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COVID precautions seem to have ended for the most part. COVID has not ended. COVID precautions seem to have ended.
It is as if declaring an end to COVID precautions means the same thing to many people as ending COVID.
Ending protections against COVID means ending protections for the most vulnerable, not just the healthiest alone, not just for the people who are the most resistant to COVID but also for the people who are the least resistant to COVID. The best example is probably wearing face masks.
The majority of the population has found wearing masks too inconvenient to continue. The majority does not include the people most vulnerable to COVID. And so the COVID spreads.
And so the elderly in particular, but also the very young along with everyone else whose immune systems are vulnerable to COVID because, say, they are undergoing cancer treatments, continue to die at much greater rates when they do contract COVID. Did I mention that some 77% of COVID deaths so far in 2022 are people over the age of 65?
Journalists have reported these events and these statistics. If journalists report a problem, their reporting is incomplete if they do not report that a solution or solutions also exist, are also facts, are also in fact part of the story. Reporting only the problem is not enough.
"It is usually going to be cathartic for me to think about the possible positive ripple effect for another human being in that room who possibly might be immunocompromised." Dr. Erica Birkley, Assistant Professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, quoted in Eric Berger, Coronavirus / As Americans Ditch Covid Measures, Pandemic Worsens for the Vulnerable, THE GUARDIAN Tues., Aug. 30, 2022. Doctor Birkley was talking about wearing a mask. The reporter, Eric Berger, wrote about the problem caused by most people not wearing a mask, and he also reported a solution to that problem offered by Dr. Birkley.
It's not hard for journalists to do: When you report on a problem, reporting on the solution or solutions is an essential part of the story.
Please read the disclaimer. ©2022 Dennis J. Wall. All rights reserved.
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