Posted on 01/17/2025 8:57:54 AM PST by Diana in Wisconsin
Susan Scarbro stares down a bowling lane at the distant pins.
She hears a sound that breaks her focus. Was that a cough? Will her mask protect her?
COVID-19 remains a very present threat for the 55-year-old. Scarbro has multiple immune disorders, making her vulnerable to infection.
“Any minute anybody could cough, just incidentally,” said Scarbro, who lives in Sunset Beach, North Carolina. “And that cough could be the one thing that could make me sick.”
This month marks the fifth anniversary of the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in the U.S. The virus would go on to kill 1.2 million Americans and disrupt countless lives.
While the pandemic's emergency phase ended in May 2023, the threat of infection remains a governing force in the lives of people like Scarbro. They protect themselves from the virus with masks and isolate themselves in small family bubbles. Some grasp for unproven strategies — gargling with antiseptic mouthwash, carrying a personal carbon dioxide monitor to check the ventilation of indoor spaces.
In online support groups, they trade research about the danger of repeat infections and cognitive impairment. They miss the empathy they felt during the early days of the pandemic. Some have lost friendships, but they strive to maintain the social ties that are important to mental health.
Scarbro’s bowling league helps her feel connected to her neighbors. But recently, she’s detected more stares and skeptical looks from strangers when she bowls in a mask.
“There was more respect and understanding, but now they’re over it," she said. "They expect me to be over it, but they don’t understand that even before COVID-19, these were the precautions I needed to take.”
(Excerpt) Read more at channel3000.com ...
“We have done everything we possibly could to maintain our mental health and our social life,” said Jacqueline, who has an immune disease that makes her vulnerable to infections.
Jacqueline, 30, and her sister Alexa, 34, launched a dating app called Dateability in 2022 for people who are disabled or chronically ill, though all are welcomed. Users can add a “COVID Cautious” tag to their profiles to signal they’re interested in meeting others who take precautions. The Child sisters say 10% of their 30,000 users add “COVID Cautious” to their dating profiles.
“It’s a market that we didn’t expect to target but we happily accept,” Jacqueline said."
*PING*
Meet one who became and remains seriously ill after the two China disease shots!
I quit worrying when all my Ivermectin expired 2 years after the initial idiocy.
Whatever floats your boat.
But masks don’t help because they don’t filter out the virus particles.
People still believe the propaganda that about equates Covid with Black Death, and so live in bondage to fear and paranoia.
I get that some people have compromised immune system but they need more of a grip and shouldn’t be expecting the rest of the world to cater to them.
He said he was issued a respirator and the N-95 masks. He was told cloth masks would be effective against only droplets and should never be used.
When facing hazards, his training prescribed the N-95 mask could be used, but only after ensuring proper seal and negative pressure by following a three-step procedure. Then after a half hour he had to leave the area and reestablish the seal with a new mask. Masks could only prevent receiving and never prevent spreading biological agents
From: Retain Mike Sent: Thursday, October 14, 2021 3:26 PM To: keri.lopez@redmondschools.org Subject: Mask Mandate
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) proclaimed its latest policy about masks and our governor mandated wearing by children as school began.
However, the best science the CDC could provide was uncontrolled studies highlighting first such groups as 139 hairdresser clients, 382 sailors on the U.S.S. Roosevelt, 124 Beijing households, and 839 Thailand residents subject to contact tracing. All results came from observation followed by personal judgement, and none resulted from the mathematical disciplines used to rigorously evaluate complex environments.
In the same article the CDC disparaged the 2020 randomized controlled trial (RCT) in Denmark involving 4,862 participants, which found no benefit to wearing masks to prevent infection. The disciplines of a RCT divides participants into different groups on a randomized basis. Random assignment means that factors not specifically controlled can cancel each other out by appearing equally in both groups. One group receives the treatment (which in this case was the mask) and the other group does not. Researchers can isolate the one variable and are not able to introduce biases to produce a preferred outcome.
RCT’s are considered the highest standard for this type of research. Therefore, the most reasonable approach for the CDC would have been to consider this study as a benchmark against which others would be evaluated, including studies from other countries which found masks ineffective and even harmful.
The above represents an especially valid approach, since the first four combined citations from their May scientific brief had less than half the participants of the Danish study. The proposed approach is especially valid also because the CDC dismissed the study for involving only .001 of Denmark’s population. At the same time polls predicting the decisions of 150,000,000 voters in a national election were determined by less than 1,500 participants or less than .00001.
Do Masks Work?
https://www.city-journal.org/do-masks-work-a-review-of-the-evidence?wallit_nosession=1
Effectiveness of Adding a Mask Recommendation to Other Public Health Measures to Prevent SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Danish Mask Wearers: A Randomized Controlled Trial
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33205991/
Science Brief: Community Use of Cloth Masks to Control the Spread of SARS-CoV-2
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science-briefs/masking-science-sars-cov2.htm
Absence of Apparent Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 from Two Stylists After Exposure at a Hair Salon with a Universal Face Covering Policy — Springfield, Missouri, May 2020
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6928e2.htm
Surgeon Shows CDC Top Evidence On Why Wearing Masks Work
https://freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/3988508/posts
Face masks for children: Both ineffective and dangerous
https://www.wnd.com/2021/09/face-masks-children-ineffective-dangerous/
All the tragic potential harms of face masks
https://www.wnd.com/2021/09/tragic-potential-harms-face-masks/
Darwin says survival of the fittest is the rule of the jungle. I got Covid and it put me in bed for a day. It was weird. I was just weak. I didn’t know what it was. No fever, no cough, no other symtpms but weakness. The next day I was fine and wondered what I had until I read Tom Hanks went through the same thing - just weak and I put 2 + 2 together. Glad I didn’t take the jab like my in-laws who have recurring illnesses that they didn’t have before.
Personally, I don’t care. If they want to wear scuba gear around in public, I would say nothing. That is their thing. Their Life. Their Circus, Their Monkeys.
But as soon as one of those “jagoffs” (as Hegseth would say) opens their mouth to say anything to anyone about why they should follow suit, I have no problem with mountains of ridicule and condemnation of them coming to rest on top of them.
Just open their dumbass mouths to condemn or convince anyone else, they should be jumped on with zero hesitation.
“Scarbro’s bowling league”
Oh, brother. If she is scared to death of COVID, then why is she in a bowling league with all the filthy people and dirty surfaces? Why isn’t she hunkered down at home the rest of her miserable days?
The covid fear campaign has turned my communist brother agoraphobic. He stays inside all of the time and has a hand washing fetish.
My mother in law, one of my close neighbors, and 5 other acquaintances passed away from Covid. Another from post Covid pneumonia. Yeah, I know, “It’s just the flu” But I’ve never lost so many people so close together, whatever it’s called in different circles.
I got it three times so far. All mild, just mild aches, a bit of a cough and feeling blah. The last bout April 2024 did provoke a pulmonary blood clot, vitiligo on my hands, and microvasculature inflammation on fingers and toes.
LOL...all of those bowling balls...touched by all of those hands...!
I am sure they have their own supply of hand cleaner. They must resemble a looped video of Pontius Pilate the whole time they are in the building!
The mentally weak and impaired will always be with us. Stop platforming their maladies.
Hypochondria used to be considered a mental illness.
Now it’s a virtue.
I’m in upstate NY. I wear my mask to keep my nose from turning red...
“We have done everything we possibly could to maintain our mental health and our social life,”
It didn’t work.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.