Sorry, I though you were asking scout what she had seen that supported that China wasn't going to share their research with us, but it was the other part of her statement you were asking about.

It's not attacking per se. I shouldn't have brought it up. It does feel personal in a way I can't articulate. And I disagree with a lot of people on this board! I spent a lot of time posting about the concerns of people not wearing masks outside. One line that basically says, well it doesn't matter because the government says they have to...okay? Feels dismissive when I read it. But whatever, like I said, shouldn't have brought it up because now I'm explaining myself way too much.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/11/china-clamping-down-on-coronavirus-research-deleted-pages-suggest The Orwell version, lol https://amp.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3078497/coronavirus-china-pulls-plug-wasteful-unnecessary-research-covid

I just heard a doc talking on NPR who was frustrated by this as well. It's been interesting listening to their reporting, touting the dangers and ineffectiveness vis a vis the president taking it prophylacticly (yesterday), and then today there was a story about people are pulling out of clinical trials because of that. And the doctor on today was saying, look, every drug has risks but we need to do the studies.

Jean, I don't know if you have a beef with me for some reason, but I can discuss this on a message board, right? The relative risks of people going out without masks in outdoor spaces? I don't care if you disagree with me but I feel like for some reason anytime you post in my general direction it seems aimed to shut me down. I'm probably imagining that. In any case, a government regulation for everyone to wear a mask to go on a walk outside would be pretty silly and not necessarily backed by any sort of science.

Call and ask to talk to the postmaster. Tell them what happened. I personally would be conciliatory and acknowledge this must be a stressful time for carriers, but that this seems very unprofessional.

Right, but outdoor air is much different than indoor air. I have only read a couple of those 6ft studies and most don't seem to account for the dispersion of particles and how fast that occurs outside. If you're outside, unless you're right in someone's face, any droplets would disperse almost immediately and any virus particles would be degraded almost immediately as well. It's not like we're walking into fog clouds of other people's droplets unless we're talking about being inside in a very specific sort of environment. I think of it like putting an eye dropper of blue dye into a bathtub vs the ocean. In an ocean, you're not going to get enough dye on you to cause an issue unless you're right next to the dropper, and maybe not even then. Honestly I would not expect people to be wearing masks just going for a walk even if passing on the sidewalk. I am not anti mask by any stretch, but that seems unnecessary to me given what we know about outdoor transmission. I might be worried about a stadium type scenario where air can kind of stagnate and there are a lot of people right next to each other...but not just passing people outdoors. Maybe if you're talking about NYC-style crowded sidewalks?

are people really expected to wear masks outside...like outdoors just going for a walk or whatever? I get mask wearing inside where air is recirculated and not moving at all, but outside the dispersal of any droplets and degradation of virus paricles has to be so quick and effective why would people wear masks outside unless under very specific circumstances?

My parents live in an expensive area that, even if my DH could find a job there, would make us extremely house poor and limit opportunities for the kids. My parents will likely move to be near us in a few years wherever we land DH's parents town doesn't have jobs for him. He's looked. It would be more compelling I think if either set of parents lived in a place where either of us grew up or something, but both sets have moved since we left home. Also, I haven't lived near family for about 20yrs minus about 16months. So I guess I don't know what I'm missing?

Thanks to everyone for their input! Tulsa and Eastern WA were already on our list, but I've definitely added Dayton and surrounding area now for the job hunt. I also don't mind Raleigh, but the winters might be too mild for DH. Thanks for helping me browse zillow and dream, lol.

Yes, he's retiring shortly (into a historic pandemic induced recession! YAY!) and we don't really have any ties anywhere so I'm trying to get ideas of where we might want to live. Of course a job that pays actual dollars will probably be the ultimate deciding factor. 😂

Tulsa is a place we've looked at and I'm pretty fond of...I grew up going to Eufala every summer. But I'm not sure if it has enough winter for my DH.

No, my DH likes snow and I don't mind it being cold three to four months out of the year, but I also want a decent growing season and some heat in July. I have a friend in MN who says the greyness most of the year really affects her. Northern latitudes scare me for SAD reasons.

Okay, I worry about Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota for grayness and long winters and not very much summer. Is that not a concern I should have?

Where in the continental US do I want to live if I want: --Low cost of living (I know this is subjective, let's say that I want to be able to get 2500sqft house $350k in a neighborhood that isn't sketchy) --All four seasons (or within a days drive to snow in winter) --Big enough city to rate a Costco and similar stores but not a huge place, so I guess a bigger small city to mid-size --Not totally flat and featureless --I want to have backyard chickens, so chickens should not be outlawed Does this 🦄 place exist?

They did not test at the beginning. This article outlines some of what they did. It doesnt really answer the second part of your question though.

For the first paragraph I feel like this is what I have been trying to say in a lot of my posts. Individual goals and choices are not ever going to be able to be the same as public health goals and mandates, but individual goals and choices will somewhat align with perceived risk a lot of the time. To the second part I quoted, if you read the news articles about what the US Navy did to get everyone on the Nimitz healthy, this was pretty much it. Even then, with asymptomatic cases and simple human mistakes it was EXTREMELY difficult to do and the jury is still out on whether or not it was accomplished. For an entire US city or region? I don't think it's doable. I mean the military was able to take some drastic measures because they can force people into isolation because people in the military don't have the same rights as you and I.

DP

It's a map of where a bunch of NYers moved to at the onset of the pandemic. "In March, the United States Post Office received 56,000 mail-forwarding requests from New York City, more than double the monthly average. In April, the number of requests went up to 81,000, twice the number from a year earlier. Sixty percent of those new requests were for destinations outside the city." In April the chart shows over 80,000 mail forward request.

I feel like this can't be good. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/05/16/nyregion/nyc-coronavirus-moving-leaving.html

But also, those were crowded parties with people crammed up next to each other on purpose and people jammed into hotels and sharing goodness onow what. I don't know if that's really comparable to people laying out on the beach in small family groups or walking or swimming or surfing. I saw some pics of VA Beach oceanfront from last weekend. I used to live there and the photos were clearly, clearly taken with a long lens to make it look like people were on top of each other. I don’t think it's a good idea to overstate the risk and close off outdoor spaces because of spring break parties from 2 months ago where a bunch of people were deliberately all up on each other shouting and swapping sweat in a tent with a dj. Even if beaches are open, no one is scheduling big parties in small spaces.

Well, I guess I don't think someone says something like that as just a purely neutral sentiment. I will say I misread the original intent, but it's not without at least a bit of loaded meaning. Which, it doesn't have to be neutral; obviously people can feel how they feel and then express that on the internet. And maybe I have become cynical reading elsewhere because you better believe there are a lot of people out there who absolutely want to see the open up crowd have to eat their words.

did you miss the part of my post where I said: "Jean has said she didn't mean they should go without treatment and I believe her. I don't know where else this conversation goes, tbh." You don't have to continue this argument with me. I got your meaning.

It's not like I don't understand the desperation of all of this. I do. Acutely. I'm just over here lol'ing at how this conversation went from, "these people shouldn't see a doctor if they really believe what they're saying" to, "It is surely Emse who lacks sympathy for others and we need to explain risk to her."

Are you asking if it should be free of consequences? People should not drink and drive or be irresponsible. That doesn't change the fact that people will be irresponsible. They will make horrible choices based out of ignorance, malice, or fear, or laziness. They will hurt others. They will put themselves at risk. People do already have the liberty to drink and drive; our system of justice is necessarily punitive after the fact, not so much preventative precisely because of personal liberty. Can someone decide to drink and drive and kill someone else? Absolutely! Should they? No. I don't know what you mean by personal liberty in that regard, or how you would compare it to someone not masking or deciding to offer hair appointments or laying out on the beach. Rights are always balanced by responsibilities and consequences. We have not, as far as I know, as a society said that one of those consequences should be being left without medical treatment regardless of what landed them in the hospital. We even treat people who get hurt when they try to murder someone else. Jean has said she didn't mean they should go without treatment and I believe her. I don't know where else this conversation goes, tbh. Going out to Walmart without a mask or even being vocal about not wanting to wear a mask or take other as of yet unproven actions isn't the equivalent of drunk driving. But even if you view it as such, we give drunk drivers medical treatment if they crash their car and kill someone elthe. In any case, we may find out in 30 days that some of the things we're doing now don't work or were unnecessary, or maybe had the opposite effect we intended. To that end, I'm inclined to give a little grace to the naysayers, whatever they want to naysay in the moment, even if I think they are wrong. Even the YouTube lady filming herself on the beach pointing out what everyone else was doing wrong in her eyes, lol.