Tag Archives: health

Misinformation and Conspiracy Theories Can Kill

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Some reflections on the danger of COVID misinformation and conspiracy theories.

Do you want some reliable information about COVID-19? Visit the Center for Disease Control’s COVID page: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/. This page is especially useful if you’re wondering what to believe about vaccines: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/facts.html

The other day I saw a business owner I hadn’t seen since early in the days of the COVID pandemic. His name is Mike. His business is down in Yakima, WA and I’m pretty sure that the last time I saw him was when I was on my way back from my southern migration in mid March 2020.

The last time I saw Mike

Back then, the pandemic was still new. I’d done a bunch of art shows in Arizona and was scheduled to do one in Borrego Springs, CA on the second weekend in March 2020. I’d voiced some concern to my artist friend, Janet, who was also going to do the show, wondering whether it would be cancelled. She thought I was nuts — that’s how new COVID was. So we both drove all the way out to Borrego Springs, camped out in the desert, and were informed, the day before setup, that the show had been cancelled.

This told me what I’d already suspected: the pandemic was real and it was serious.

I headed home and stopped in Yakima along the way to pick something up at Mike’s shop. He was spewing conspiracy theories as usual — he’d always shared what he learned from far right wing radio talk shows with me and I always tuned them out — suggesting that COVID wasn’t real.

I got what I needed and hurried home.

I don’t like to disagree with folks who share what I think are crazy beliefs — it just isn’t worth it — but I don’t like to hang out with them, either. It’s almost as if I’m worried that some of that crap will take root in my brain and start rotting it.

Mike’s Bout with COVID

Want to read a real story from a COVID survivor? This Twitter thread has plenty of first-hand details.

Fast forward to Monday of this week. I needed another item from Mike’s shop and was already down in Pasco for an art show that weekend. Instead of going straight home, I headed over to Mike’s place in Yakima. I wore a mask when I went inside and, although none of the employees were wearing masks when I showed up, they all put them on right away. I admit that surprised me. Yakima is one of Washington’s COVID hot spots for a reason.

I talked to Mike. He wasn’t vaccinated, of course. He reported that he’d gotten COVID and told me all about the symptoms. How quickly it had come on, how he’d lost his sense of taste and smell, how he’d had a cough and some trouble breathing. He didn’t need hospitalization — or, if he did, he didn’t tell me about it. But since getting COVID, he was having issues with his arms. Pain, mostly, and lack of strength. It had been going on for months. His doctor had tried several pain medications and none helped — although ibuprofen, which I suggested, did. He claimed his doctor told him not to take it long term because it could “mess him up.” So he was living in constant pain after having COVID.

He was suffering from Long COVID.

He knew it. He admitted it. He said the good thing was that now he was immune to COVID so he wouldn’t be getting the vaccine. That was good because there was an Israeli study….

He went on a bit before I interrupted him and told him I had to go. (My fear of brain rot had kicked in.)

It Really Isn’t Worth It

Despite his crazy beliefs, I kind of like Mike. I don’t want him to be sick. I want him to get vaccinated. I want him to understand that what he’s reading isn’t true or is, at the least, misleading.

So when a FactCheck.org article related to misinformation about the Israeli vaccine study crossed my Twitter feed, I sent him a link in a text message.

You mentioned Israeli studies about vaccine efficacy. I hope you’re getting FACTS and not misleading information. Here’s an article from FactCheck.org about a misleading video about the Israeli studies. https://www.factcheck.org/2021/11/scicheck-video-questioning-vaccine-efficacy-pushes-falsehood-about-israel-data/

It got the response I should have expected. I can imagine him typing all this crap into his phone, feverishly trying to convince me that an organization I trust and respect is “bullshit.” I didn’t even read it all. In fact, I didn’t even know until just now, when I selected it to copy and paste, that he’d written so much; it didn’t show up in the text window. But here it is, in its entirety:

Did you know that fact-check.org is a bullshit site ? Deep into censoring, tainted by big Pharma money and tied to Facebook ?
No I’m not misinformed . I know too many Doctors, and RN’s who I talk to that agree with me . I don’t care if someone wants to get the Jab or not. I’ll take my chances with my natural antibodies, could I get sick again, yes, just like those who got the jab . I’m on the same page as Rand Paul. At least I won’t have to worry about all the side effects people have been experiencing.
I read all news left and right and it amazes how gullible and naive people are , for example just look at how many people fell for that phony Russian collision bullshit . You know, the ones that ONLY get their news from CNN or MSNBC, you know the type. The totally misinformed . Now that made up bullshit is coming to light . Durhams investigation has proven it to all be a total fabrication .
As far as studies go to the efficacy of natural antibodies there have been 96 studies so far .

Japan crushes Big Pharma with a small yet effective move


Japan is vaccinating and the Japanese government recently made Ivermectin available too . Since Ivermectin was made available New cases have plummeted from over 6000 per day to around 100 . If used in the early stages it is very effective . You can always tell who the misinformed are when you mention Ivermectin . If Horse Dewormer comes out of their mouth you can tell they are misinformed . Ivermectin was distributed to 300 million people in Africa by Merck for over 30 years, billions of doses taken safely . It is considered by the WHO as one of the ten most important drugs in existence . In 2015 the inventors won a Nobel prize for the good they did . River Blindness, elephantiasis and a host of other disease was eradicated by its use . There is also the Veterinarian Ivermectin medicine .
Believe what you want . I won’t believe anything coming from sources like factchecker.org and Wikipedia . Way too biased for me .

My response was short and simple:

Believe what you want. Sorry to bother you.

It’s kind of heartbreaking.

But there’s one thing I should have told him, one thing I realized after that final text to him.

He didn’t get vaccinated and he got COVID. I did get vaccinated and I mask up in public and I haven’t gotten COVID. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

Another Neighbor Dies

Last week, another one of my neighbors died of COVID.

Understand that I live on a private road with only about 25 lots and maybe 20 homes. In total, fewer than 50 people live here. Yet we’ve lost two of them to COVID.

The first was an older guy who lived by himself and was not well-liked in the neighborhood. I don’t know for certain what his personal beliefs were, but I know he was friends with another anti-vax neighbor who he visited every morning for coffee. I’d see him drive by with his dog — the same one who killed my chickens twice — barking his brains out the pickup truck’s window.

The story that went through the neighborhood is that he got COVID and was hospitalized. He was in for quite a while. They were ready to release him when they discovered he had pneumonia. So they kept him longer. Then, before they could release him, he had a stroke — could it have been caused by a COVID-related blood clot? I don’t know. They sent him off to the Seattle side of the mountains for rehab and he died a while later.

Keep in mind that all this happened before there was a vaccine. Sure, he could have kept safe by wearing a mask, maintaining his distance from others, etc. But he apparently didn’t think that was necessary. Instead, he carried on his morning coffee routine with the other anti-vax neighbor, a man who goes off to work every day and is doubtlessly in contact with many people. And who knows what kind of other socializing he did?

The more recent death was infinitely sadder. The man who died was also unvaccinated, but he was a doctor so I honestly don’t understand why he didn’t get vaccinated. He was in his 50s and had recently built his home. He had a wife and grown kids and probably grandkids. He was in that time of life when the hard work is done and retirement is on the horizon. The time we supposedly work hard for our entire lives.

He and his wife both got COVID. They both wound up in the hospital. She recovered. He didn’t. He went into the ICU. I don’t know if he was intubated — I didn’t ask. But he didn’t come out.

I knew he was dead when I came home from shopping one day and saw the florist’s delivery van coming down the road from the direction of their home. Another neighbor confirmed it later. I was asked to help spread the news among our other neighbors, including the vaccinated couple across the street who had gotten relatively mild cases of COVID from co-workers and the pediatrician at the hospital who likely already knew about our neighbor’s death.

What I find so sad about his death is how preventable it was. A shot or two in the arm may have prevented his COVID infection and likely would have prevented death even if he did get infected. But somewhere, he’d read something that convinced him it was better to not get the vaccine. Did he regret that decision in the days and weeks leading up to his death? I don’t know. I hope his wife, family, and close friends learned something.

I hope my other neighbors learned something. But I know they didn’t. Apparently, these people can’t believe reality until it strikes them.

Hell, even Mike doesn’t believe — and he’s actually suffered through it.

The Pandemic Isn’t Over

This past weekend, I sold my jewelry at an art show in Pasco, WA. The venue was indoors and masks were required. I normally work at home and wear a mask only when indoors in public — for example, when shopping — so I wasn’t used to wearing one for 10 hours straight. I did not enjoy it.

I’m angry that I had to do it.

I’m not angry with the governor or the venue operator or the show promoter who required it. They are doing what they have to do to keep us safe. I appreciate that.

CDC COVID Cases
CDC COVID Deaths
As of today, the CDC reports more than 46 MILLION cases of COVID-19 in the US and 755,201 deaths in the US due to COVID-19.

Instead, I’m angry with the stupid, gullible, misinformed idiots who doubt COVID is real or serious when people are getting struck down with it every day. People who think the vaccine does more harm than good when all evidence proves otherwise. People who are keeping the virus alive and allowing it to mutate by giving it a place to thrive and grow — their own bodies — because they’re not taking logical, science-based precautions.

We are nearly two years into this pandemic and it is still affecting our lives. And it will continue to affect our lives until the misinformation and conspiracy theories about it stop.

Do you want this to be over? Get vaccinated. Wear a mask when among strangers or unvaccinated friends. Don’t let your guard down. Stop believing the bullshit. Let’s end this already.

Welcoming a Vaccine Mandate

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I share some thoughts about how Washington’s upcoming vaccine mandate may affect my participation in an art show.

Custer's Arts & Crafts
The Christmas Arts & Crafts shows are just two of the shows Jim Custer Enterprises produces.

Yesterday, I got an email from Jim Custer Enterprises, a Spokane-based company that manages arts and crafts and other shows in Washington state. I’m signed up to participate in two of their holiday art shows in November this year. The email was related to a vaccine mandate going into effect on November 15, 2021 for all indoor events to be attended by more than 1,000 people.

My History with Custer Shows

This will be the first time I’m attending any of Custer’s shows. I had originally applied to one of their shows way back in spring of 2019 but my application was late and they were already full. I applied again for the November 2019 shows and was waitlisted. Undaunted, I applied again for their two spring 2020 shows and was accepted. But then Covid came along and both shows were cancelled. The November 2020 shows were also cancelled. So were the spring 2021 shows.

But the November 2021 shows were not cancelled and my previous acceptance got me in without going through the whole reapplication process.

There are two shows — one in Pasco and one in Spokane — and both are indoors. Most of the artists I know in the area are familiar with the shows and several from Leavenworth’s Village Art in the Park, where I sell my jewelry a few times each year, are going to both of them. They say good things. I was slightly concerned when I learned that the shows had an admission fee — it seems to me that less people will attend if they have to pay a fee to get in — but I suspect that if people are willing to pay to attend, they’re also more likely to buy. I’d rather have X number of serious shoppers than X times 5 number of browsers who are coming to waste time (theirs or mine) or look for ideas for their own work.

Because both of the upcoming shows are in November, they are holiday shows full of gift buyers. I’ve been spending the past week making jewelry and, will continue to do so right up until November 3 when I have to pack for the Pasco show. It would be a crying shame if I ran short on inventory and I’ll do everything in my power to prevent that from happening. These two shows are the last two I’ve got scheduled for 2021, so I want them to be successful. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, 2021 is the year that ML Jewelry Designs will finally turn a profit — after years of investing in equipment, materials, and education and taking a big hit from Covid closures in 2020. These shows will be my last chance to make that profit big.

The Vaccine Mandate

The email message I got from Custer talked about a vaccine mandate that I was not aware of that takes effect on November 15 and how it may affect the Spokane show. It started like this:

We are sending this email today to bring you updated Covid-19 protocol information. Last Friday, Washington State Governor Jay Inslee announced a new Vaccine Mandate that is going into effect on November 15, 2021. If you are an artist in both our Pasco and Spokane Shows, this mandate only applies to the Spokane Show since it will take place four days after the mandate goes into effect.

It then went on to provide exact wording from the mandate:

Everyone over the age of 12 must show proof of Covid-19 vaccination (verified by CDC record cards, photo of the card, printed certificate or screenshot from MyIRMobile.com or other immunization records from health providers) to attend the event OR show proof of a negative Covid-19 test taken within 72 hours of the event.

It then explained how the mandate affected the show and reminded artists that if they have not been vaccinated yet, their only current option is the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine, since there isn’t enough time now to get both shots of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines prior to the show. If the artist did not want to get the vaccine at all, he/she would have a very narrow window to get the Covid-19 test and prove negative results prior to the show — and testing is backed up in Spokane right now.

(Honestly, I think that anyone who makes a living participating in art shows who is not vaccinated is a total idiot — how can they risk regular exposure to so many people without protection? But hey, I believe in science and I think the “personal freedom” argument is a lot of bullshit fed to gullible people incapable of their own thought by manipulative “conservatives” in their never-ending efforts to divide Americans into Us vs. Them.)

Expected Trouble

The email includes the following, which also came to my mind:

If you are wondering how this will affect attendance, we are in the same boat. There will be people who will be frustrated and upset by the mandate who will make it political. There will also be people who will feel more comfortable attending because of the mandate. At this point, we are so happy to be having any show that we will take what we can get! Truly, it’s better than last year when there was no show at all. The people that will be there, will be ready to buy! There’s no doubt about that.

First of all, I have to admit that I will feel a lot more comfortable participating in a show with this new mandate in effect. I had the less effective J&J vaccine — which was the only one available when I went to be vaccinated at the end of March — and am not sure if I’ll be able to get a booster prior to the show. I’m terrified of becoming a breakthrough case — two of my vaccinated neighbors got it from a vaccinated employee who tested negative three times before a positive test result. That tells me that I can’t put 100% of my faith in either vaccines or tests. Despite that, I feel a lot safer knowing that everyone attending will either be vaccinated or have gotten a negative test. While this does not eliminate the risk (in my mind, anyway), it does greatly reduce it.

I should also reiterate here that I’m not worried about dying of Covid-19. I’m worried about long-term effects that could possibly reduce my quality of living for the rest of my life.

Unfortunately, both shows — Pasco (to be held pre-mandate) and Spokane — are in the red side of our blue state. That means many folks have bought into the “conservative freedoms” argument for not getting vaccinated. Never mind that vaccines for polio, smallpox, measles, mumps, rubella, shingles, tetanus, and flu have been either required or widely available and used with little or no side effects for decades. These people have been convinced that their personal freedoms are being threatened by Covid-19 vaccine mandates and that it’s their “God-given Constitutional right” to refuse a vaccine that has the potential to save their life or at least help them avoid a serious, contagious virus.

So I suspect there will be a lot of push back including, but not limited to arguments at the gate. Violence would not surprise me. I hope Custer hires a good security outfit.

I also suspect that folks will be using — or trying to use — fake vaccine cards. I sure hope they’re caught. I believe they should be arrested, but I suspect they’ll just be turned away. If they’re caught at all.

Will folks who, like me, are worried about Covid be more likely to attend? I sure hope so. I’d honestly prefer selling my work to like-minded folks. I’m sick and tired of listening to anti-vax whiners moaning about their freedoms while putting my health at risk.

Meanwhile, I have to admit to hoping that a few angry, idiotic artists back out of the show in some sort of protest. First of all, I don’t need two work among people like that. And second, well, less competition.

It’s Business

In the meantime, I have a lot of sympathy and respect for the folks at Jim Custer Enterprises. These people make their living producing shows and everyone I’ve spoken to about them agrees that they are good people. I can imagine how having to cancel shows for a year and a half must have affected their business. No income for that period! It’s a wonder they’ve been able to survive at all.

It’s this closing paragraph that sums up their situation to me (emphasis added):

As we wrote in our cover letter when you first applied, flexibility is the key to your successful show participation this year. We are in a global pandemic and it is not over. Yes, everyone has an opinion about it. However, as business owners of a company who brings together large numbers of people, we will continue to trust the science and comply with whatever mandates will help the shows go on.

No matter how the show turns out, it’s a real pleasure to do business with an organization that not only thinks like this, but isn’t afraid to make their thoughts on the matter public.

A Message for Anti-Vaxxers

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It’s simple: vaccines save lives.

While I’ve been blogging about my summer cold, I’ve also been innundated by ads on YouTube, news stories on the web and radio, and Twitter posts practically begging people to get their COVID-19 vaccinations. The fact that people are not doing this blows my mind. Why wouldn’t you get a vaccine that could prevent you from getting a potentially fatal illness?

Apparently there are a lot of folks out there who believe conspiracy theories about the vaccine putting a chip in them, magnetizing their skin, or being “experimental” and, thus, dangerous. (I guess these are the same people dumb enough to believe the earth is flat, we never landed on the moon, and jet contrails are full of mind control chemicals. Does the stupid ever end?)

I’ve got one thing to say to these gullable morons: wake the fuck up.

Vaccines save lives. We no longer have to fear polio, smallpox, measles, and other serious, life-threatening illnesses because of vaccines. This has been proven again and again all over the world.

And to everyone out there who says they’re not getting vaccinated because “COVID is 99% survivable,” understand that there’s a huge difference between having an illness — whether it’s the common cold (which I appear to have), the flu, or COVID-19 — and dying from it.

Sure, there are folks who have gotten COVID and have survived. Lots of them. Maybe even 99% of them.

But are you considering the percentage who have been bedridden for weeks or months due to symptoms? The ones who have lost their jobs because they simply can’t do them anymore? The ones who have been hospitalized and separated from their friends and families? The ones with ventilator tubes painfully inserted into their airways, making it impossible to breathe on their own or even talk or eat? Do you think those folks are glad they weren’t vaccinated even though they survived (or have survived so far)?

Long COVID symptoms
Do you really want these symptoms for months or years? This scares me more than dying. At least when you’re dead you’re not suffering every damn day of your life.

And what about the ones who survived but are still dealing with post-COVID symptoms, including “long COVID” sufferers who still feel weak or achey, suffer from headaches, or can’t taste their food? And those with permanent brain or organ damage?

And what about the ones who survived but infected friends or family members who weren’t so lucky? The ones who have to carry the weight of someone else’s death on their shoulders because they so stupidly believed in conspiracy theories or disregarded science?

Don’t be a statistic like the folks in this Washington Post article:

A coronavirus outbreak at a Florida government building killed two people and hospitalized several others who were unvaccinated against the virus, a county official said.

The Manatee County Administration Building reopened Monday after the virus that causes covid-19 spread throughout the county’s IT department and forced the building to shut down on Friday. Manatee County Administrator Scott Hopes, who is also an epidemiologist, said six unvaccinated employees, including five in the IT department, tested positive for the virus within a two-week period.

The two IT employees who died last week were identified in local media and obituaries as Mary Knight, 58, and Alphonso Cox, 53.

Hopes said that the one IT employee, 23, exposed to the virus who was vaccinated did not get infected.

Do you see a pattern here? I’m sure we’ll be seeing a lot more pieces like this one. Don’t let yourself or a loved one be featured as one of those killed or permanently disabled by their own stupidity — or yours.

Wake up and get vaccinated now.