International and domestic politics; Deputy Director, Committee LLC; co-host
@committeepro
; Julie Oliver for Congress 2020, Beto for Senate 2018, Bernie 2016
I wrote about
@NPR
's decision to frame disabled people's ongoing exclusion from all public spaces as an annoyance to be navigated by individuals, rather than a massive civil rights violation to be challenged by the collective.
Don’t forget “everywhere is understaffed,” “millions of ppl are disabled”, “every flight is delayed,” “every hospital is overwhelmed,” “every kid is continually sick,” “proliferating brain fog is causing accidents”, “younger ppl are dropping dead of heart attacks”….
Al Roker almost died when his last COVID infection brought on blood clots this past fall. Now his employer exposed him again, mere months later. Again, this is a worker’s rights issue. If NBC can kill Al Roker on live TV w zero repercussion, your employer can too
I’m working with experts at my job now and the wildest thing about the COVID research coming out is there’s not even a debate that of course it’s damaging to get this disease. It’s not like some ppl are finding “yeah ppl should be totally fine after getting it ten times”
The system rewards ppl who can’t think critically. Cause if you have the intelligence to say “hey wait isn’t it bad to cook the planet and leave it to my kids in worse shape” you don’t end up being an executive for an oil company lol
Kids are dying of strep throat and flu now amidst mounting scientific evidence that COVID damages the immune system- and zero scientific evidence that nonexistent “lockdowns” 2 years ago did. Look away as you like, this only gets worse from here
I need parents to understand that your kid personally having a measles vaccine is not enough to protect them, it was herd immunity that protected everyone
Thanks to anti vaxxers and a broadly immune compromised population thanks to multiple covid infections, that’s gone
Every single study, from every single field, from immunology, to cardiology, to pulmonology is showing risk of vascular damage, risk of cardiac, brain and other organ damage, and risks we don’t fully understand yet. Zero studies are like “actually it’s a cold”
Knowing that ppl like Biden, Adele, TS and attendees at Davos can do Covid precautions and not be pathologized bc they’re “important” and “can’t get sick” rly shows me how much ppl internalize capitalism’s assessment of their disposability.
My health is important too.
For the record, Taylor Swift and her team still implement multiple COVID precautions in 2024 including restricting interactions and activities with people outside of her bubble, and wearing masks.
Public has trouble believing there could rly be so much scientific evidence showing repeated COVID infections are dangerous bc they assume our leaders would "do something". As you watch the sky turn orange today, reflect on how our leaders are "dealing with" the climate crisis
Sure seem to be a lot of leftists who think they’re going to radically reimagine society with mutual care and like, collective farming (??) who won’t put a fucking mask on in a grocery store despite every disabled person in America begging them to
Let me tell you something about herd immunity.
When a population has herd immunity you don’t get sick all the time.
In fact you don’t get sick with that virus ever.
We HAD herd immunity to measles. How many times have you had measles ?
There is no herd immunity to Covid
Just saw an anecdote where a woman was moved to tears bc her office masked so she could be sure not to give her sick father COVID over Christmas holiday. That’s great- and it’s what we should be doing always! Bc everyone has a friend w a sick dad! Or a coworker w a sick wife!
Honest question for those of yall who went “back to normal” when Biden said the pandemic was over:
Are you seriously not starting to see the society wide impact yet? The constant illness? The dropping test scores? The record high absences and staff shortages?
Ppl claim with zero evidence that you can no longer get ppl to mask bc they’re “fatigued” then the literal day the papers say “wear a mask” and cities hand them out with health advisories, ppl do it immediately.
On goalpost moving: in fall 2021, (after the vax) Dr. Fauci said we could expect society to be basically “back to normal” if we can get daily COVID cases under 10k a day.
As of today we have over 850,000 new COVID cases per day. And rising.
Ppl who claim they want to “follow the science” are ignoring every. Single. Thing. “the science” is telling us, very loudly, and very clearly. Pls stop basing your health decisions on the PR of a president whose pollsters told him to declare this over
Rly interested to hear how leftists justify being unmasked in spaces where ANY workers are masked, clearly do not want to be infected, and likely do not have the luxury of WFH or paid leave. Like?? Live your values PLS
One of the reasons ppl say they don’t know anyone with long COVID is bc they have no idea what long COVID is. Random heart attacks and strokes? Developing shingles in your 30s? New onset dementia, autoimmune diseases, neurological problems? Hair loss? That’s long COVID, baby
I sooooo badly wanna go live somewhere where ppl are just normal about masks and didn’t turn them into some massive referendum on political freedom while also non stop complaining about being sick for the last 3 years
And this is why people think COVID magically disappeared, as the research shows more and more awful long term and cumulative impacts. The cascading implications of this horrific pandemic response-which is utter denial- will be with us for decades.
The obfuscation of this fact via (1) just straight up media blackout and (2) pointless back and forths over whether 5 or 10 or 20% of COVID infections result in long COVID , is very reminiscent of the climate “debate”
I’d really love to read a book about chronic illness in the 18th-20th century novel 🤔 I find it fascinating the way “sickly”, bed/homebound, “invalid” characters are very common and talked about in old novels and chronic illness just kinda acknowledged to be a fact of life
Increased risk of heart attack, stroke, blood clots, neurological damage, Alzheimer’s, kidney failure , liver failure, increased risk of other infections bc it appears to have an immunosuppressing effect, these findings are completely consistent and not at all ambiguous
New new new!
I wrote about the excellent Covid precautions at Davos- and why we should all be demanding the clean air of the billionaires
#DavosSafe
#CovidIsntOver
The
@nytimes
was instrumental in forcing kids back into unsafe schools without clean air, now they are much sicker. Instead of facing reality, they invent an explanation that requires apparently zero evidence to publish. Kids are sick. You helped normalize it.
Adults blaming “daycare” for their kids contracting a half dozen viruses at a time- instead of acknowledging we as adults have a responsibility to clean the air, control infections, and make spaces safe for children. Yeah, I dunno
As someone who consistently masks & practices COVID safety- and as someone who suffers from clinical depression- please spare me the “I need to go to bars for my mental health”. What of the mental health of the most vulnerable? Every decision you make to spread COVID harms humans
Are we all on the same page here that billionaires are going to willingly watch all life on earth go extinct for their lifestyle ? So maybe can we understand why sympathy is not SO HIGH??
1) not explaining the heart damage covid does is causing ppl to blame the vaccine
2) telling ppl they have to get sick to be healthy made ppl believe getting sick is healthy
3) non stop wall to wall years long propaganda that COVID is mild did what it was always gonna do
“Americans who regularly get a flu shot are just the type of people you’d expect would routinely get vaccinated against Covid. Yet as the statistics reveal, even many of them appear to have declined the latest booster.”
Yeah, there is an extreme politicization of masks here but I always roll my eyes when ppl say it’s “impossible” to get a population to routinely wear masks when it is literally already happening in other parts of the world
This is that billionaire who’s obsessed w anti aging!! I actually rly appreciate him documenting and sharing this bc I’ve been saying for a WHILE how wild it is that fitness/ wellness ppl ignore COVID. This is reality! Masking up is anti aging y’all
My lungs aged 19 years after having COVID.
After 18 months and numerous interventions, my lungs still have not regained full capacity.
+ In 2021, my lung capacity was age 26.
+ By Nov 2022, after getting covid, my lung capacity was age 45.
+ Now 2024, my lung capacity is age
The ultimate irony of COVID is all the people loudly proclaiming how much they don’t care if disabled ppl can be in public are…. Going to end up disabled. You can’t get COVID 3x a year indefinitely and be fine. Nothing in science supports that, liiiiike at all
So the
@WHO
announced 1 in 10 COVID infections result in post-COVID health problems, and HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS of people will need longer term care (so, a significant slice of all humanity), the same week they announce we’re leaving the emergency phase of the pandemic ? Ok 👍
I want to be clear that this is very specifically something that has been of critical concern among researchers, and something that was dismissed as completely impossible among the media-amplified minimizers pushing back to normal. This is extremely bad
For anyone saying AIDS activists wouldn’t use shame as a tactic, this is absolutely false. ACT UP had an entire campaign called “Sexism rears its ugly head” about men refusing to wear condoms and killing women. They also often shouted “you’re killing us” at medical/cdc folks
We know COVID is airborne. We know how airborne infection control works. But we’re so committed to the “back to normal” delusion, we’re refusing to implement it in hospitals - and killing patients
Read my latest at The Gauntlet:
I canNOT cannot cannot get over that our new normal is just everyone getting COVID over and over again and developing new health problems while our idiot president goes on tv and says he forgets a million people have died sometimes omfg
I think it’s so interesting how all the kids are wearing masks and the organizers specifically explained to press that they are wearing masks as an act of community care and to stop COVID spread and the progressive politicians showing up still refuse to mask 😷
I am once again asking the lawyers who want to make money on class action lawsuits to contact me bc the idea that hospitals can get away w doing zero infection control during a pandemic and killing their own patients seems off to me
Videos of HCWs who are gleefully cheering on the removal of masking in health care settings are creepy & bleak as hell. Cuz not only will this harm patients, but it will harm them, too. No one wins.
#KeepMasksInHealthcare
#KeepMasksInCA
Gonna go ahead and say there’s a pretty major issue w the US left when life expectancy looks like this and many major left orgs, media outlets, politicians and activists not only have nothing to say about it but are now defending Biden over vulnerable ppl , pls be serious
I told my close friends that I wouldn’t be seeing anyone w/out my same level of COVID safety during the XBB.1.5 wave, even w a neg test. One texted me she changed her dinner plans to be outdoors and the other texted me she will start wearing masks to work 🥹 I feel so blessed
internal CDC emails are revealing a lot , including that they speculated whether COVID was airborne but were freaked out by the liability implications for employers. Here we see them discussing how they shouldn’t call SARS2, SARS2, which is apparently how we got to COVID
COVID causes blood clots, heart disease, heart attacks and diabetes. Not “work from home”.
Any outlet engaging in this obvious propaganda should be considered utterly discredited. Embarrassing, dangerous, deadly misinformation
The hospital did not do airborne infection control, refuses to do airborne infection control, and openly states it’s too hard for them to do airborne infection control. patients should expect to be infected with COVID.
This is not healthcare. This is not medicine.
The profound toll COVID-19 has had on heart health is only now starting to emerge. Doctors are grappling with how to help.
“We are seeing effects on the heart and the vascular system that really outnumber, unfortunately, effects on other organ systems.”
Hey leftists who want to ignore COVID now, are you aware state governments have implemented special liability shields to protect hospitals that infect and kill patients w COVID after admission? Does that maybe seem like something we should organize around?
Something is happening with B.C.'s youngest students. CityNews has launched an investigative series -- The Kids Are Not Alright -- to find out what is going on.
Part 1 of this series looks into the rise of concerning behaviours in elementary classrooms.
The bar is so low like one of the major things I want in YEAR FOUR of the pandemic is COVID tests that actually work lol. Like if they say negative, you’re negative??
Biden is out here saying we have the tools, also flip a coin and that’ll be as accurate as these tests
I truly think a big part of the problem is deeply ableist conviction ppl have that *they* won’t become disabled. Lots and lots of long COVID patients saying something along the lines of “I was young and healthy so I just didn’t think it would happen to me”
The
@nytimes
morning newsletter contains like 6 pieces of disinformation about COVID today lmao. In particular it claims long COVID is mysterious, rare, and probably clears up in a few months. Also says ppl are protected from previous infection
"I don't have to choose between my values and my desire for connection.”
@Clean_Air_Club_
still cares about COVID—and wants safer concerts. Learn how their Chicago-based organizing work helped create a global wave of clean air initiatives for artists.
Biden announcement to end the pandemic state of emergency - and v little pushback on left - very hard day . Millions to be thrown off Medicaid. Vaccines, meds, tests to be pushed out of reach for many. What a betrayal. Prob off here for a day or 2. Heartsick, tired.
Nope, not just MAGA. Liberals and liberal outlets told parents that their kids got super sick last year bc of “lockdowns” and lied that kids need to get sick to stay healthy. They told ppl that challenging the immune system w.l viruses is important, which is an anti vax claim
Thanks to MAGA misinformation, more families than ever before are asking permission for their school-aged children to skip vaccines.
And it's not just COVID. Even the measles, whooping cough, and polio vaccines are seeing their rates go down.
Infectious disease deaths among 5-17 year olds are now 32% higher than they were pre-pandemic
Incredible normalization of massive harm; the entire modern conception of public health was thrown under the bus for “back to normal”
4 degrees would mean the end of humanity. It would mean less than half the current arable land , cooked seas, feedback loops we can never reverse. This man talks about it blithely. We’re going to be killed by ppl who don’t seem to even grasp what they’re doing
Obama: "We may not be able to cap temperatures to two degrees centigrade." Or even three, he says.
But that's because OBAMA HIMSELF ignored the climate crisis, shunned activists, and expanded fossil fuel production while people were begging him to stop:
I feel like in 3-5 years when full ramifications of continual COVID reinfection are clear, there will be a lot of progressive politicians’ and orgs’ PR ppl trying to scrub the indoor maskless ‘21-‘23 pics off the internet, but I betchya disabled ppl will have the receipts
Where are we as a society when we’re so deeply in denial about COVID that we are not talking about hospitals becoming a death trap for sick, vulnerable ppl who go there for care. Ending masks in hospitals is evil. Pls, pls, do not allow them to normalize killing patients
@NickyWoolf
@tresdessert
Recently I was in Chile and a candidate for Senate handed me a beer, in her office, at 1 pm on a weekday. When I expressed surprise she reprimanded me, “we’re socialists. We drink.”
Anyway my point is….this is praxis
I will also add that many progressives were so happy to buy into the “COVID is over” propaganda that they barely made a peep as every covid era benefit was stripped away. Medicaid, free covid care/tests, work from home, isolation days. Coulda gone v differently
One-fifth of people on Medicaid—20 million people—were kicked off it in the past year. Half reported skipping care due to costs. 5 million are still uninsured. That suggests that Medicaid unwinding is responsible for 20% of all uninsured people in America
If you won’t wear a mask indoors during an ongoing pandemic killing hundreds in the US daily, you are killing disabled people and participating in eugenics and literally no work you’re doing can possibly make up for it
It just might be the biggest scandal you've never heard of. Read my latest:
"The WHO's claim that COVID wasn't airborne cost millions of lives. Now, they're changing the definition of airborne"
Same mistakes made w Covid being repeated again w bird flu- bc capitalism cannot handle community care and cannot prioritize our lives above money. It simply does not have the incentive structure.
-Testing for H5N1 should be free and easy for any farmer or owner that wants a test
-- Testing should not be limited only to cows that meet very specific case criteria - we now know that some infected cows have no symptoms 4/x
Absolutely deranged that Biden and walensky can just openly quarantine for 2-3 weeks WHILE claiming it’s super safe for everyone else to go back to work. I can understand ppl not liking masks but how do ppl not demand the paid sick leave these ppl are providing for themselves ?
Unlike the Democrats in Congress, I don't really feel much like laughing these days. Read the newest article on my Substack- about how a dangerous new variant is spiking COVID while progressives ignore the most vulnerable.
Infection control is not a favor.
Infection control is not a preference.
Infection control is not a special amenity.
Infection control is not a ridiculous ask.
Infection control is the responsibility of hospitals and the right of all patients. Stop spreading COVID. Do no harm.
The way liberals seem to be just totally blithely unaware that 750,000 Americans have died of COVID on Biden’s watch, that disabled ppl are now unsafe in public spaces, and that he normalized forever reinfections that carry horrific health implications is so wild
If you can't recall whether you were better off 4 years ago, when this guy was in charge of our most dire crises (COVID, inequality, racial violence, the election), here's a reminder of how Trump managed 2020 - and why it matters for voters in 2024
@TIME
Seeing someone succumb in year 3 to long COVID should be a sea change for the coverage of this illness. We do not understand the full implications of this virus we have chosen to reinfect the entire public with. We do not know what post COVID and chronic COVID look like longterm
37-year-old technology genius dies after battling with Long Covid since March 2020 and recently going into fatal multi-organ failure from Long Covid: so, so common for previously fit, young, healthy people destroyed by the mild virus
h/t
@LauraMiers
This is how ignoring COVID is supercharging right wing priorities. We have labor shortages everywhere bc of long COVID and high rates of acute COVID. Now they’re trying to replace lost workers w children.
A major child labor rollback goes into effect in Iowa this weekend.
14 year-olds are now allowed to work in meat coolers, 15 year-olds can join assembly lines and 16 year-olds can serve alcohol.
In a few weeks, similar rollbacks take effect in Arkansas.
Literally all of which was predicted and warned about! But okay! Let’s do every single step of this the hard way and wait half a decade or more for clean indoor air! And then let’s have to do clean indoor air anyway bc this doesn’t work AT ALL!
If you ask me
@AOC
can keep the disability community’s name out of her mouth as she continues to refuse to mask indoors, despite POC, queer and marginalized workers being the MOST affected by COVID and despite her own *twice weekly govt provided PCR tests*
I’m genuinely asking if we’re dealing with mass dissociation / denial / delusion
Like not caring about COVID is one thing, NOT REMEMBERING THAT IT EXISTS??? Are y’all fuckin GOOD???
ppl who are ignoring COVID and now angry about being forced back to the office just goes to show you how lack of solidarity will bite you. 1/10 COVID infections result in long term health problems. If we’d been organizing around that, as a workers’ issue, no one would be RTO
I love how the Biden admin keeps bragging about unemployment being so low when 20 million ppl have long COVID. Ppl who drop out of the workforce/aren’t actively looking for work don’t count as unemployed btw
Pneumonia in June is not normal. COVID hits the immune system. You will see more infections, more viruses, more severe outcomes, and they will continue to get worse. It’s not “kids catching up”. wear a mask and don’t throw your health away for these ghouls
😲Leana Wen was just in the hospital
Wen told Anderson Cooper "I'm just getting over pneumonia myself... last week I had severe shortness of breath & chest pain & ended up being hospitalized for pneumonia"
(talking to Cooper abt Madonna's infection)
@DanieTHBee
One of the weirdest things about these stories is even when ppl acknowledge that “touching fentanyl” can’t kill you, no one seems to put forward the obvious alternative explanation: the cops are doing fentanyl and overdosing like everyone else??
We don’t measure bacterial infection rates before washing hands
We don’t determine whether MRSA is spreading before wiping down beds
We don’t measure STI case rates before recommending condoms
Infection control is a REQUIREMENT for safe patient care, and airborne virus = masks
Ppl really seem to be having trouble with the concept that you can never, ever do war crimes, not even a little, not even sometimes, not even if something really really bad happened, not even cause you really wanna
ICYMI: the “let it rip” approach to COVID came from the (false) idea that the public would acquire herd immunity. But neither vaccination, nor infection, produced that immunity. Now we’re on a never-ending carousel of illness and declining health
This is controversial these days but I think it’s bad if you get 5% of your entire population long-term sick in the span of 4 years, while reinfecting everyone with the virus that did it. I think it’s not good. I think we should do something about it. I’m ~weird~ like that
It’s very interesting to me how the evidence bar for the claim “this brand new virus that’s killed millions of ppl could harm you” is infinity studies, yet the evidence bar for “no it can’t” is ZERO studies. Lol.
Yall normalized a virus with immune damaging effects that carries only a few months of immune protection. What exactly did you think was gonna happen
Wear a fucking mask 😷 (and demand clean air NOW!)
What's up with undergrads missing class constantly due to sickness? I've heard this is a thing at multiple institutions. My class has been repeatedly decimated.
Let me help you out, according to this chart we’re going to completely miss the target under both Trump and Biden. You cannot compromise your way out of extinction
I rly don’t care whether you personally think COVID is not going to disable you, the issue we need to work on AS LEFTISTS is that COVID disables ppl and everyone is being forcibly exposed by their employers. Can someone justify that to me? Silence = complicity