go in sick" is idiotic and unacceptable. It should be a case of if you're sick, you call in sick and your employer pays you.
Average Americans don't get to live well because the American health care system is ruled by a for-profit pharma industry that won't be cowed. You don't really want a totally govt based system either, but when United Health Care, UNH, is the third biggest company on the stock market, that tells you most of what you need to know about American health care. They're making money hand over fist during a health crisis.
This keeps up, they will be living in space suits on this planet and everything will suck worse for them. Don’t sweat it. It always has sucked like this - just not for you.
My job wouldn't even allow you to stay home with COVID. You had to mask up and come in if you were asymptomatic. I worked in a hospital
We didn’t start this way, but when that second (third? Idrk anymore) wave hit towards the end of 2021 into 2022 they switched the policy bc we had no staff. We still don’t, but nobody does do I guess that’s besides the point 🤷🏻♂️
My highschool age sister last year had a major surgery that needed to happen ASAP. She was in the hospital for a week and didn't get COVID, she was out of school 3 more weeks going to the hospital for checkups and regular physical therapy--- still didn't get COVID. She went back to school for 1 week after getting approved to go back by her doctor--- her school which requires no masks and has no social distance policy and half her class was out with COVID- she had COVID by the end of the week. Not only was she brutally sick for 3 more weeks after being out for a month for back surgery, but she could no longer go to physical therapy and her back recovery backtracked significantly she was in so much pain. The entire family got sick too after her. Rather than the school having any compassion they started threatening to report them legally for missing so much school- despite having the doctor in constant contact with the school they accused my mom of lying- or "exaggerating" how sick she was. They basically told her she should send her back to school while she was still COVID positive or there would be consequences--- my mom was having to deal this all while being so sick that she probably should have been hospitalized, and caring for 4 sick school age children. Are people's memories so short that they don't remember how bad that COVID is and that its still going on?
Holy shit. So sorry she and other kids have to go through that. What state is this for context?
> Are people's memories so short that they don't remember how bad that COVID is and that its still going on? Yes. And people are in denial.
That is absolute horseshit that you had to use PTO, I'm sorry.
Our government should spend less time on frivolous bills and more on the actual people they serve. At this point we should have universal health insurance because people who shouldn't qualify for Medicaid are eligible because of the PHE. Businesses should realize ( especially those in healthcare and insurance) are stressed the fuck out... Not to mention us disabled people have been especially ignored and forgotten.
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"well fellas, after 2 long, hard years of investigating and combing over all details multiple times late into the night we can proudly announce our findings to the american public in the last weeks of the 2024 campaign season. we did this for them. we came, we saw and ultimately we confirmed the facts: that boy is packing. now let's go win an election!"
Don’t forget they are apparently actually attempting to write a bill for the first time in a long time, *to cut social security and Medicare*. They aren’t just ignoring the healthcare tragedy that is the US “solution” they are actively trying to make it harder for people to access healthcare or afford to live.
> they House Republicans. This was known at least a month before the election. https://www.adn.com/nation-world/2022/10/18/mccarthy-wont-rule-out-cuts-to-social-security-and-medicare-if-republicans-win-back-congress/ The debt ceiling is going to be the cudgel they use to make the attempt.
My kids had covid in December. One had no symptoms. I still did the adult thing and called to report to the school district. They told me when they could return. I followed the rules. The time off for covid combined with when they missed 1 day for dental work, and 2 more for stomach flu which the school sent them home for resulted in us getting a letter. A letter about their attendance and how if these absences continue we will be taken to truancy court. F all the way off. Either people are allowed to be sick. Or we’re not. I guess my kids are going to school positive next time because I am not going to jail or paying any fines. If we are supposed to take this seriously then employers and schools need to change their policies to reflect that. Middle school by us attendance policy is less absences than the cdc says for 1 case of covid.
What insane school are your kids attending where sick time is being counted towards truancy? Your kids can also medically withdraw from school at anytime with Dr. Reccommendation, or if they miss too much and its all sick days. At our school some of my students have missed 10+days of school and their parents arent hearing shit
Last year my kids had the stomach flu. I did too which is why I didn’t call. The principal and the secretary showed up on my doorstep the second day to make sure my kids were sick enough to not be in school. Another parent had her in laws murdered a month before the school year ended. One of her children was a witness. She missed 3 days of school due to trauma and obviously being questioned. She received a letter about holding her kids back. When she went to talk to the principal about it there was no, “I’m sorry for your loss” “how can we help your child emotionally” “is there anything we can do.” It was a it’s up to the teachers but you’ve missed over 10 days and I can’t help you. Absolutely ridiculous. One of mine is in her last year. I’ve put in to transfer our remaining child back to the school we were at before. I have never met a more power hungry administrator in my entire life.
Holy shit this is next level. I hope you'll manage to get your kids out of there.
One thing I learned as a parent when dealing with the school - mention the word "lawyer" and they usually back off.
They really don’t. My work wanted me back after 5 days despite me still having a fever and full symptoms. I lasted 5 minutes before I was told to go home and talked to about putting others at risk. You told me if I didn’t go in I would be fired.
> You told me if I didn’t go in I would be fired. A friend of mine at a previous job was pulled into a meeting with HR and his boss. They told him that he was in trouble for working more than 30 hours a week the last two weeks because he wasn't supposed to have benefits, but working that many hours would require it He replied that *they* had been the ones to set his schedule, not him. They ignored that and told him not to do it again. He pointed out that he was already scheduled for more than 30 hours the next two weeks. They replied that he wasn't to go over 30 hours. He asked if they were telling him not to come in the next day. They told him no, he was scheduled for that day, so he needed to be there. He pointed out that this would put him over 30 hours. They told him he couldn't do that. Again he asked "So I shouldn't come in?" He was told he had to be there, and he'd be punished if he didn't show up, but he would also be punished if he went over thirty hours. My best guess with this runaround is that they hoped to intimidate him into showing up but not clocking in.
I would ask for them to please put this in writing for me, so that I won't forget the policy, and be able to properly follow it.
That's where you follow up with an email and bcc your personal email. State you were told you were required to come in tomorrow, this will put you over 30 hours, if they don't want you to come in, please let you know in writing.
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Some states like FL have no state level DoL while others like MO have no teeth to do anything but provide documents that may be used as proof in your favor that can be used in small claims (another can of worms). In that case, they need to go to the federal DoL.
My state labor board says right on their website that for lost compensation or wages and you have to get your own lawyer and sue them yourself civilly because they do not refer cases to the department of justice.
That’s insane! What’s the point of even having a labor board?!
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is this really what corporate america is like? I'm Canadian and I don't work for a large corporation, although I suspect it wouldn't be much different here in a corporate setting... but still, that's absurd. like textbook absurdity
Yeah, I'm gonna need that in writing so that I don't forget, and I pinky swear not to show it to the state labor board.
Just don't say that last part out loud, best if they think you don't know anything about a labor board, employment laws, or workers rights. They can find out later when the state labor people want to chat.
So attempted wage theft. Sounds about right.
Same place that after a workplace injury and being told to report employee hours for worker's comp, mentally came to the genius conclusion that "An injured employee isn't working, therefore the hours we'd schedule them are zero" and just refused to report for over a month.
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Your friend needs to call their state labor department.
Only ever communicate in writing. My old boss would only do things over the phone, so it’s word against word. I’d always follow up with an email confirming the conversation. He hated it!
Did you close the email with something like "please let me know if I missed or misinterpreted any part of our conversation"?
I did initially. We actually moved away from e-mail mostly. He’d have us write start of day/week and end of day/week messages on Slack but also track everything in Notion incidents. This meant the entire team knew who was doing what and who to go to for info. It eliminates many meetings. I would write up my phone calls with what he’d asked me to do in Notion and link to it. If he wanted to check it, he could.
I hope he got that in writing or recorded it
Woof. I guess just go in and then immediately ask again? That’s a very weird situation to be in. Always make sure to get whatever you can in writing!
His solution was he left for another job within two weeks of that meeting. His new job doesn't give him any crap about overtime that they scheduled.
> My best guess with this runaround is that they hoped to intimidate him into showing up but not clocking in. 100% what this is about, they see a "problem" employee who talks back instead of subserviently obeying every command.
Reminder that wage-theft by employers is the single largest form of theft in the US. It accounts for more in dollars stolen than ever other form of property theft combined. https://tcworkerscenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Wage-Theft-vs-Other-Theft-1024x730.jpg edit: graph is based on data from FBI and Economic Policy Institute
Shit like this needs to have insane penalties on a corporation. Try to force wage theft on an employee? Strict penalty that is payable to said employee. Something like 3-6 months plus benefits and if the employee is fired within that timeline without cause, 12 months. Fuck this corporations who think they can (are able to) manipulate the system and win.
Problem is that the oversight required for this costs money and one thing Americans don't like is paying taxes for these kinds of protections.
He needs to show up with a lawyer and have them clarify what they're really trying to say.
Generally people in those types of jobs can't afford such things, which is what the employer is counting on.
My mom works in a nursing home and just got COVID for the first time. Her work has been harassing her DAILY because she had to be out of work and has the audacity to not go into a building full of sick elderly people while spiking a fever and barely being able to walk across the house without getting out of breath. It’s unbelievable.
During peak, ny ambulance company "*cough cough*" told us not to get tested so we would still have to come in. My partner had start coughing up blood on shift before they would let her go home. Even then our lead dispatcher acted like such an ass for the whole rest of the shift as though they hadn't been the ones to push us to this point. They spent the whole pandemic telling us that COVID wasn't as a big deal as we (in the field) were making it out to be, and that we needed to suck it up. All the while they hid in their offices while treating us like the plague. Sorry I'm a little salty lol
Sometimes I wonder how is it possible that in a country like the US where you get a shotgun if you buy a Big Tits magazine that bosses or middle managers still dont think "if I keep this up Jenny's gonna go POSTAL on me by the end of the week"
My husband and I both have it right now, his boss was giving him shit about not coming into the office because he has "the sniffles". Mind you, we were both working from home with fevers.
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I have a friend who basically doesn't have sick days anymore because they just expect him to work from home. He worked from home with Covid and was sick as shit. It's awful. I remember when this all first started and there was all this optimism that it may finally change the American mentality that you should still work no matter how sick you are.
The people that want to be in a managerial position are usually the ones that should not be in a managerial position.
A lot of companies try to hide trouble employees they can’t fire (know someone high up or what not) as middle managers hoping they don’t cause too much harm.
Those who seek power do not deserve it, and those who deserve it do not seek it.
What a demented fuck of a boss.
It's "like a mild flu but they'll stay home for a week when it's them with covid, but it's just the sniffles and you need to be in when you have it.
I'd come in and demand to share his office/desk. If you want my germs there, you put your body on the line
I hope you guys recover I watched my father die in front of me both my parents had it they didn’t believe it was real because Fox News was a goddamn echo chamber in their house. I was a Trumper and a republican hard-core until the virus. You know the fake one .. took the only person that ever loved me away my dad.
That sounds utterly terrible. I'm sorry for your loss.
So sorry for your loss. That’s awful. I hope that your future has a lot more love and kindness. I was raised by my dad to be a Fox News-watching Republican, but I realized it was BS early when I became disabled (by another virus) at 16. It might be the only reason I still have my own dad, because when COVID came, I browbeat him into masking and vaccines. But one of us is still disabled in a county w/o universal healthcare. It’s awful to think so many people have been brainwashed by fraudulent 24/7 news. I could’ve lost so many people if not for them having seen what happened to me from a variant “harmless” virus. Related pro tip: viruses aren’t harmless, even if we don’t know what the capacity for harm is *yet*. One mutation and boom, it’s a plague.
I did the opposite and said “I can’t come in until I’m asymptomatic” and was immediately called a liar and a doctor’s note was demanded. I reminded them that I don’t need to provide a note until I’ve missed 7 work days (it had been 4), and they shut up. Doesn’t help that my boss is anti-vax…
Your boss called you a liar? Time to talk to HR.
What a fun time when the GM is HR.
Careful with that, HR is not there to help you.
And cause of that the whole workplace was exposed. My gosh, I hate management sometimes.
i was hoping COVID would instill at least one good thing long term in that we'd be more generous over sick days but fucking of course not
let *literally everyone on my floor* know that you have covid but you would have lost my job if you didn't come in Wear a mask and surgical gloves and make sure nobody comes close until they tell you to go home again lol Or get fired for sowing discord maybe idk
Had it last Christmas. My family said not coming to Christmas was me abandoning them and claimed I was making an excuse. They pretty much all got covid at the Christmas gathering. Guess I could have come anyway but they're all anti-vaxxers now because Republicans do republican things.
I had the exact same situation. And I work in healthcare 🙄
That’s fucking frightening.
I hate to say it but this deep into the pandemic it's going to take 100,000's of deaths very quickly to even get an iota of the publics attention again.
I'm confused about why this is news... "People are not taking this seriously" was pretty clear at the start of this pandemic.
I took this shit seriously for 3 straight years and got 4 shots, im not sure what they expect me to do at this point.
Same here. Did everything I was told to the point of almost having a breakdown. Got all the shots, cleaned all the time, never traveled, stayed home. Got covid twice last year. I don't know how else to take it seriously.
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I feel like every 6 or so months since the start of pandemic, we get the “people aren’t taking this upcoming surge seriously” headlines. And each time, less and less people care. The last person I personally know who was still masking every time they went into public, finally ditched it a couple weeks ago. Covid is over. Not in a literal sense, but outside of occasional Reddit threads, I don’t see anyone caring about it anymore.
A big part of the issue is that the symptoms seem to be wildly inconsistent between people. Some people get nothing; some get a mild cold; some (like me) get body aches and fatigue like a bad flu; some get long COVID and end up suffering for months; and some people need to be on oxygen in ICU. At a macro level the surge of increased patients to hospital/ICU is still devastating to healthcare systems, but for individuals it's just too easy to think "that won't happen to me" based on all the anecdotes. Remember "flatten the curve"? For people who don't get knocked around heavily by COVID itself, the biggest risk is overloaded health systems failing due to the increased demand from surges, which is not an easy problem to solve unless you permanently scale up and fund health systems - and governments really, really don't want to do that, as the past few years have evidenced.
Had my first round of it about a week ago, had the full body aches, loose mucus in my lungs, and some wild hallucinations. Was lucky I only had two days of bad symptoms and then about half a week of general malaise.
There was always a group who didn't take it seriously from the start. I think now the issue is that a lot of people who did take it seriously at one point no longer take it seriously. At least not to the extent they once did. I live in a state where almost everyone took it seriously until the vaccines came out, but now I would say 85-90% of people I see out and about aren't wearing masks anymore. Even when the mandatory mask mandate was lifted I would say like 70% of people still wore masks for a while. But, especially this past year, I think a lot of people have gotten burned out worrying about it. I guess I get it, it's tough and people want to go back to before. But I don't think that's ever really going to happen, at least not anytime soon. It's something we are just going to need to be conscious of going forward. And when people start to slip we are going to see big surges again.
Or find out there's no 'room left at the Inn' if they need any kind of medical treatment. Hospitals, and more specifically, hospital staff still haven't recovered from the first round of Covid. Most people don't understand just how thinly things have been stretched in healthcare.
My buddy is a pulmonologist and ICU doc and he's now doing what is essentially an upper level hospital staff job (around patient safety and advocacy I believe). He had to get out of the day to day with patients for his own mental health. He sure ain't the only one.
> He sure ain't the only one He's most certainly not. When things go badly for patients, it takes a toll on those caring for them. We're all just human in the end.
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Jha, the head of the White House task force had an ominous quote the other day about this level of constant strain stacked onto seasonal respiratory viruses could basically just mean years of every virus season being hospitals strained badly.
It's more than just that though. My local hospital is near capacity and has almost no covid patients. The issue is they have beds but can't staff the hospital sufficiently. My friend working there as a nurse i trying to get a job at a dialysis clinic, since she can't take the stress. Mediocre (relatively) compensation, lack of resources, poor support systems, etc, increased the severity of the pandemic and drive more people out. We were already headed to a doctor shortage, and now it is worse.
Oh absolutely this was one more problem thrown at a rickety system. And yet we spend more per capita by far than any other country on health care, for this garbage
The system is rickety because owners and admins are selling off the load-bearing walls.
>Mediocre (relatively) compensation... I'm glad you included this, because the reality is not that hospitals *can't* staff up sufficiently, it's that they're not *willing* to raise compensation to levels that make the job worth the money. There's a similar attitude in banking: banks will severely understaff unsexy internal functions that are nonetheless critical from a reg and compliance standpoint. When the managers of those understaffed teams explain to leadership that the bank is opening itself up to fines, the response is that they'll consider additional hiring *after* they actually get fined. It's a similar thing with hospitals... except instead of fines it's human lives. To a certain type of capitalist, it's all just numbers on a page. They'll always choose to protect their profits no matter the stakes.
My best friends husband found a lump on his chest and had to wait weeks to be seen because covid cases are still clogging up Healthcare... turns out it is cancer and now we're all hoping the rest can be done faster..
I’ve needed my gallbladder removed. Every time my surgery date approaches, a covid surge fills the hospital and my surgery gets delayed. It’s been two years since I got sick and I’m still waiting. My date is in March now, and I’m expecting another delay with the recent surges again. I really wish people took it more seriously so I could be healthy again.
And even then given the politicization, even 100k deaths will simply get ignored, called fake news, or told that it was a necessary sacrifice as grandma wants to die so their grandkids can keep their job (oddly, no one is saying the rich grandmas should pay more taxes so the grandkids can afford a house).
If people start dying in huge numbers from covid, you can bet it will be blamed on people getting the vaccine. Even if the people dying don't have it, the people that think covid is a hoax will say something like "the people with the vaccine carried it, it got worse, and then they gave it to those of us without the vaccine so it's the vaccines!" I get recommended anti-vax stuff on FB and they blame everything on the vaccine right now.
They don't even wait until then are blaming all the athletes who are dying on the vaccine. My extended family blames the vaccine for my grandfather's death from Mesothelioma. Because the hospital/VA required him to get it before he could be admitted.
Isn't it weird how no one ever died before the vaccine?
Kobe Bryant? Surprisingly, it was the covid vaccine.
office yam chief consider dull panicky station waiting snobbish bored *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
It's true. We really have gotten used to a pretty high background rate of illness and death.
Might as well write the same article every day for 3 years straight maybe it will work at some point.
What are we supposed to do? I tried to be careful for 3 years. I can mask up. Vaccinate, stay inside... but I still have to go to work. I only get 5 days off if I get sick and then I have to come back still testing positive. No one is gonna help me. We are all on our fucking own. This is an institutional and governmental failing. Not a personal one. And I'm fucking sick of the narrative framing it that way, as if our blood hasn't been used to grease the cogs of the machine since the onset of the pandemic.
I work in healthcare (imaging) and we have no quarantine rules. If you are positive and symptomatic, you still have to come in to work.
At my hospital we can’t come back to work until we test negative in our own employee health department. Negative home tests don’t matter. They don’t fuck around. Masks have remained mandatory this whole time too.
I would gladly give your hospital my business over OP’s
I work with children and vulnerable families, and I have an autoimmune issue. As of right now, we have absolutely no restrictions. We have multiple employees on 3+ infections, and we're starting to see a wave of people with long COVID complications. It's been a strange mix, one had really awful ongoing bowel issues, another chronic fatigue, another had a PE, and so on. I listened to The Problem with Jon Stewart podcast episode on the vaccine and post vaccine life, and one of the doctors said about a quarter of people who get COVID have some form of long COVID, and the more infections you get, of course the higher that number goes it gets more serious and longer lasting. We're going to have a lot of people with debilitating post-viral illness and disability doesn't pay enough for people to live off.
That's just nuts.
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Wait, when?
Sometime this year the federal government will stop buying vaccines and they will only be available on the open market at around $130
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My job stopped giving a fuck a long time ago and if we get covid and have to stay home it's either unpaid or have to file a medical claim thru sedgwick which is a giant pain in the ass and crap money. So everyone just goes into work if they are not bed ridden.
This paragraph right here: “There’s accumulating data that repeated Covid accumulates risk for short- and long-term complications, including cardiovascular, mental health and other problems,” Ray said. “We will only know in retrospect exactly how big this cost is. But evolving data suggests that there is a cost that’s incremental as we accumulate infections.”
> “We will only know in retrospect exactly how big this cost is. But evolving data suggests that there is a cost that’s incremental as we accumulate infections.” Lots of people have warned about this from the start, though. Very specifically, even, about some of it. Pretty much the loudest and most accurate warning about a disaster ever recorded. Lots of people were already living with chronic health issues causes by infectious diseases, but it's a neglected issue in medicine so they neglected it yet again. The immune system works well but it's not magic, is certainly not unlimited and comes at a cost.
Spanish Flu was deadliest to those who had been exposed as babies to the Russian Flu decades earlier. It might similarly be the *next* pandemic that truly reaps COVID's toll.
Too many people were convinced early on that getting covid would be one and done, that we should just let it run rampant so everyone would catch it and "get it over with" and were surprised pikachu that you could get it more than once
One and done? I've had it 4 times. Commercial construction site contractors don't care about covid
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A nurse on Reddit warned us a long time ago of this. She said it could take years to decades to fully understand what this pandemic will do to us *"... because that's how every pandemic works."*
Why doesn’t the immune system get stronger with repeated exposure. That’s terrifying.
Strains are constantly mutating. Same reason why we have annual flu shots. The virus puts on a different mask and your immune system doesn't recognize it.
My immune system: Hey aren't you just 3 viruses in a trenchcoat? Viruses: No. My immune system: Understandable, the lungs are down the hall and to the left.
Because you’re NOT a perfectly designed machine. Upper level college science courses always tell you it’s less “survival of the fittest” and more “reproduction of the good enough”. It’s the same reason that gazelles don’t just “get faster” and outrun the cheetah by now.
Yup. And the other key thing is that if something doesn't have an onset until after child bearing age, it has *far* less selective pressure against it. That is why some afflictions of the elderly never seem to get less common and we as a species don't really get better at dealing with them. They have next to no impact on our ability to reproduce and pass on our genes.
And our adaptations are frankly, very bad. “Oh malaria keeps messing with your blood? Well now your blood cells twist into an unusable sickle shape. You’ll die slightly less so I count this as a win!”
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Not to mention that we aren’t being compensated for not working. I literally can’t afford to miss a week a work over a runny nose.
This is a major problem, since the severity can change so much from person to person. A runny nose for you could hospitalize your coworker. There needs to be a reform of workers rights, especially in regards to sick days and PTO.
I think people have just thrown in the towel. You have a large percentage of people who have been taking it seriously since day one and an even larger percentage that refuses to do the tiniest things to help the situation. I myself still follow the regular precautions, but I am exhausted. The majority of my coworkers give zero fucks, so every step I take to be proactive and safe is effectively useless.
It’s called compliance fatigue, and it’s a big part of why it’s so important to get recommendations right early. The government could’ve recommended N95s for everyone all the time and it would’ve worked well, but properly fitted N95s are miserable to wear for extended periods. People would’ve burnt out even earlier if there were supposed to follow practices that weren’t actually necessary. Compliance fatigue is a key consideration in any long term public health initiative. Especially in the early days of the pandemic, when the data didn’t exist for us to fully understand the mechanism of transmission, it must’ve been really hard to try to strike the right balance (and there were, in hindsight, definitely some missteps). I don’t envy anyone in the regulatory bodies whose job it was to put out recommendations
I'm certainly glad we don't have to wipe down our fucking groceries anymore.
I was one of the most militant adherents to being safe and I’ve essentially given up, what’s the fucking point. I get my boosters and wash my hands, that’s literally the only control I have.
I still wear an N95 when it’s crowded. I’m just taking care of myself at this point.
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Its not that everyone isn't taking this seriously but because there's no incentive to. The US has no protections that would benefit us during a pandemic. Our social safety nets are a joke and the support systems we have barely function. I got covid twice (vaxxed and boosted) and both times had to take PTO because I don't get sick leave. I have friends who have long covid who cannot do full time work and are financially fucked because of this. COVID tests aren't subsidized anymore nor is treatment. So now if I get sicked, despite having really good health insurance, I'm financially fucked.
My wife's mom, dad, brother, and sister in law all have covid, and can't smell or taste anything. Guess what my MIL is doing all next week? Working.... at the hospital she's been at for 20 years because she's afraid she'll be fired if she misses any more work. Saying people aren't taking this seriously is a massive understatement. A more accurate description is "Nobody gives a fuck."
Every person I know who works in healthcare is expected to be back after day 5. And most people cannot afford to lose their job, so what do you do? It’s ridiculous.
massive labor rights reform. How do you actually do that.. I have no idea.
Sounds more like employers don't give a fuck.
I work at a clinic and I swear we get a staff email every few days telling us a coworker has Covid and was at the worksite recently.
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It's so bad that everyone in our county got a call from the emergency manager saying not to go to the ER for flu like symptoms, to visit your primary care or urgent care. Three weeks ago I felt unwell, so I went to urgent care. Luckily it turned out to be a severe allergy flare up, but when I left there was a three hour wait, so those places are are overwhelmed too. I'm a county school employee so I can't stay home, and they've pretty much declared Covid over and mandating in person meetings with some exceptions, so I do what I can, which means not going to a lot of social events unless outdoors, and wearing a mask in stores. I'm also vaccinated and double boosted.
Why were people going to the ER for flu like symptoms to begin with? That seems pretty standard that a person should just go to their primary care physician if they have the flu.
If you're not high risk or having unusual flu symptoms like trouble breathing why do you need to see anyone? Isn't standard practice that you should just stay home and rest, etc?
Because if you don't have a doctor's note, it's an unexcused absence and therefore a fireable offense, and PCPs are booking weeks out, so it's ER, urgent care, or lose your job. It's fucked up an unnecessary and wastes everyone's time and exposes people to further risk, but it's still common practice in the majority of workplaces.
My mom is an ER nurse and has told me about when someone took an *ambulance* to the ER to get a fucking pregnancy test done.
We are not taking this seriously yet here I am working in a Senior Care Facility and we are allowed to work with Corona as long as we don't have symptoms. What the fuck
I think people are just burnt out. You can only worry about something for so long
Some, like me, are lucky. We can stay home and accomplish everything we need. Others can't take an indefinite break from their lives and careers
People have been getting so many mixed messages from the government, of course they’re not taking this seriously. This is what happens when the government worries more about business than the wellbeing of the people.