Tag Archives: Ben Truman

You Should Think of “Protect the Most Vulnerable” as a Purely Aspirational Statement

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The available evidence points to one dispiriting conclusion: We are about to experience another substantial wave of Covid-19. Both state and federal data (the two are drawn from different testing regimens) show that our wastewater is full of the virus. The Centers for Disease Control says that nationally, wastewater levels are Very High, and the worst levels in the country are in the Northeast. Case counts in Vermont, although still classified as “Low” by the state Health Department, are on the rise. Nationally, according to the CDC, Covid-related emergency room visits, hospitalizations and deaths are all heading upward.

Dr. Michael Hoerger of the Pandemic Mitigation Collaborative is projecting that “Nearly one in three Americans will get infected during the peak two months of this winter surge. That’s 105 million infections & more than five million resulting Long Covid cases.” The PMC says we could be headed into the second highest peak for Covid transmission ever. Including those times when we avoided exposure as much as possible and wore masks whenever we ventured outside.

Yeah, well, I’m sure it’ll be just fine. At least that seems to be the foundation of Gov. Phil Scott’s post-pandemic policy. Because his administration isn’t doing a damn thing about it. Not even to “protect the most vulnerable,” which he says is one of the three pillars of his governorship.

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If Anybody Needs Me, I’ll Be Hiding Under the Bed

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I was about to write another post, but this number stopped me in my tracks. 487 Covid cases today. That’s half again as many (more than that, actually) as the previous one-day record.

Perhaps I was premature in writing that Gov. Phil Scott might soon be able to declare victory over the Delta variant. I mean, good God.

The figure comes with a caveat; an extraordinarily large number of tests were processed yesterday, and that contributed heavily to the high case total.

But still. Today’s other numbers were pretty bad as well. 55 hospitalized with Covid including 19 in ICU beds. Six new deaths. Test positivity rate continues its steady climb, now at 3.2%. So even accounting for the test processing total, there’s still a lot of Covid out there.

This isn’t an artifact, either. Health Department spox Ben Truman told VTDigger “the numbers are accurate and there are no associated glitches or delays,” referring to the previous single-day record of 330, which the department blamed on a computer error. Nope, that 487 is real.

Good thing Team Scott has five full days to come up with excuses before the governor faces the media again. They’ll need it.

Covid ain’t going away, folks. I’m making no unnecessary trips, masking everywhere I go, and might start double-masking. We will return to normal blogging activity after a brief sanity break.

In which I join the ranks of the Vermont Illuminati

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Yeah, somebody forgot to invite me to the secret ceremony — or maybe The Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy intercepted my invitation, hmmm? — but apparently I have joined the ranks of the secret elect. Yes, I’m in the Firmament of Evil alongside Peter “Capo di tutti capo” Shumlin, Mary “Whirling Blades” Powell, Paul “Carbon Tax” Burns, Shap “The Fixer” Smith, Crea “Moneybags” Linthilac, and whoever else.

I learned of my elevation in a curious way: via Twitter, from one of our staunchest conservatives.

Oooooh, “Orwellian”. Me likey!

Some explanation is needed, I’m sure, for the casual reader.

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A little fearmongering from VT Watchdog

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Scary headline earlier today:

More than one-third of refugees in Vermont test positive for tuberculosis

Immigrant Resettlement Program. )Not exactly as illustrated)

Refugee Resettlement Program. (Not exactly as illustrated)

That story comes to us courtesy of Vermont Watchdog, a conservative “news” site. But before you go investing your 401K in surgical mask manufacturers, there’s more you need to know.

The story is based entirely on a single fact: Of the 901 refugees admitted to Vermont since 2013, 318 tested positive for TB.

Those numbers were provided to Watchdog by the state Health Department. Scary, right? Aliens among us are bearing potentially fatal diseases, right? Rutland had better pull the plug on that Syrian refugee plan, lest it be overrun by plague-infested furriners, right?

Ehh, not so much.

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