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The Real Effectiveness of Shots, Masks

While the nation's Republican governors in fully Republican-run states were screaming "bloody murder!" over President Biden's mask-wearing and vaccination mandate yesterday, the Associated Press went to work building the case for both.

From a recent study of 600,000 cases of Covid-19 April through mid-July, we find out that unvaccinated people are 4.5 times (that's 450 percent) more likely to become infected and 10 times more likely to become hospitalized than their stubborn brothers and sisters. Those unfortunate enough to follow the advice of those governors, Fox News or Tucker Carlson are 11 times more likely to die of Covid complications. 

Imagine sitting in a study group of 11 people, knowing that one of you would survive the next few weeks. That's a living room full of people who could be your sons, daughters, cousins, nephews ... Tell those loved ones that 90 percent of the people in the hospital with Covid have not been vaccinated against it. 

Even among old people (I'm 75 and am one of them), while vaccination's effects are waning for them, the shots still remain around 80 percent effective and with the upcoming booster shots, from what I've read so far from trusted sources (that would not be Fox), protection will again soar.

For those of you who are more chicken than eagle, let me say that the shots don't hurt. I've had my two and they are a slight pinch, even when the nurse giving them is one of those "shove it in the shoulder and move along" military types. The damn shot doesn't hurt. It doesn't hurt!

Please, please, regardless of what the far right tells you about "individual rights" and the left's desire to strip you of them, this is a national health emergency, not a game of one-upmanship. We have lost a substantial number of people thus far and the emergency is still in full force, thanks primarily to the effort to get people to stubbornly refuse what has been proved to be effective treatment and behavior.

Get the shot(s). Wear the mask outside your home. Please, do it for the children, if for nobody else. Their death rates are already soaring.

The CDC director recently said, "We have the scientific tools we need to turn the corner." The implication is strong: If we don't use the scientific tools, we die.