respublica

Mask fines

The Edwardsville Illinois city council adopted a measure Tuesday night mandating face coverings while engaging in almost any activity outside a residence. Such activities include shopping or working at retail businesses; picking up food curbside or from a drive-thru restaurant; visiting a doctor's office; traveling on public transportation; and interacting with customers, clients, patients or colleagues at businesses or places of worship that are open to the public.

And there will be fines, first offense is $25, a second is $50, a third is $100; and the fourth or more are $250. Higher penalties, ranging from $50 to $500, are stipulated for businesses, stores, offices, property owners, managers or operators.

But what I most approve of is: Anyone not wearing a mask over mouth and nose in public spaces in Edwardsville may now be fined. 

It drives me crazy to be around people in public places or working in businesses who have their noses uncovered which also makes the mouth part of the mask with a wide open gap. I see this and come into contact with, more people than I can count. So I'm happy to see Edwardsville taking note of the importance of getting the nose covered, not just the mouth.

Thanksgiving via Dr. Fauci

I was reading Dr. Fauci's warnings about Thanksgiving safety due to the Coronavirus outbreak. He said he would not go anywhere on Thanksgiving this year out of health concerns. "He warned that if too many people choose not to abide by the basic health guidelines and advisories set by health officials such as social distancing and wearing face masks, a bad situation could be made far worse."

Then this: "The chances are that you will see a surge superimposed on a surge," Fauci predicted. "Things lag by a couple of weeks, so what we're seeing now is what happened two-plus weeks ago. What we're doing now is going to be reflected two, three weeks from now."

My highlighted text is the important part and is exactly what I've mentioned earlier. The outbreak we are seeing now....what happened two or three weeks ago?  The election! People in long lines to vote early, more people voting in person, that is what went on all over the country two or three weeks ago.  It nags at me that no where have I seen any major news reporting on this connection when they are quick to point to any other big events and covid out breaks.

Why is this?

A question about the new Covid outbreak

In past months when there has been an outbreak of the CoronaVirus in various areas, news reports have been quick to point to protests or rallies or indoor dining openings. But the current rise in this virus is pretty widespread across the country. And, this has happened within two weeks of in person voting on election day. And the last week of early voting with long lines.

I wonder if this could be a big source of the contagion, one I have not heard from any news outlet. They have been quick to point to the others in the past, but not election day and I wonder why.

This is truly awful

I just hate reading these stories, especially coming from news outlets. This one was in the Mississippi Free Press but there are others just like it.

"Mississippians should plan “to have very small Thanksgiving gatherings” with only nuclear family members this year to stay safe amid the COVID-19 pandemic. You’re going to have a lot of sick folks who caught (COVID-19) during Thanksgiving. We know this is the perfect milieu, having young folks and old folks and folks with chronic illness around the table—and then death. We don’t really want to see Mamaw at Thanksgiving and bury her by Christmas. It’s going to happen. You’re going to say hi at Thanksgiving, it’s so nice to see you, and you’re either going to be visiting her by Facetime in the ICU or planning a small funeral by Christmas"

This almost does me in, there is no hope in this at all.The tough part is, this is an extreme point of view, but it's not totally wrong.

A reminder

Sometime back I wrote about the germ killing properties in mouth wash, especially the kind containing alcohol. This has come up again in various Covid reports and it appears that any mouth was containing at least 0.07 percent cetypyridinium chloride CPC will kill germs.

I feel more secure with the alcohol based type because it was what my dentist recommended and had me use before my last appointment. But if the other works, we all need to be using it daily.

We need all the help we can get.

More and more and more Covid news

For a minute there I started to believe that with the news of a CoronaVirus vaccine looking hopeful we'd stop getting weird and awful Covid news. But no. This morning two news reports have added to the stress.

1. Biden Coronavirus Task Force Member: We Are About to Enter COVID Hell."  That person believes the next three to four months are going to be, by far, the darkest of the pandemic."

     And then 2.  One in five COVID-19 patients develop mental illness within 90 days - study    " a large study found 20% of those infected with the coronavirus are diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder within 90 days." 

     And finally, 3. a writer for a site named Jalopnik expanded on why she wears a mask even while driving alone in a car. She recommends doing this so we avoid touching our faces, especially after finishing up shopping or being out other places. Our hand may have touched who knows what germ and we often don't realize just how often we touch our faces. I would probably agree that we do touch our faces frequently. We may not have to keep the mask on in the car if we've used hand sanitizer after getting into it. But, this is just one more thing I will be obsessing about.

Happy Tuesday everyone.

 

One more way to protect yourself

A year ago or so I had to have a tooth extracted followed by a crown put on. It was not the most fun I've ever had, but I did learn one helpful thing I'd not known and I was reminded of it this morning.

Near the end of the 3 month long tooth ordeal, the orthodontist told me to rinse regularly with a mouthwash and not just any mouthwash, but one that contained alcohol. This type killed germs more effectively than the other type.  Frankly, I'd never given a thought to mouthwash having alcohol, most on the store shelves do not. At one time all of them probably had alcohol but was removed because of the possibility of it being used as an actual drink.

Today an article popped up with the headline:

Mouthwashes, oral rinses may inactivate human coronaviruses, study finds

And what was this simple habit? Regularly doing a mouthwash rinse. And, if my dentist was correct, the alcohol type is even more effective.

Anything we can do to slow this virus is fine with me and this one thing is easy. We all brush regularly, right? Just add this one step.

Forget about the family Thanksgiving

Dr. Fauci is worried about Thanksgiving because he is seeing a big Covid-19 outbreak among people who were part of small gatherings. Small indoor gatherings of families and friends are driving coronavirus outbreaks across the country — and that has worrying implications for Thanksgiving, "You don't want to be the Grinch that stole the holidays, he said, but, as families plan for the coming festivities, they need to consider the risks of a gathering."

"You get one person who's asymptomatic and infected, and then all of a sudden, four or five people in that gathering are infected," he said. "To me, that's the exact scenario that you're going to see on Thanksgiving."

I knew this was coming, there have been too many local outbreaks recently. It is almost as though this won't go away until we all get it.

But it seems very important to not relax and let down your guard right now. We're all tired of wiping everything down, constantly washing our hands, wearing masks etc. But we have to keep this up. Don't give up, never give up.

But Thanksgiving may be a family Zoom holiday this year in our family.

Cover your nose!

One of my pet peeves on being out in public among other people wearing masks is coming alongside someone with his nose uncovered. This may seem a silly thing to be bothered by, but if you've listened to any information given about masks, you've heard that the nose can put out more moisture particles and germs that the mouth. You can at least keep you mouth shut, the nose not so much.

Most of those who wear their masks with their nose uncovered are men, often older men. I see this all the time in Schnucks, Home Depot, Kruta Bakery, and Walmart, places I tend to go to if I go at all. Also male store stockers have their noses uncovered much too often. Why is this? I am guessing they feel they can't breath well covered or their glasses fog up.

I am always paying attention to other people and giving the bare nose people a wide berth. Doing it halfway is not good enough these days. Call me overly critical or paranoid, I can't help it. We have the information we need to follow it.

Experts and more experts will be our un-doing

For how many weeks have we been hearing from medical experts and news people of all sorts that we simply must get a flu shot this year. The combination of a flu outbreak and the Covid virus could make things much worse. This started in September and warnings went out that we should get the flu shot before the end of October, even earlier if possible to get those antibodies time to work.

And so Dale and I did go and get a flu shot, why ask for trouble.

But today CNN talking with some medical expert is telling us this: "Insufficient sleep in the week before getting a flu shot can lead to the production of less than 50% of the normal antibody response -- a reaction that would render the flu shot largely ineffective." "Sleep prior to vaccination could be critical to vaccine efficacy."

This sort of information bandied about by major and local news is exactly why the rest of tear our hair out and come to not trust or believe them half the time. I mean, seriously, I have no idea whether or not Dale or I got the correct amount of sleep the week before our flu shot and now we have to be concerned it may not be effective.