smoky

Should have just asked him the time, and moved on.

And that's fair... I can't argue with that. Would Mayor Neonmoon have a mask mandate for K-12 schools right now?

Yeah, I'm not really seeing those reversals. I'm seeing folks dig in deeper. i.e. Today, DC announced they're lifting their indoor mandate for basically everywhere but schools. Nearby Virginia state congressmen voted along party lines today to keep/ lift the state school mask mandate. I pointed upthread about the fuzziness in the Michigan data for districts with mandates vs ones without. The point I'm trying to make is that I can't think of a reason that you would enforce a mask mandate at schools that you wouldn't also enforce everywhere else. I asked the question because I haven't seen "If we get to X, we'll lift the mandate for schools." We actually got to that threshold back in the fall, but because APH never moved us to Stage 2, the mask mandate in schools stayed in effect. Most reasonable people would say, well as long as the hospitalization is low OR as long as the death rate for kids is X%, we don't need to mandate masks in schools. In Austin, where I am, with three fully vaccinated kids in AISD schools I don't see the need to mask them up. I also don't see AISD moving to 'masks optional' any time soon because they aren't guided by data. If we're going to "follow the science" as Dr Elizalde put it in December, we need to have metrics and offramps that coincide with those metrics. We shouldn't go by polling or whether you're taking a picture with Magic Johnson or whether you're in a 4th grade classroom. Either masks work and we need to mandate and enforce it everywhere or drop the charade. We shouldn't be following the science of Summer 2020 now that vaccinations are ubiquitous. And the beauty with options is, if you want to mask your child in a properly fit-tested N95 respirator, you can do that.

And schools... What would your data point / local metric be that would give families the option to send their kids to school in a mask or not?

LA County's mask mandate doesn't differentiate between indoor and outdoor venues if the crowd is over 5k. Anything over 5k attendance requires a mask. http://publichealth.lacounty.gov/acd/ncorona2019/masks/

What's even funnier is hearing the opinions of parents that haven't the foggiest idea what school COVID policies actually look like in practice. My kids' middle school still has plexiglass dividers up in the cafeteria.

We might be. There aren't many places where masks are actually mandated. Schools are one of them, which makes masks a point of contention for some people. That content bleeds out into society. I think if you make masks optional at schools, you'll eliminate a lot of the overall bitching about masks. I asked you what you think a good metric would be to allow masks to be optional instead of mandated because the school districts have not provided much insight into when that would be. Curious what your take would be.

What data point would you use to decide it was okay for a school district to switch to masks optional?

Looking at the data, about half of Travis county's deaths happened before widespread rollout of vaccinations. If I'm reading the data right, we were at 684 total, this time last year. From then to now, 237 deaths were aged 70 and up. Add in 60+ and you're at 382 total. That group was highly vaxxed, but older... And apparently had some other things going on. It's probably a decent bet that the other 300 deaths were unvaccinated and had comorbities.

I just don't think Americans are even aware of where we fall compared to the countries we consider our contemporaries. Then again, maybe they are fully aware. One lesson the last 2 years have taught me is that Americans can not care better than any other country in the world. I dont know where we'd fall for other stats like life expectancy and average BMI, but I'd guess if Brazil is at 1k and we're at 3k that we live longer and are fatter.

Maybe that's AISD dumping their clinic scores into the pot?

Same amount of stoppage time as the temperature.

They do! I'm glad you asked. The rules were updated 1/18/22. In SoFi stadium, you would not have to wear a mask if: You were showering or swimming There were fewer than 5,000 in attendance You were getting a shave You were alone Actively eating ("This means that you can briefly remove your mask when you are actually eating or drinking but you must put it back on immediately afterwards. You must also wear a mask when you are waiting to be served, between courses or drinks, and while seated after finishing your food or drink.")

I know, I think that would be an important separator, especially in an idyllic climate such as SoCal's, but LA County doesn't differentiate within their mandate. WhenToWearAMask.pdf (lacounty.gov)

For us, it was because the entire area is a construction zone with sidewalks that lead to nowhere.

Ungarrrrrrrr?

Sorry if this is beyond the statute of limitations for a reply, but tapa isn't good at notifying posters when you're mentioned or have a dm... This is the slide that produced the original story: link: MI COVID response Data and modeling update (michigan.gov) What I'm still unclear on is their methodology. Based on the footnote in the lower left, it seems as though they're counting cases from the 5-18 age group and then applying it to the public school area that those cases are originating in. So, in ATX terms, if a 10 year old in zip code 78758 gets sick, they'd see that as a case for a school with "masks required" even if that kid went to private school with a lax mask policy or was home schooled. So the article was printed based on that slide. Michigan then continued the study, as it's relatively easy to do once you have the dataset set up. Through 12/6 here is the same slide. link: MI COVID response Data and modeling update (michigan.gov) And this was presented really before Omicron took off. I'd suspect they'll update it again in the near future and the lines will still overlap. The second graph doesn't mean masks don't work, just like the first graph doesn't mean that masks do work. The study was flawed in their data collection. After doing some digging on why they weren't pulling data directly from school district data, I found my answer when I ran across this article: How many COVID cases are in Michigan schools? State has no idea anymore | Bridge Michigan Basically, if you really want to present an argument as gospel, there's a dataset out there that will support your claim (which is why we have crazies everywhere).

Given that this study is pre omicron, I'd like to see the data refreshed. EDIT: Looks like they did update the data. By Mid December there was almost no distinction between districts with mandates, partial mandates or no mandates. Moral of the story is there are no absolutes, don't try to spike the covid football, and check the dates on story that show up as "new" https://www.michigan.gov/documents/coronavirus/20211214_Data_and_modeling_update_vMEDIA_743631_7.pdf#page=51

What's the rule in NYC for international travelers coming into the city for vacation? I don't think French or Spanish 8 year olds can get the vaccine in their home country, so is their family shit out of luck or is there an exemption?

How much were the tickets and how much was the food? $2 was probably low, but if a family of 5 went to a night movie, over half of that was on the tickets. We're tipping on tickets now?

It's a bounce house rental place isn't it?

I guess lowell and lance need some tape for their SEC network interviews?

fuck that

You dont want to hear the history of Licon doing the worm at Sul Ross?

Refs need to get WEbber off the fucking court