“The current state of everyone staying home is clearly untenable — for sanity, the economy and other reasons. But flipping a switch and saying we are opening it back up would be extremely dangerous. We don’t want to do that. So we have this model of a dimmer switch to say what can we ease back into and when? That is what we are looking at now, and it comes down to part modeling and part politics, unfortunately.”
— Jessie Tenenbaum, Ph.D., chief data officer for the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services
We are off again.
Our last major trip was over 2 years ago. We have been planning to go for several months but stopped short when the Omicron wave swept across the world
We were in Madrid Spain when the news of the erupting pandemic reached us. As I have reported in previous posts, we left Europe 9 days before the entire country of Spain shut down. We were not fleeing the infection, it was our scheduled trip home. We had no difficultly crossing the U.S. border. We sat in airport waiting areas reading our phones and wondering what it all meant.
We have been more fortunate than most. Our kids are grown and safely vaccinated. We have nothing to complain about. Since I was retired there was no need to rush to work. Other than travel our exposure to potential infection was limited.
As the weeks progressed to months it became clear that this pandemic was no short term storm. We worked to follow health guidelines - masking, social distance etc. Both of us sought out and obtained vaccines and boosters. We watched as Covid slowly crept closer to us. Friends and family became infected. The virus seemed to be behind every bush and dark corner.
So we waited, watched the news, started raising chickens, and wondered if anything would be the same again.
What we thought we knew about the virus and vaccines has changed. Like many both of us thought that was we received the vaccine we would be immune to infection - much like the measles shot.
This has now been shown not to be the case.
Some 900,000 people have died in this country alone. This is a staggering number. As of today around 2,000 people die daily in the U.S. from the infection. This is equivalent to the lives lost at 9/11 except it happens every 24 hours.
That sounds terrible - so why leave the bunker?
The answer is complex.
First of all, it is important to know that 97% of the people who are seriously ill with Covid and dying are those that have chosen to be unvaccinated. Tens of millions of people have safely received this miracle of medicine without any significant side effects, yet there are those that mistakenly believe it will cause them harm. This belief is a terrible lie.
New data now shows that it is likely 80% or more of the United States has either been vaccinated or has acquired the infection already. This news creates an environment that the virus is endemic and the level of threat , while not gone, is diminished. At least in the USA.
What does history tell us? In 1918, the great influenza pandemic killed around 600-700, 000 Americans. It came in three terrible waves. So did it go away? The answer is no. There were additional waves but the American public had grown weary of mask wearing and the press stopped covering it. Sound familiar?
It never left. It did mutate to a milder form. The Flu season each year is the ongoing legacy of that pandemic. Each year the infection claims 30-50,000 lives.
And there is a vaccine for that one too.
The Covid vaccine will not completely eliminate the chance of infection. However. it will greatly reduce the chance of serious illness and death.
So with the knowledge that it is not going away, we waited until the infection rate has fallen enough to where we felt more comfortable traveling.
We are going to Andalusia - an automatous region of southern Spain. Currently the infection rate there is lower than Indiana. And 96.3% of the population is vaccinated. Furthermore they have an excellent health care system.
Is this a mistake?
Probably. I do not know.
At some point you have to open the bunker door and let fresh air in. We plan to continue with good hygiene guidelines and wearing masks where appropriate. We don’t want to be stupid but we also want to get on with this chapter of our lives.
So, as we enter Episode 11 of the Road to Bali I invite you to join us for the journey. We have stories to tell.
See you down the road.
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