Picking Sides

      Okay, we have lived with this damn virus for over a year and a half now, from the first whisper to the current surge of the Delta variant.

      Delta is hitting hardest among the unvaccinated, and spreading most rapidly in those parts of the U.S. with the lowest vaccination rates.  You can check it on news sources from CNN to conservative local newspapers and TV stations in the affected area, from NPR to Fox News.  Geography doesn't lie.  If the illness was affecting the vaccinated more than the unvaccinated, most of New England would be on fire; they'd be dying on the sidewalks outside of hospitals in Vermont.

      They're not.  The South is bearing the brunt of this.  Maybe hot weather driving people indoors is to blame?  But no; the entire country has sweltered under a heat wave this summer.

      In the worst-hit places, hospitals are overwhelmed.  Patients are being diverted.  This is one of the subtler ways the virus has killed elsewhere: once the hospitals are full, the rate of increase among the gravely ill can outstrip our ability to get them to a suitable healthcare facility quickly enough to help.  And at that point, a patient suffering heart attack or a severe allergic reaction is in just as much jeopardy as someone with a severe case of coronavirus. The lifesaving care they need is not available in a timely manner. 

      One coronavirus vaccine has received full FDA approval as of yesterday.  You can read about it, including the process they followed, on the FDA website.

      At this point, anyone arguing against the coronavirus vaccines, against measures to limit the rate of spread, or in favor of allowing unchecked spread so "nature will take its course" is arguing on the side of the disease.  On the side of death.  Hey, hold your own opinion, but if you're still on Team Virus after so much has happened, I think you're a fool.

      There's a fight on and it has nothing to do with the usual red-blue political bullshit.  It's the human race against a viral disease; it's people vs. a remorseless, mindless biological robot.

      Pick a side.