Also, let me say, it’s refreshing to see that every single person here isn’t falling over themselves to declare how ‘saddened’ they are by this terrible tragedy, like thousands of people who weren’t actively enacting a pro-coronavirus agenda didn’t die on the same day.
Also, they recently discovered that it crosses the blood-brain barrier into the brain, which is why so many patients feel “brain fog”, and possibly causes other neurologically originated symptoms.
Regardless of how we feel about this one guy, ALL Republicans are on notice to do better about Covid. This stunt that’s about to go down on the 6th of January is icing on the cake as illustration of how lemming-like this crop of spineless conservatives is. As far as I’m concerned, we cannot clear the decks of these fools fast enough. I’d prefer to vote them out, but if this is the way, then: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
May be a little overboard, but there are full face shield positive pressure powered belt units that are used in industrial settings. No additional resistance to respiration on your part, and there are N95+ rated filters available for the fan unit.
Have to weigh being “that guy” in the full face mask vs painful/difficult breathing, but maybe a “shopping shirt” that have “Yes, I do have a medical condition, and COVID would be catastrophic, but I still need food/resources, thus weird looking mask unit”…
(they’re called PAPR’s or Powered air purifying respirators, and unfortunately aren’t inexpensive).
There is Zero need to get into compassion brinksmanship on this topic. You aren’t going to change anyone’s mind either way on what level of compassion or lack thereof the families of COVID-19 victims should receive. If you really want to go down that hole, start a new topic.
Like a dozen nationally prominent republicans have died of COVID already. There’s nothing that will change their minds short of someone manually changing them with tools and brain surgery.
It’s infuriatingly obvious, but 40 years of AynCaps pushing the neoliberal default in this country means that at least 40% of the country would rather deny the disease is fatal rather than prioritise individual human lives and well-being (at least of people they don’t know) over the economy.
One thing this pandemic (probably not the last most of us will encounter in our lifetimes) has shown us is that we need a more formal S.O.P. to temporarily “freeze” the normal economy and markets in a crisis and allow the state to step in with “stimulus” (not really the apt term but close enough) to keep people sheltered and fed during, say, a four-week super-strict lockdown.
Unfortunately, that’s not going to happen in the U.S. as long as Libertarians keep pushing their “free”-market fundamentalism to the degree that it’s already taken over one duopoly party and helped turn it into a death cult (with effectively suicidal aspects, as in the case of this congressman).
I might have to look into one of those if this thing drags on (which is looking more likely by the day). Woodworking is a hobby of mine, so I have a bunch of N99 rated masks lying around from my finishing-gun work. They are surprisingly more breathable than even the chepo surgical masks. Thanks for the tip!
Need to be careful of those for pandemic purposes. A lot of them have flapper valves that make exhaling effortless, but also unfiltered, neutralizing the “protect others” aspect of the mask. Not true of all, but a lot of them are like that. PAPR’s are incredibly effective (properly filtered, of course) and very much more comfortable, but do give that “moon man” impression.
I’ve had the same issues with some. Many thought that comorbidity meant other reasons they died as opposed to other things they had going on when they died.
I had the valved n95’s, and until recently, non-valved ones were unavailable.
Grainger has Non-valved “moldex” N95’s that are corrugated with a plastic mesh on the outside to provide some durability. Ostensibly for metalworking use, they’re non-valved N95’s, and have become my favorite “going outside with the idiots” mask.