Blog#75-7/11/21
MINORITY RULES IN GOVERNMENT AND COVID
By Richard Davis
It’s bad enough that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and his band of idol-worshipping Trumpies are controlling much of what goes on in congress, but many of their supporters around the country are also in control of the course of COVID.
Federal politics has always been less than representative of the will of the people and that kind of imbalance has increased over the last few years. Even though Democrats have a slim majority in the Senate they have great difficulty passing any significant legislation because of issues like the filibuster and the need for 60 votes for bill passage. This situation has all but crippled the body politic and it will continue for the foreseeable future.
That future is starting to look at little grimmer when it comes to COVID in this country. A minority of Americans are determining the course of COVID because of their refusal to get vaccinated. The unvaccinated are not a monolithic group but it seems clear that states that lean Republican and places that have bought into the Trump lies have the lowest vaccination rates.
Consider the numbers according to the CDC on July 10, 2021. Nationally, 55% of Americans have received a first vaccine dose and 44% a second dose. Some states such as Vermont and Hawaii have done better than that with Vermont at 74% for a first dose and 60% a second and Hawaii at 70% and 50%. But there are 20 states that have first dose rates in the 40% range and second doses in the 30% range.
What these numbers tell us is that a minority of Americans are responsible for spreading COVID. As the virus mutates and the delta variant becomes more widespread the unvaccinated will help the virus infect more and more people. While the fully vaccinated are mostly protected from infection with COVID variants it is still remotely possible to contract the virus.
The COVID hotspots are now cooking in the states with low vaccination rates. Just to give you an idea of how low these rates are, here are some numbers. The first number for each state is the percent who have received a first vaccine dose and the second number is the fully vaccinated percent.
Alabama 40% and 31%; Arkansas 43% and 32%; Mississippi 37% and 31%; Georgia 44% and 35%; Idaho 40% and 36%. Those of us who want to be protected from COVID and its variants might feel some sense of security if we do not go to states with such low numbers. But people in those states travel and it is just a matter of time before the unvaccinated begin to control the behavior of those of us who have tried to make life better in these times of COVID.
Also consider all of the children in this country under 12 years old who are not vaccinated. They may have an acceptable level of protection with masks in states with high vaccination rates but what will happen to children in states where masking is almost non-existent and vaccination rates are low?
I fear that this country is on the verge of a new COVID surge. Masking is a rare occurrence in most states and if my anecdotal observations are correct, most people are acting as if the virus has left us. If vaccination rates remain low in 20 or more states it is just a matter of time before the new wave hits us.
