*Background & update on NC House Bill 237*
Right now in NC the NCGOP is attempting to ban masking in public for health reasons & would make this act a class 1 misdemeanor. NC House Bill 237, if passed, removes the health exemption currently in place & would make masking for...1/8
Let me get real clear with the “I hate mask mandates” crowd. The ONLY reason why we had to have mask mandates is bc you refused to wear them around immunocompromised ppl! You refused to wear them in hospitals where there are organ transplant recipients and ppl with cancer and…
As a North Carolinian who is now staring down the potential of a public mask ban, let me use this opportunity to lambast every single expert posting photos of themselves unmasked, or showing their unmasked faces at conferences while discussing COVID or long COVID…
I have not been able to get a single doctor to care that I lost 30lbs unintentionally, 1/3 of my hair, and I have a constantly swollen lymph node on the right side of my neck for 2.5yrs. I have been offered an asthma test. Again. I am now smelling smoke for the last 30hrs…
Friends, I’m hearing rumblings that the Gov’s office & some NCGOP reps are surprised at our reaction to the mask ban bill & are getting a little concerned. DO NOT LET UP! We’re not the yahoos in the horror 🎥 turning our back on the bad guy. Let’s stop this murderous bill now ⬇️
Today is a critical day to fight NC House Bill 237. This bill will kill ppl in the state of NC. This bill will increase police brutality. This bill will force everyone who chooses to mask for health reasons, WHICH IS NONE OF ANYONE’S BUSINESS, to pick btw infection…1/
Please sign & share the petition linked below with next steps to easily contact NC House members. Let’s stop this dangerous bill before it can kill someone or create yet another case of long Covid.
I want everyone to note that
@CDCDirector
who is from NC has not said one single word about this bill. Her voice is deeply needed and as usual she is nowhere to be found.
We heard it straight from the NC Senate hearing right now that wearing a mask for health reasons in public going forward in NC is a CLASS 1 misdemeanor in NC. Up to law enforcement discretion to enforce it.
Listen here ⬇️
Please sign & share the petition linked below with next steps to easily contact NC House members. Let’s stop this dangerous bill before it can kill someone or create yet another case of long Covid.
I just spoke to
@NC_Governor
office. The staffer I spoke with was deeply unfeeling about this bill, had zero remarks signaling any understanding about how devastating this is for high-risk & immunocompromised NCs & he has no known plans to comment at this time. I highly…1/
I live in 1 of the most beautiful states in the US w/ some of the ugliest ppl on the 🌎. If you live in NC, you know what I mean by “ugly”. Here we also use that word for evil, mean-spirited behavior. NC bill 237 is 1 of the ugliest to round the
@ncstatecapitol
in a 🔥 minute. 1/
🧵For everyone still complaining about the shaming tactic, LISTEN UP!
I am not giving any of you pleasantries about this when at the end of year four all you managed to do was what was mandated, complain the entire time, and then pretend like it’s over as immunocompromised…
I am going to say this to
@jonfavs
& everyone else Covid-informed or not who continues to reference medical activism or ACT UP. Larry Kramer would have cussed you the fuck out. They were successful bc of their anger, not in spite of it. Shut all the way up & learn your history.
Just to follow up: the brand of person I was referring to is someone who tells people to fuck off if they choose to work from home while sick. I don’t find that persuasive, I find it unhinged.
Long Covid is real, tragic, and deserves more attention (I had a post-Covid condition
Quite frankly, had you all been masking consistently we would have a much firmer argument to make about why this ban is so dangerous and unacceptable. Your need to get likes on a photo from social media or fit in has directly weakened our fight we are going to have to wage…
We heard it straight from the NC Senate hearing right now that wearing a mask for health reasons in public going forward in NC is a CLASS 1 misdemeanor in NC. Up to law enforcement discretion to enforce it.
Listen here ⬇️
It’s YEAR FIVE & we have no Covid anti-virals for children. This is unacceptable
@potus
. We have no vaccine options that are not mRNA for children. We have no
@CDCDirector
response to the latest winter surge & children have gone back to school with no masks, few with HEPAs. 1/2
I would like to know why
@NC_Governor
is being completely silent on NC House Bill 237 that will ban masks in public for medical use. I would like to know why
@CDCDirector
is being silent on this as the NCGOP works to criminalize our right to protect ourselves from infection.
You know who yelled & shamed others for not taking care of their community? Larry Kramer. So maybe you need fighters in this Covid advocacy after all. We are allowed anger & we are allowed to shame shameful behavior. Killing & disabling ppl is shameful, the last time I checked.
It’s absolutely hilarious to me that the
@CDCgov
claims they didn’t promote N95 wearing at the beginning of the pandemic to save them for healthcare workers, except we can’t get healthcare workers to actually wear them without a tantrum
@UCSFHospitals
I will vote to not concur with the Senate changes to HB 237. Every person has the freedom to wear a mask to ensure their physical health and safety if they want to. Removing the medical mask exemption provision from current state law has created confusion among the public. HB
Encourage any & everyone who can to call
@NC_Governor
office at
(919)814-2000 & demand that our Gov make a statement about this. Playing politics with the lives of NCs will not fly on any side of aisle.
Against this, and I am furious to be in this situation to begin with, and disgusted that our position is weakened by your vanity, laziness, and lack of leadership. And if you don’t like it, help us put a stop to this. And get your mask back on your damn face & cut the BS.
Stop the mask ban now! Let’s bring this petition to 10K today!
#Immunocompromised
brothers and sisters! Join me to stop the mask ban in North Carolina! I am a friend of Victoria Coble! Let’s do this together! 😷🪧
This mask ban in NC. You better do some heavy lifting, and you better do it with a mask on your face. The amount of ppl this bill is going to kill and harm…fucking horrendous.
Personal News Announcement:
I have started Covid Action GSO, a non-donation seeking nonprofit who will help immunocompromised members in my community access reasonable accommodations for HC appointments, and who will advocate for masked days/hours at children’s play & learning…
There is NO excuse for any expert working in the Covid or long COVID space to be unmasked unless you can present several other mitigations used to help prevent infection, where there is no one in short range of you.
Thinking I should add a portable microphone in my Covid bag for all the yahoos who say they can’t hear me over my n95. I would love to throw a petty gadget in there.
“CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW? HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU BEEN SICK THIS YEAR YOU BAFOON?”
Hashtag “self-care”.
🚨LAST PUSH TO STOP NC MASK BAN- we have names of three house republicans to contact that may be swayed to vote no on this bill, in the tweet below. A vote on this could come as early as tomorrow so it’s so important we call now. Remember ppl from out of state can also call 👇1/
The HELP Committee hearing on Long Covid today has been the most cooperative bi-partisan public government hearing in maybe what, 8 years or more? COVID did not have to be divisive. Selfish grifters & selfish individuals & selfish Gov stooges made it divisive.
Heart disease and lung cancer and cystic fibrosis ETC. All of which include children too! You wouldn’t mask in NICUs and at doctors offices and in places high-risk ppl had to visit. You did not care who you killed or made severely ill or chronically ill after infection bc you…
Everyone?! What about all the immunity debt to Herpes? What about that?
I really think everyone pushing immunity debt theory needs to test this. Please contract Herpes first, to keep from contracting it. And then we can go from there.
I’m rooting for you!
There are larger consequences for making the choice to unmask publicly and having those photos circulate online. The disgust and horror I have over those of you who do this, make excuses for it, complain about it when being called out, better pitch in for this fight to prevent…
adults AND CHILDREN “fall by the wayside”. You complained for 4 yrs, did the bare minimum, offered no ideas or solutions, & want me to be compassionate about your failures when you showed no compassion for any1 more vulnerable than you. Compassion is an action word not a feeling.
Remember everyone can call in NC or not. In the U.S. or not. Tell them you can’t travel here & you will boycott NC businesses if you can’t travel here bc NC won’t allow you to protect yourself from airborne pathogens & pollutants. We stopped the bathroom bill with
#BoycottNC
NC Mask Ban bill HB 237 news:
Attn Cabarrus, Forsyth & Pitt Counties -
@trianglemask
posted on IG that 3 more Republican reps in the NC House may be convinced to support a health & safety exemption for masking in public, with enough constituent outreach. Call/email TODAY!
#ncpol
What an excellent thing for the
@CDCDirector
to oversee while her own state works to make masking in public for health reasons a class 1 misdemeanor. She has made no public comment on it to date.
No1 should fear going to the Dr, work, or the grocery store or wherever the hell else they need to go. And if you don’t like my tone, let me remind you that I don’t like your bare-naked face. If you can’t wear a mask, you need ppl to protect you & everyone who can should!
-End.
Centered your convenience over the health & wellbeing of others. Had you not lied about Covid from the jump, had you not called it a hoax & accepted that yes we have new virus and yes this is going to hurt some ppl & yes we need to be reasonable about trying to lessen that harm…
Big BIG thanks for the unanimous support of all NC Dem House members & senators who are openly against the removal of the health exemption on NC Bill 237. I want to highlight
@friendsforbatch
&
@NatashaMarcusNC
for loudly fighting this in the NC senate judiciary meeting…1/
Take note
@CDCDirector
this is what leadership looks like & what you should be advocating for in your own state. However, since you are worth $31 million, you can access treatments that most North Carolinians can’t, so you just can’t be bothered to care.
As an autonomous organ of the
@_AfricanUnion
,
@AfricaCDC
is at the forefront of enhancing health information exchange across Africa, ensuring seamless collaboration and swift response to health emergencies.
Read our latest article from Lancet on this topic 👇🏼
NC healthcare is a bad joke. I have been told my chest pain is Costochondritis & to use a healing pad & try inhalers. What about all the other symptoms?!
If the LACK OF MASKS(n95/kn95) in HEALTHCARE does not get addressed I’m going full RHONJ & flipping a table.
WTF ppl! This is the biggest barrier! The risk of being infected BY healthcare workers/settings.
Where we can, and had any kind of cooperation whatsoever there would have been no mandates. You brought the mandates on yourselves and you want to gleefully punish cancer patients including kids with cancer as you celebrate NC trying to ban masking for health reasons in public!
And let me be clear, I love my family and I am grateful to be able to be at home with them, but no one should be shut out, especially children from places like science centers and museums and educational and play places because others dgaf about anyone but themselves.
While you claim Jesus Christ to be your personal Lord and Savior. What an absolute joke! The ppl hurt by this didn’t force you to get vaccinated. They didn’t set the mandates and they certainly didn’t force you to act like an inconsiderate baby during the worst health crisis in…
And you will be getting NONE from me until you reform your actions and grow up.
Don’t like it? Jimmy crack corn, and from the bottom of my soul, I DO NOT CARE. I HAVE STAYED HOME FOR FOUR YEARS w/ 2 small kids EAT SH!T.
We have just over 7500 signatures on this petition. Thank you so much to everyone who has had the chance to sign & share ❤️. BUT y’all we have way more than 7500 Covid Safe ppl on Twitter…1/4
I don’t like to talk publicly much about my LC symptoms bc I’ve never tested + (believe to be infected in Jan 2020 while pregnant & w/ gestational diabetes) & anti-nucleocapsid test was negative but could have been taken too far past infection or I just never made antibodies.
Decades. You did that all own your own and you won’t be happy until the most vulnerable are culled from society bc you only care about yourself, while invoking Jesus on your side. This bill is going to hurt so many ppl who have done NOTHING to you, and to the surprise of no one…
You don’t care and that is completely on brand. So please take this opportunity to shut your mouth and stop attacking ppl with cancer, organ transplant recipients, ppl with cystic fibrosis, children with cancer & their families, ppl with heart disease, & ppl who just don’t want…
We’re back at it this morning. More emails, more calls, more tweets & posts. Let’s stop NC Bill 237. It will be a standalone crime, a class 1 misdemeanor to mask in public for health reasons if this passes. Are we to trust the party that vilified masking to not charge us…1/
Today is a critical day to fight NC House Bill 237. This bill will kill ppl in the state of NC. This bill will increase police brutality. This bill will force everyone who chooses to mask for health reasons, WHICH IS NONE OF ANYONE’S BUSINESS, to pick btw infection…1/
I agree we should not beg. We demand. Larry Kramer and ACT UP fought the institutions & won. They fought the NIH, they fought the CDC, they fought the president and they won. We can do the same. We don’t beg, we demand. And we ACT UP. And we can wear P100s while we do it.
The institutions are not gonna save us. The institutions do not love us or empathize with us or exist for us. Begging the institutions to care is worse than a waste of time. They're trying to kill you.
Apparently the
@NCGOP
wants to kill off cancer patients. Children with cancer, adults & kids with cystic fibrosis, type 1 diabetes, severe asthma, organ transplants, etc. Their bill 237 ignores the fact that respirators like n95s are medical devices. 2/
Right now the NC Senate Judiciary made it clear that it would be a violation of NC law if this bill passes to wear a mask in public.
It was stated right now that the KKK would be protected under this bill but wearing a mask for health reasons would NOT.
@ThomasAaronBru1
@RaffyFlynnArt
@MamaToronto
Put on an n95, and mask your kids. Stop making excuses for not doing it. The science isn’t going to change so we need to all collectively grow up, accept it and get a mask over our filthy contagious mouths and stop complaining. 4 years of complaining and not masking gave us JN.1.
I want to extend my gratitude to
@ErinforNC
,
@JohnTorbett
&
@RepHumphrey
for taking a firm & early stand & publicly committing to voting no on NC House Bill 237. We know how NC politics works. We know the immense internal pressure of saying no to the NC senate GOP. That takes…1/
To deal with & ignore the rest. Who loses weight at 39 after 2 kids? How is there no medical curiosity at minimum? When will the healthcare community responsible for not masking with n95s, not cleaning their indoor air, and for ignoring patients in crisis? I’m lucky…
Call
@NC_Governor
office at (919)814-2000 & tweet at him. Call & email NC House members (tell them you can’t travel here if not an NC resident). Tweet at the
@NCGOP
& House reps & if anyone can visit their reps in person please do 🙏🏽& sign our petition ⬇️
Today is the day the vote will happen in NC to see if masking in public for health reasons will become a class 1 misdemeanor. We must make a final big push to stop this. Lives are on the line. Please sign & share and ask your followers to do the same:
1/
Hi new followers 👋🏽
This has been a private account up until the last month or so, so I thought I should introduce myself.
I’m a grad student & budding 📊 scientist using cultural analytic tools to study how covid/long covid is self-reported & described in public online spaces.
I had a hard delivery, resulting in physical trauma that required physical therapy that was greatly delayed due to medical racism, had postpartum depression, mastitis while breastfeeding. It wasn’t until I stopped breastfeeding (my body stopped producing yes I tried EVERYTHING)..
@ChrisCuomo
I am not a learned doctor, or journalist, just a lowly masters student, but I have a suggestion others have made that can help get the lead out with Long Covid research.
Start profiling it in kids. Loudly. Repeatedly.
#LongCovid
I was very lucky bc my husband and I had followed experts here early on and took Covid very seriously. My pregnancy likely informed that and we were staying home and masking by early February. We choose to homeschool & very grateful for that option, and have lived a strict…
And maybe a few months had passed until the weight loss started. I thought the hair loss was postpartum related but it continues to come out years later. The weight loss would not stop, nausea like I was pregnant again, chest pain, POTs symptoms but didn’t know what POTs then…
The
@NCGOP
wants North Carolinians to forget that ppl use wheel chairs and neck braces to commit fraud, but we don’t ban those medical devices bc that is illogical and morally repugnant. So is banning masks & denying a health exemption for everyone…3/
I have an incredibly supportive spouse and a safe home that has helped prevent reinfection. But it has come at an enormous cost and we have had to forgo necessary medical appointments & cancer screenings bc it is so unsafe and the hostility about it is so cruel.
“We have the tools” 🙄
Where is your comment
@CDCDirector
?
This goes against CDC recommendations and this is YOUR state. Your silence on this is unacceptable.
@CovidActionGSO
I would think, considering I am a former smoker (it’s been more than a decade and quit in my late 20s) who grew up in a house with secondhand smoke for at least 1/2 my childhood, they would at minimum check me for cancer seriously. They do not care.
@__potatie__
Anyone can call you do not have to live in NC or the US. When you call & email let them know you will not visit or vacation in this state if this bill passes and if not already please sign this petition:
Stop NC House Bill 237 banning the use of masks in public for health reasons & making it a class 1 misdemeanor!
Phone & email list of all NC House Reps ⬇️
1/4
@MurielBlaivePhD
Do you have any idea of the CO2 level on that bus? Ppl riding in close proximity to others onto top of poor ventilation is an ample opportunity for infection and this person may have cancer, be an organ transplant recipient or have any number of high-risk conditions or upcoming…
covid-safe lifestyle since then. I have been to countless doctor appointments. I have connected with many other patients who not only can get their doctor to wear appropriate PPE for airborne pathogens, but they literally seem to pick and choose which of my symptoms they want…
As you sign, please read some of the comments. My goodness we are fighting for so for many ppl who face so much harm if this passes. Forever grateful for those who have & will sign this petition & a big ❤️💪🏽to everyone who left a comment. I read them all & they are so important.
They removed the video bc they blatantly state that masks will be banned and that the KKK is protected from this ban based on their bill as it is currently written. Who has a copy?
@CovidActionGSO
LC with small kids & no medical support is a constant cycle of guilt/overexertion/crash. The impact on the LC patient & family is so immense, and as an adoptee the idea of my children being raised without me makes me 🤢. It keeps me up at night.
Look who gets to apply for an exception to the NC Mask Ban, yet if NC House Bill 237 passes we get no allowance to mask for our health. If this isn’t classic
@NCGOP
, I don’t know what is:
🧵I have an update, thanks to
@catladyactivist
excellent advice and steadfast refusal to simply allow our HCW to infect us without push back.
I called my GP and let them know that the telehealth visit they are refusing me would result in a state complaint, an ADA complaint…
@CovidActionGSO
My biological father died of AIDS induced cancer just a few years older than I am now. I wonder all the time if a very similar fate is waiting for me too.
@CovidActionGSO
was born out of this, to start demanding better care for my MIL, my myself, and our high-risk kids too, as well as many others in my area who are experiencing the same problems.
Attn all, we have the NC Reps who are on the conference committee & we will be sharing their contact info along with the major points about this bill, and how we can also tweet at the reps as well for anyone who does not have spoons to make calls or emails later this evening…
1/ In talking about how much I love
@NukitToBeSure
portable far-uv 222nm, I thought it might be a good idea to share what’s in my Covid bag. Here are the gadgets I never leave home without. What’s in your Covid bag?
The EPA has stated since April 2021 that surgical masks are only 38.5% effective, and this has been on their website ever since. Stating that they are in anyway equivalent to respirators is misinformation. 1/
I don’t think mask mandates work, nor does long term mask wearing for individuals prevent them getting Covid. Most transmission is at home.
But I do think you get a short term decrease in risk and so some increased in protection by wearing a mask and using some eye protection.
Willfully ignorant monsters. This is a blatant violation of the ADA and unless you want the entire state sued for preventable death you will retract this dumpster fire piece of legislation and find another way to satisfy this trumped up issue at hand, when y’all wrote this…8/
stop this bill before it harms the health of NCs & all those who visit here. We can't defeat this bill w/out you. You do NOT have to live in NC to call/email/tweet at reps or sign the petition.
Action: Steps 1-3 ⬇️
1)🙏🏾 sign & share the petition:
5/8
who wants to protect their health from airborne pathogens, whether they or their loved ones are high-risk or they simply can’t afford to be sick for work, a vacation, special occasion, or just for overall health and longevity reasons. 4/
Ppl are having tantrums and tone policing others not being “pleasant” while ppl are DYING! They are bedbound! They are getting sicker by the day! And we have NO meaningful results. None. I think if we want any real change we are going to have to get a lot angrier…
Which would disenfranchise many who must mask to be able to vote in person, even if they were able and willing to show id or identify themselves outdoors by pulling down their mask momentarily in a uncrowded area. The
@ncgop
is banking on this and
@ncdems
are asleep…6/
At the wheel letting a huge voter base go to unnecessary & premature death & debilitation. Shame on all of you. Grow up. Respirators are medical devices. You can find another way to identify ppl without vilifying cancer patients & other high-risk children & adults you…7/
The
@NCGOP
is banking on the fact that
@NC_Governor
and
@JoshStein_
and
@JeffJacksonNC
won’t fight this bc it’s an election year and the “C” word polls poorly. It’s no coincidence that this bill would go into effect a month before the election… 5/
I will be contacting your licensing board about this tweet today. This is unacceptable to direct patient care on Covid over the internet. Shame on you.
Jerome had to live through racial profiling while masking in Denver, CO even without a mask ban. This is absolutely unacceptable and we must support Jerome & put a stop to this ban in NC now.
A friendly reminder to folks who don’t think that what’s happening in North Carolina could ever happen to them. This happened to me in Denver, Colorado, and there was no mask ban law in place. Just good ole’ fashioned 🇺🇸 style anti-Blackness & ableism!
#KeepMasksinHealthcare