Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Apple Closing Stores in Southern California, Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana, Texas, Utah and More
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
Here in the US there is a perverse fetish for verified cases which is a very weak indicator of anything.
But a lot of those 49,500,000 will still die after aug/sept, and the death rate is projected to start exponentially increasing again. So by the time every one of those 49,500,000 has the disease run its course, it will be a lot more than 200k dead.
Its not about the death rate. Its about having hospitals too full(of people that will survive with proper care) to take in people with other illnesses and emergencies. Yes, some hospitals are huge and can handle lots, but many small towns can't handle influxes or people.
Plenty of counties have made it mandatory when outdoors in public and inside any building - mine included. So apparently you can.
That's true. But we're also not hearing much about long-term complications and consequences of surviving COVID. I've read numerous articles about people who are still not fully recovered months later, who suffer lingering health issues, both physical and cognitive. I just read something yesterday about the first NBA player to be diagnosed (back in February I think) and he's still not fully recovered.
COVID might not kill you, but it can clearly cause lasting damage. I was listening to a BBC radio show called The Conversation a few weeks ago. The show has two women from different cultures in conversation about a specific topic. I heard a show with two ER nurses, one in Boston, one in London, both in their late 20s. Towards the end of the conversation, the moderator asked both women if they were worried about getting COVID themselves. They both gave a similar answer. They said at first they weren't worried at all. Working in the medical field aside, they considered themselves to be low-risk, both young, no pre-existing conditions, etc.
After caring for COVID patients for several months, they both said they were were quite concerned about contracting it. They said they had cared for patients of all age groups, that many of their intubated patients were under 50 years old with no pre-existing conditions. They described the long-term challenges some of these patients have faced, having to learn to walk again, still not being able to walk up a flight of steps without becoming completely winded months after "recovering", etc. They said the scary thing about COVID is that you have no way of knowing if you're someone who will just get a sniffle or will find himself/herself on a ventilator for weeks. They said pre-existing conditions and age really had little to do with who experiences severe symptoms and long recoveries.
At this point I think we're pretty screwed. We let the virus spread throughout the country. It's entrenched. Even if more people take social distancing and masks seriously (which they're clearly not doing where I live!), at best we're doomed to an endless game of whack-a-mole every time a new cluster flares up. How are things going to look in the US this winter, when we're dealing with both seasonal flu and COVID? I hesitate to even type the word government lest I get censored again, but the only reason things aren't a complete disaster today economically is because of government assistance. That can't go on forever.
I don't blame Apple for taking COVID seriously, but I have to ask, what's the endgame? And not just for Apple, but for the economy in general. Hospitalization is expensive! How many Americans have been bankrupted by medical bills? Even if the death rate is going down, more infections means a growing pile of medical expenses and people out of the workforce while they recover from illness. In some cases that could mean a long absence, disability payments, etc. That seems just as bad for the economy to me in the long term as being locked down, maybe worse, because confidence in the safety of public spaces will be eroded. People who refuse to take social distancing and mask-wearing seriously are being very shortsighted in my opinion.
They also didn't deny Seinfeld soup.
Which brings me back to my earlier point:
NokX said:
Also, a fun fact: the average age of someone who dies with coronavirus is 81 years old; which is 3 years older than the average expected lifespan.
If you're a vulnerable person (old and/or with a poor immune system) or work with vulnerable persons, isolate yourselves. No need in shutting down the entire economy, ruining businesses, causing suicide rates to go up, and causing all sorts of other unintended consequences like fewer screenings that will cause even more illnesses than coronavirus.
To add on to this - projections are meaningless if the model used to estimate them are inaccurate.
Fauci says much the same -
We shouldn't try and massage figures and extrapolate randomly just to support a political PoV - which I think is what Nancy Pelosi was trying to do.
Let's stick with facts everyone.
So if a mask isn't constitutional, wouldn't the same be true for clothing in general?
New active cases are an indication of what direction things are going, but if the focus is on total verified cases that’s bonkers. People who had it in April but have recovered aren’t a risk to anyone.
Americans are really coming across as a little bit short sighted to the rest of the world right now. To put it politely. Their days as being the leading exponents of the free world, that other countries looked up to really are diminishing.
Just because a county has made it mandatory does not mean it’s constitutional and that it won’t be later found so by the courts. And these orders will be found unconstitutional. This week, the Texas Supreme Court informed Texans that there is not a COVID exception to the US Constitution. https://www.texaspolicy.com/texas-s...is-no-pandemic-exception-to-the-constitution/
Where in the constitution does it say you can ”create no law concerning clothing?” And, if so, why can’t i run around nude in public?
Except the massive GDP, leading the world in medical and tech research, giving more in charity than any other country, being the cornerstone of the world economy, and producing the tech that people use around the world daily....
Not sure where you live, but I’m in Texas. It is a criminal offense to be nude in public. The SCOTUS has ruled time and again that there is an indecency component to the 1st Amendment, thus allowing for such laws. Apples and oranges to your analogy, anyhow. The Constitution does address life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I believe the question regarding masks deals with the liberty portion of it.
You cannot require the public to wear a mask to be in public places just as you cannot prohibit free speech, filming of police, and peaceable assembly in public places.
I want my mother, who is 91, to have a chance of seeing her friends and going places in her last few years. These selfish anti-mask people are taking away any hope she and I have. This is painful enough without them making it worse.
Yes and no. While I do not disagree with you in general, you also have to see where the positives are. For what we know, 1000 positive cases in the 50+yo bracket will cause less deaths than 10,000 in the 50yo or less bracket. Yours is a reasonable observation, but it's not enough to draw conclusions.
Then your mother should stay inside and isolated from the general public and you should exercise mask-wearing and hand-washing practices if you believe that they are prudent.
Shops have the right to establish these rules. Shops are not public places. Operating a motor vehicle is a privilege, not a right. You also have to have a license and pay registration fees to do so. These are cute little comparisons to people who don’t use critical thinking skills when they see them, but they are on a completely different plane when compared to masks in public.
Well, I don’t expect you to understand, but, legally, yes, you can require a mask be worn in public. There are a variety of existing laws, already challenged and upheld in the courts, that give governments power to mandate mask wearing in public. As a start, I suggest you study “strict scrutiny” in constitutional law.
I don't think that in most cases the issue is that Grocery Stores impose the mask; it's about counties and states making it mandatory which is under question.