It's not zero though as that would be an absolute. It's negligible. A vaccine manufacturer could not say 0% of side effects if there was a .0001% but I do see your point.

Of 1.22 million cases of COVID, 178 died according to data analysis by the CDC of children aged 0-17, see the top table in this link:

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/...e1.htm#F1_down

It's interesting transitioning from Denver to Chicago this past week. In Denver, you could tell things were beginning to slowly open up. A few people would wear a mask outside, but most people didn't. Here in Chicago, so. many. people.... wear masks outside, which makes me cringe, but whatever. I suspect in a couple weeks, Chicago will be where Denver was when I left.

On the other hand, when I stopped at a gas station in western KS, very few people were wearing masks inside the grocery store.

So weird to see the different phases just across state lines.

I was in the Front Range Corridor last July (Longmont, Fort Collins, Greeley, Estes Park), and businesses were open, and very few people wore masks outside. Masks were universal inside.

It's the American way, and if you want to have an anti-vaxx party you can drive to a state that has one. If you wanna get-down on some masks or experience what it's like to live under totalitarian rule, you can visit a lockdown state (like CA!).

Most people are still wearing masks outside in my neighborhood in Los Angeles, too. It does somewhat annoy me, especially since vaccination rates are so high here, but it's ultimately people's choice to make for themselves. As long as no one says anything to me about not wearing one outside (and nobody has), then I don't really care what people choose to do. But it does amuse me to see masked people walking alone outside in a neighborhood full of those "in this house we believe science is REAL" :haha:

On the flipside of it, it's amusing that people who hate science and have always railed against it suddenly get to accuse people of being anti-science. It's clever though, lol, since they more than likely have kids in science classes and took some when they went to college. Like myself, I was called anti-science (first time ever!) even though I have a minor in Geography :shrug:.
The right thing to do is for people to think whatever they want about each other, but don't say it out loud in public. :yes:

Of those 178 that passed, how many died from Covid alone?

In my neighborhood, walking around, you still more people wearing masks outside than not, but it doesn't faze me. I'm so used to them now. My partner and I tend to wear them under our chins when out walking in our 'hood, because we're often walking to a restaurant or to the market, and it's less of a hassle to just pull the mask up over your nose once we get to our destination instead of digging through your pocket to get the mask out and putting it on.

All that mask wearing is based on faulty "science" used by the CDC and then the media latched on and ran with it.

https://messaging-custom-newsletters...08c3122f8093b6

Chicago can be crowded for the outside thing. East Lakeview where I live on the corner of Broadway is crowded. I don't wear a mask anymore outside mostly but seriously what is it with people getting so worked up about people wearing masks. Is this a psychological thing? It makes no sense. So what if people are wearing masks, we all have our own comfort level and it isn't all the same. And what is this tons of masks posts anyway? We all get your point by now, you don't like it. No matter how much you post here it won't change anything.

^ I for sure could care less if people want to wear masks outdoors--it's their choice to look like fools.

All I care about is that I don't have any rational/scientific based reason to wear them, so that's why I stopped. Plus, I have to wear those damned things EVERY DAY at my job, and have been doing so for 14 months. They are stifling and I hate them now. They don't have the "cool" or "novelty" factor any more like they do for those people who've been staying home all day and only go out once in a while

That's a lot of people to get angry at for no reason, and there are so many people in an urban area there's no way to know WHY they are doing it. Oh and the people who don't like the mask now, they never liked it and never wanted it lol. Complaining since day one and still going at it.

Perfect case in point for what I meant and right on cue within a few seconds.

In my neighborhood it's pretty mixed. I also don't think anybody considers it a political statement anymore to wear one, or not wear one, when outdoors. Earlier in the pandemic, however, it was a little different. Back then, the mask resistance was more skewed towards orthodox Jews, and Eastern European immigrant groups. But even then, the mask wearers weren't really shaming the ones without masks outside. Way more often the mask controversy seems to be coming from the mask resistance.

Yeah I'm not sure why other people care so much if other people are still wearing masks outdoors. Do they also care if people wear socks with flip flops? Or wear shorts in the city?

What other people choose to wear doesn't affect you in any way. If you're fully vaccinated and are outdoors, feel free to unmask, but is your psyche really so fragile that your day will be ruined if someone that is wearing a mask gives you a funny look?

Fixed it for you.

In any case, most cities will at the same point in a month where everything fully opens up, if it hasn't already. Some areas are just further along on this process than others.

If you haven't yet been vaccinated, are willing to and have a choice about which one to get, here's some actual information from a reliable source:

https://uniim1.shutterfly.com/ng/ser...762228/enhance

https://uniim1.shutterfly.com/ng/ser...761973/enhance
Source: https://secure.medicalletter.org/dow...621g_table.pdf

Agree with this. My guess is that the immunity from these shots lasts longer than the mass media and possibly the company publicity departments (although it strikes me that their motivations on this are mixed) are currently telling us. But the best reason we may need boosters next year is probably that we may start to see more break-through cases caused by variants and the more disease there is globally, with viral replication which is when variants arise, the more likely that is. If you look at the chart I posted above, we are already seeing "lower activity" against the B.1.351, P.1, B.1.526, and B.1.427/B.1.429 variants.

We may need a booster that is targeted specifically at these new variants in addition to the original virus that the present vaccines were designed for.

If, in a couple of years, we can get a significant proportion of the global population immunized, we should see fewer new variants and hence less likelihood of one or more variants that cause breakthrough disease and therefore less likelihood that the immunity we get from the vaccine is inadequate and a booster is required.

^ What's being missed from this conversation is whether variants (there are limits to how many variants even can exist to a virus, while still being a successful virus) even require a second vaccine in order to prevent the kind of catastrophe that we are seeing during the original outbreak.

Vaccinated people with even partial immunity to future variants are likely still protected from serious disease. I can see a booster being needed, but serial new shots to address the virus' ongoing mutation don't sound necessary to me.....unless you're trying to make lots of money.

Pretty soon this will be like the Flu shot--which basically sucks and doesn't work more than half the time, and most of the public never bothers to get the flu shot anyhow because they aren't worried about the flu. Covid will become that pretty quickly