Too real.SAN FRANCISCO -- The Day by the Bay Music Festival very sweetly doubled down on announcing lineup reveals and VIP ticket deals yesterday, despite all evidence pointing to the impossibility of safely holding such an event in 2021, sympathetic music fans noticed. [...]
While many bands are booked to play Day by the Bay, none actually believe Trenner's insistence on the event's viability.
"It's like asking a terminally ill child what they want to be when they grow up," explained Interpol frontman Paul Banks. "You just humor them because to actually face the gravity of the situation is too painful. Just let people believe what they need to get by. I haven't booked plane tickets or a hotel for the fest, and I highly doubt I'll have to. And while it's nice to send emails about bookings again, I fully expect to be on my couch re-watching 'New Girl' and eating entire pints of ice cream that weekend."
The Department of Health and Human Services continues to release guidance for the various business and events struggling to survive.
"Are you fucking kidding me? Is anyone even listening to me? That 0.4% possibility estimate for large gatherings is generous at best," explained Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. "Mass graves! We had mass graves due to this disease... which keeps mutating, by the way. Are you forgetting about the mutations? We have goddamned the X-Men of infectious diseases out there killing Nana and Pap Pap, and you think you're getting 8,000 people to watch Yeah Yeah Yeahs? They haven't released an album since 2013."
"pints"?
Amateur
With mass vaccinations already underway people will not only be ready to leave lock-down by September, but they will demand it.
What "mass vaccinations"? Thus far, the only thing "mass" about it has been the looming fourth wave resulting from jumping too soon back into restaurants, schools, and yes, live shows.
Providers are administering about 2.3 million vaccine doses per day on average. Over 130 million doses have been delivered to states, territories and federal agencies. A third vaccine was just approved. At least 90% of the US population will be partially vaccinated by August at the current rate. Given that the elderly are being prioritized everywhere that should mean a dramatic downwards trend in hospitalizations and death rates.
Source NYT vaccine rollout page.
Yyyyy--no. All those dates are wishful thinking, not guaranteed. Hell, the first thing every California expert noted after Biden's is speech last night is that there is no way they're gonna meet the May 1 deadline to getting adults vaxxed.
Toss in things like Santa Clara county refusing to comply with government roll-out or collaborating with Blue Shield and the odds of July 4th are all the more unlikely.
Then there's the elephant in the room: they're not gonna get herd immunity in that time. Let's put aside anti-vaxxers, right-wing shit-heads, dumb college kids who think they're invincible, or even the folks who think lovin' Jesus will somehow save them from the virus they think is no worse than the flu... even if you got rid of all of them, you'd still have a shockingly large portion of the US population that has no health insurance.
That makes them 1 - often un-knowledgeable about where/when/how to get free medical aid, 2 - afraid of needles because they rarely get injections, and 3 - willing to fall back on the old uninsured stand-by of "just riding it out".
Now... add all those other groups back in: do you think that super-large group is gonna willfully do something they perceive to be painful (one or two injections) when they would even do the blatantly painLESS acts of wearing masks, washing their hands, and staying the fuck home?
Yeah... neither July nor September will see a return to "normal". Oh, we'll see a good portion vaxxed, but no herd immunity normalcy.
The August projection is just a linear extrapolation of the current vaccination rate. I'm sure mileage will vary based on location as you've noted. After the past year I understand skepticism and I'm no optimist, but the data is promising.
Everyone is ignoring the fact that zero kids will be vaccinated by the fall. Ages 12+ might be able to be vaccinated in September or so. Ages 6+ are Jan. 2022 at the earliest.
30% of adults say they will definitely not get a vaccine. The main culprit is the right wing, with nearly half of Republican males saying they won't.
Add those two together and we are not getting herd immunity in the Fall. Add in the more infectious B.1.1.7 variant (UK) and we may not get there even in early 2022.
Our whole family will be wearing masks until middle of next year, my guess. Certainly no large events until then, though we may travel a bit this year.
May 1 is the target date when all adults will be eligible for the jab. It will take many weeks after that to vaccinate.
I predict that by the end of the summer every American who wants the vaccine will have at least the first shot. The vaccine phobic will acquire immunity by getting the disease unfortunately.
Most states are at ~20% vaccinated with at least a first dose. We just started vaccinating for real roughly 2-3 months ago, with half of that time under the leadership of a moron. We just approved another vaccine.
The vaccines all appear to be to drop the death rate of COVID-19 to literally zero. Literally no one died during the J&J trial to COVID-19. No one even went to the hospital with a serious COVID-19 related condition. The vaccine are gold, and we have already gotten nearly a quarter of the population, and that's before we approved a third just vaccine supplier and have yet to finish ramping up the other to.
Come September, if you die of COVID-19 in America, it will be because you chose to by refusing to get vaccinated. Hell, I won't be shocked if we have more vaccine than people willing to take it by July.
I promise you that by September, we will be arguing about how much coercion is legally and ethically appropriate to use on anti-vaxxers that stupidly won't go get vaxed. We will have vaccine rotting in refrigerators. If anyone is doing any dying at concerts come September, it's because they were anti-vaxxer morons that pulled a Herman Caine and basically killed themselves. Every sane person at the concert will be vaxed up and having a good time.
More than 30% of the "long COVID" cases have appeared in people who originally were asymptomatic or had few symptoms.
I miss live music and dining out but until it's clear whether the vaccination I got will protect me from that, I'm going nowhere.
Totally understandable and that's your choice. The general public is going to go wild though. We're going to see an unprecedented level of partying this summer and fall.
And then there's this.
Damn Aussies and Kiwis, with their sensible lockdown procedures, free & effective contact-tracing, and government social programmes that assured the citizens don't go hungry & businesses have safety nets...
'Murica's doin' just fine without that Commie shit! Juuuuust fine!