Throughout this pandemic I'd like to think I was flexible, compliant, and cooperative with the authorities even when I failed to see wisdom in some of their decisions.
Did I think locking people in their homes and arresting all economic activity within the industrialized world was an effective way of dealing with a novel virus? No, not at all.
* * *
But I stayed home.
Did I think donning cloth masks that I watched people hit their vape while wearing was going to do anything to filter out the microscopic COVID germs? No, not at all.
But I bought seven or eight to have on hand.
Did I think it made any sense to require people to wear masks as they walk 10 feet to their restaurant table, only to take them off and proceed to laugh, eat, cough, and sneeze for the next 40 minutes, before putting it back on to walk 10 feet back to the door? No, not at all. But those 10 feet at Applebees have been the most sanitary 10 feet of my life over the course of the last year.
I've complied and I'd like to think I've limited my complaining. But we all have our limits.
And Tuesday, I took my daughter to a MedOne clinic where we were forced to sit outside until summoned, at which time we were told to wear masks for the duration of our time there. Vaccination status made no difference to them. Later that same day, I called a local specialist's office to schedule a follow-up appointment for my own medical issue. Before we hung up, I was instructed that they are requesting all patients continue wearing masks "for now."
Ordinarily I would just say okay and move on. But after the experience with my daughter, my fuse was a little shorter and the following conversation ensued:
Me: Oh, are you all not vaccinated yet?
Her: We are all vaccinated in this office but we know some of our patients may not be.
Me: But for those of us who are, is there still an expectation that we wear a mask?
Her: Yes.
Me: I see. I mean, I will wear a mask, but I'm curious if you could explain why we need to wear masks if we're all vaccinated.
Her: Just as a precaution.
Me: Right, but a precaution for whose safety?
Her: Well, for all of us. We know we're turning a corner on this virus and we just don't want to contribute to any relapses.
I feel the need to stress again that this is a doctor's office behaving this way. If they're not following the science there, if our leading medical professionals are themselves modeling a willingness to cave to the virtue-signaling superstition of mandatory masking, isn't that alarming?
Shouldn't it be doctors and nurses who are the ones most adamantly screaming from the rooftops that:
- The science of vaccines proves inoculated people are safe from transmitting or receiving the pathogen.
- Recent lab analysis of child-worn masks has indicated a disgusting cocktail of potentially deadly pathogens being contained and carried within them.
- The science of masks now proves that they have been demonstrably ineffective at limiting the communal contraction or spread of the COVID-19 virus.
With the myriad of opinions, hot takes, and passionate feelings about the efficacy and morality of mask wearing, it sure would be helpful if our medical community could lead a unifying charge for data and common sense rather than give in to politically charged narratives and power plays.
But alas, here we are, with half the country living one way and the other half another.
As I strap the mask on for my appointment today, I'm reminded, it didn't have to be this way.
