Also worth pointing out that even at .2% we'd still be millions of deaths away from herd immunity in the US without vaccines. ETA: j/k--I screwed up my math!

you're right--sorry. I was responding to @Penelope 's figures.

There are a number of states where more than .2% of the population has died of covid (10, according to this link: https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/public-health/us-coronavirus-deaths-by-state-july-1.html) To argue that the mortality rate is .2%, you'd have to believe that EVERYONE in those states has had covid. Like, it shouldn't matter if NY or any other state did a bad job by letting too many high risk people get exposed....to believe your numbers, every single person would have to have gotten covid anyway.

It definitely seems to be the case almost everywhere that very online people and/or people who can travel farther have a much easier time finding appointments (at least in urban/suburban areas. Rural areas seem to have more vaccines than demand in most places). And, of course, this generally means that younger people and relatively financially stable people (i.e. have transportation and can take time off work easily if needed) have better access. It's a huge problem.

Hendrix has a question on their application about your favorite candy, and then they send you your favorite candy (I have heard tell that they will go to considerable lengths to track down the candy if it's something obscure; my kid just said snickers, though). Aside from that, nothing more exciting than socks.

I have always checked it, but now that no one uses it anymore it feels a bit pointless. And we do our own taxes, although we have enough self-employment income/deductions at this point that we probably shouldn't. I'm super cautious about deductions--probably much more so than an accountant would be. Oh--just reread--I do use Turbo Tax.

huh. interesting. I haven't had or heard of anyone having tinnitus after the covid vaccine, but I did start getting very occasional, mild tinnitus after my weird, probably not covid but who knows, long respiratory illness last March/April. It had never happened before that (although my son who has a hearing loss has it occasionally...no idea if there's a genetic component).

Another INTJ who scored in the 20s (23) and thinks the score is all about the introversion and not about autism. I can remember professional types itching to decide my oldest was somewhere on the spectrum all the time; he had severe social anxiety (probably as least partially related to a fairly severe unilateral hearing loss that we didn't know about until he was 5). But after spending time with him and having me fill out all the questionnaires, no one ever got there. One person settled on "he's a puzzle, isn't he?" He certainly was. As a young adult, he's still super introverted and can struggle with new situations, but not nearly as much as he used to, and I think he'd be an in the 20s kind of person as well.

They had them available on campus, and there was a certain date they were required to get them by. So they didn't have to have them at the beginning of the year; it was something like November 1 or December 1.

My son's college required a flu shot to live on campus this past year, so I'd be shocked if they didn't require covid for next year. I don't think there's going to be much pushback at his small, progressive LAC, but I'm sure there will be at a lot of schools.

Second moderna yesterday afternoon, and today I feel mostly fine other than a sore arm. Maybe a little run down like when I'm getting over a cold? Maybe just imagining that. Observations about the vaccine process: Georgia mountain town walmarts are worse for mask compliance than rural TN or Alabama Walmarts, which is quite a feat. My husband came in with me, but I told him to go back out to the car because he was fuming about all the people walking around without masks and coughing. Or maybe it's that it's getting worse everywhere, since the pandemic is totally over 🙄. I overheard a pharmacist tell someone that was asking about a waste list that it wouldn't be long because they have cancellations "every day." I'm hoping that's people cancelling because they found something closer to home and not because they changed their minds about getting vaccinated. I'm allergic to penicillin, and the pharmacist told me at first that I'd need to wait 30 minutes instead of 15 because of that (that's when DH got REALLY annoyed; he was ready to GO), but then she changed her mind a few minutes later since I didn't have a reaction to the first shot. It was odd because DH is also allergic to penicillin, so between us we've been to two different walmarts that didn't say anything about a longer wait after. And THEN when I went to the waiting area I verified, "so 15 minutes?" and she said, "or a little less." I guess it's not an exact science 🙂 Anyway--fully vaccinated and no anaphylaxis even though I hightailed it out of there at exactly 15 minutes!

We've decided to let our vaccinated 17 year old go back to youth wind symphony when they start back up in a couple of weeks. He was playing with them in the fall when they were doing rehearsals outside, but he stopped when they moved inside over the winter. They're doing distancing and bell covers and "masks" but they're masks with slits in them for them to play through, so that part seems pretty performative. Based on what we know about vaccines so far it seems like the risk to him is very low and the risk to others from him is also very low. I still think indoor rehearsals with wind instruments are a bad idea overall right now, but that part's not my call to make. It was a tough decision to have him stop going in the winter because it's so important to him (although I really don't see how we could have made a different decision (and he was very much in agreement with us, even though he was sad about it)), and when to go back is yet another tough decision. I think going back 2 weeks post vaccine would be a reasonable decision....honestly, for me it would probably depend on how important choir was to me personally and/or how important I was to the choir. I have a younger kid who also plays a wind instrument, but it's not nearly as big a part of his life as it is for my older kid; I'd probably make a different decision for/with him than my older son.

This is one of those areas where, growing up in evangelical churches, I always assumed that mainline protestants believed all the same stuff, they just sort of believed it less intensely somehow. It was a revelation as I got older to realize that it's not that other Christians don't understand about being born again or about penal substitution: they just think they're wrong. Anyway, I find it all fascinating.

I found CTCL helpful in finding safeties and relative safeties for my kid who is mathy and was mostly interested in smaller liberal arts colleges with good need based financial aid. We all really liked Hendrix, but it wasn't the best match for a kid who was a likely math major--at least not when he applied. St. Olaf is excellent for math; he looked seriously at it and probably would have been quite happy there, although he ended up elsewhere. ETA: I do recommend taking another look at St. Olaf if you're looking for a "second tier" school for a kid who's into math. My FIL is a retired math professor and speaks very highly of St. Olaf. They have good merit aid, too, if that's a concern.

Where are you seeing statistics on pneumonia deaths this year on that link? Covid deaths are indeed very low for people under 18, and that's great. But people under 18 can still have long term problems from covid that we don't really understand yet and people under 18 don't live in adult-free bubbles.

here's one: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/coronavirus-covid-vaccine-moderna-pfizer-transmission-disease

I wasn't looking for a gotcha--you have hardly any posts here, and you didn't state your opinion--just posted an article that talked about how important it was to vaccinate as fast as possible to slow mutations. I....agreed with the article you posted, so I'm not sure how that's a gotcha. The fact that there's concern that the virus might mutate in ways that make the current vaccines less effective isn't really controversial, is it? We've always known that. The current mutations that we're worried about were mostly already circulating before vaccines started to be widely used, so they're certainly not because of vaccines; they're because of uncontained spread.

The mortality rate has not been particularly high in the US compared to other countries. We've had so many more deaths than other countries because we've had so many more cases, because we've done less to contain spread than the vast majority of other countries. https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

I remember being struck when we listened to Little House on the Prairie recently with how quickly Ma freaks out when the girls are a little bit feverish (umm, in this case it turned out to be Malaria, so it made sense, but she didn't KNOW it was something serious). Then I thought about how they were almost never around other people, so it WOULD be really unusual for them to get sick.

I think the big difference for me in the short term will be more freedom to see close friends and family even if the weather's bad 🙂 . It also means I don't need to worry every time my husband gets another e-mail about how he was in a room for an hour last Wednesday or whenever with a covid positive student. Outdoor restaurants. I'll feel better about outdoor stuff even when it's crowded. But I'm happy to wear a mask and keep my distance around people I don't know are vaccinated until everyone's had a chance to be vaccinated, including kids. Also, while I'LL feel pretty comfortable doing most things, I still have 2 kids who can't get vaccinated yet, so I'll likely make different decisions when they'll be with me than when I'm by myself. I'm thinking a lot about how comfortable we'll be as a family doing inside stuff while we're traveling this summer. So far I suspect indoor restaurants are a definite no, stuff like museums that are taking precautions....we'll see.

Right; as this article makes clear, it isn't the vaccine that will lead to mutations, it's letting the virus spread unchecked. The vaccine is our best chance to stop or slow mutations. From your link:

My 4 are only playing with each other right now, but the three older ones have done assorted groups before, and those sessions have tended to be more in the 2 1/2-3 1/2 hour range. I don't think they'd have time for an all day every weekend thing, just because they have so many other things going on (at least in normal times).

DS was explaining to me yesterday that he might have to take his classes pass/fail to ensure he had plenty of time to check websites to find an appointment. I think he was kidding, but I'm glad he found one fast so he can focus on other things!

DS19--in college in Minnesota--found an appointment for Tuesday at a Walmart! He spent all day yesterday (first day of expanded eligibility there) fretting and refreshing websites (no car, so he had to find something close enough for a bus or LYFT ride), and then he finally found one right when Walmart released appointments at midnight (or I guess it's 11 in MN--that's when he texted me). So he'll be about a week out from dose #2 by the time he needs to fly home, and all of us who CAN be vaccinated will be well before summer and our plans to go see my in-laws.

Okay, I went and looked at the lab results again after reading that, and it looks like she did order the "spike test" they reference. There are a bunch of letters that mean nothing to me, but then it says, "This assay detects antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 spike protein including the receptor binding domain (RBD)." ETA: so when I said there was no indication it was a different test I guess what I should have said was, "I have no idea what I'm looking at when I read the lab results" 😂