Uproar in Fairfax County – Canada announces re-opening of borders – Travel difficulties in the West – Burnout among health care workers – Evening statistics
The Fairfax County school system has been featured in national headlines, for somewhat unfortunate reasons. Michelle Leete, the Vice President of Training for the Virginia Parent Teacher Association and Vice President of Communications for the Fairfax County PTA, responded to parents who opposed the teaching of critical race theory with the following remarks: “Let’s deny this off-key band of people that are anti-education, anti-teacher, anti-equity, anti-history, anti-racial reckoning, anti-opportunities, anti-help people, anti-diversity, anti-platform, anti-science, anti-change agent, anti-social justice, anti-health care, anti-worker, anti-LGBTQ+, anti-children, anti-health care, anti-worker, anti-environment, anti-admissions policy change, anti-inclusion, anti-live-and-let-live people. Let them die.” Parents of students attending Fairfax County schools, being a trifle disconcerted at hearing death threats from one of the officials of their children’s educational system, demanded and eventually obtained her resignation. Ms. Leete did make an attempt to back-pedal when it became apparent that her speech (which was delivered on video, with a break for applause after the “Let them die” clause) had miscarried, but her efforts were not successful. She explained that she did not wish death for the opponents of critical race theory; she merely wished for the death of the ideals that inspired such opposition. In this manner, the meaning of her original remarks was made clear to those who had not grasped it at first.
Canada has announced that vaccinated Americans will be able to cross the border without being quarantined. The new policy begins on August 9th. Vaccinated visitors from other nations will be able to travel to the country on September 8th. Vaccinated Canadians are already able to visit the U.S. via air, but travel across the land border is still barred.
Travel, however, is problematic in many areas, for reasons other than COVID. At Denver, a major hub in the western part of the nation, hundreds of flights have been delayed by the smoke and haze caused by wildfires, which has limited visibility. Over three hundred have been postponed and eight have been canceled altogether. Currently there are 80 wildfires burning in 13 states, having already consumed over 1 million acres.
From Erik Frederick, the chief administrative officer of Mercy Hospital Springfield, Missouri: “You hear ‘post-pandemic’ a lot. We’re clearly not post-pandemic. New York threw a ticker-tape parade for its health-care heroes, and ours are knee-deep in COVID.” Many health-care workers are, to use a rather inelegant term, fed up. Their attitude last year was that combatting the ravages of a potentially fatal disease for which there was no cure and that struck entirely at random was their responsibility, serving their community. Now they have little desire to be “putting themselves in harm’s way for people who’ve chosen not to protect themselves,” to use the words of Steve Edwards, president and CEO of CoxHealth. Nearly all of the COVID patients in the hospitals are unvaccinated. Missouri contains a few counties that have some of the lowest rates in the country: Greene County, where Mercy and CoxHealth are located, has a vaccination rate of under 40%; in some neighboring counties the rate is as low as 20%.
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM – # of cases worldwide: 191,675,328; # of deaths worldwide: 4,112,279; # of cases U.S.: 35,009,500; # of deaths; U.S.: 624,943.