Anonymous
By Dr. Henning Ansorg, M.D., FACP, Health Officer County of Santa Barbara, Department of Public Health
If you’ve been vaccinated, congratulations! If you are still awaiting your turn to be vaccinated, thank you for your patience. You can learn more about vaccinations in Santa Barbara County, including how to sign up to receive your vaccine, by visiting the County’s vaccine information website at: https://publichealthsbc.org/vaccine/.
You are considered fully vaccinated for COVID-19 approximately two weeks after receiving your second dose in a two-dose series, such as with Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna. If you received the Johnson and Johnson (J&J)/Janssen, you are considered fully vaccinated approximately two weeks after receiving your single-dose vaccine.
According to the Centers for Disease Control, (CDC), those who are fully vaccinated may:
- Visit with other fully vaccinated people indoors without wearing masks or physical distancing.
- Visit with unvaccinated people from a single household who are at low-risk for severe COVID-19 disease indoors without wearing masks or physical distancing.
- Refrain from quarantine and testing following a known exposure if asymptomatic.
Even if you are fully vaccinated, remember that not everyone else is, so you should continue to:
- Take precautions in public like wearing a well-fitted mask and physical distancing.
- Wear masks, practice physical distancing, and adhere to other prevention measures when visiting with unvaccinated people who are at increased risk for severe COVID-19, or who have an unvaccinated household member who is at increased risk for severe COVID-19.
- Wear masks, maintain physical distance, and practice other prevention measures when visiting with unvaccinated people from multiple households.
- Avoid medium- and large-sized in-person gatherings.
- Get tested if experiencing COVID-19 symptoms.
- Follow guidance issued by individual employers.
- Follow CDC and Santa Barbara County health department requirements and recommendations.
With regard to medium or large sized gatherings, the CDC recommends that all people, regardless of vaccination status, should adhere to current guidance to avoid medium- or large-sized in-person gatherings and to follow any applicable local guidance restricting the size of gatherings.
With regard to travel, the CDC has not updated its travel recommendations and requirements, so you should continue to follow their recommendations.
For more information about local public health orders, guidance, and vaccine distribution in Santa Barbara County, please visit: https://publichealthsbc.org/
If we filled in every swimming pool in america, we could save the lives of over 400 children every year. Pools should objectively be a higher priority than masks. There are a lot of unfortunate things that cause children to die, but covid is very low on the list. We cannot prevent children from living due to an irrational fear of something that is not a significant threat to them. Facial expressions are a crucial part of how people communicate and children need to experience them as they grow up. Literally wiping the smiles off every child’s face with masks makes no sense, had no rational basis in science, and accomplishes nothing.
The death of every child is tragic, but it is important to keep it in perspective. Living comes with a risk of dying and it’s not possible to live and enjoy life without some element of risk. Should we outlaw swimming, or are the 400+ children who drown in pools every year an acceptable trade for the enjoyment we get out of pools? Should we outlaw bicycles, or are the injuries and deaths they cause acceptable given the enjoyment children derive from riding them? Should we outlaw cars, or is the convenience worth the thousands of children who are maimed or killed by them every year? Should we outlaw smiling and discourage physical activity, or is that important enough to take a small risk. I would add, masks are not 100% effective. The recent government report estimated they achieved something like a 3% reduction of deaths so the benefit of masking children, if any, might be more like 10 lives saved every year rather than 300.
For one Sac, my kids wearing a mask won’t prevent him from getting sick. It’s supposed to “protect others” in case they’re asymptomatic right? Second, all the particulate studies relating to masks assume proper mask/Ppe usage; adults don’t even use masks right. When my kid comes home her mask is wet and filthy, been touched constantly, been put down on tables, food crumbs in it, etc. certainly not the sterile ppe method utilized in any study, which also don’t address the potential negative health aspects of a kid wearing a dirty, wet mask all day while running around playing. Get your shots, live like normal, your kids need you to.
Wearing a mask when sick and unable to stay home would be one of the few situations where masks would be helpful.
That study showed make mandates equated to a 1-2% decline in hospitalization and death. Also, we’re still forgetting 80% of those hospitalized were overweight, not mention other underlying symptoms. One of the fortunate things about covid is it severely impacts a very targeted demographic, unfortunately in CA we failed to use this very beneficial trait in responding to covid and painted everyone with the same brush.
If the vaccine works…and I believe it does, then there is no scientific need for a mask. Remember follow the science, not Fauci.
11:12 AM:
Once again, flashes of sanity embedded in your feeble attempts at irony.
CHIP – ” Literally wiping the smiles off every child’s face with masks” bwhahahahahahahaha! Oh my God that is precious. Dude, enough. Many cultures have face coverings for religious reasons. Are those cultures wiping the smiles off their kids’ faces? What about hindering their physical activity? You ever been snorkeling? Gotta wear a mask and put a snorkel in your mouth. How about skiing? Kids wearing goggles and warm face coverings must be losing out on life and learning to be afraid of the snow! Those poor ski kids can’t laugh or show any emotions, eh? DUDE ENOUGH.
Chip–is t abusive to force your child to wear shoes? To wear a shirt? To wear underwear? To brush their teeth?
You’re really chugging the Tucker Carlson cocktail bro.
Bro you know there are legal requirements to fence swimming pools, right? OH MA GAWD you are inhibiting my enjoyment of seeing my beautiful pool!
The whole pool tangent is just another covidiot whataboutism ploy.
All this “take off the mask” crap is just more culture war from Fox News and their anointed high priest of misinformation Tucker Carlson.
So, Chip, Oops, all you conspiracy chuggers will you do as Tucker said and call the cops and keep calling the cops until they arrive if you see a child with a mask on? That is literally where we are in this lunacy and the only reason it continues is for views and clicks. People are so stupid, it’s actually impressive.
Chip, oops, and vor are classic examples of the Dunning-Kruger effect, on a wide range of topics, but especially with regard to the pandemic. Heavy dependence on tribal con social media as their source for information only exacerbates the effect.
You really like using that saying (“Dunning-Kruger effect”) don’t you Mac?
Sac – I wouldn’t say “no problem” as running in masks is really uncomfortable. Maybe not to all…but it is an issue. My kids switched sports as they didn’t want to do masks all day and then also run around for a couple hours after school in a mask. Long term the sooner we can safely get kids out of masks the better as there are also psychological issues in play as well. Your right it’s not worth hysteria…but you can’t say “no problem” either.
And there is simply no chance it ever applies to him.
Pit – Humorous that you want to lecture someone about kids. You wanted to keep schools closed forever in spite of all evidence showing the ill effect school closures were having on kids…
Never seen nasal spray with side effects. I’ll def opt for nasal spray over a sweaty mask. But if you wanna wear a mask more power to you
SAC – if masks are mandated then I can see why it would annoy people who don’t need them and are fully vaccinated, cant you?
SHMONK – Nope, I can’t see any reason for someone to be angry, annoyed, concerned, calling cops, etc etc etc if they see someone ELSE (not them) wearing a mask. This is not about “mandates,” this is about people (CHIP, VOR, OOPS, etc) who are furious about seeing other people choosing to wear masks or having their kids wear masks.
Well, my day is done, so I’ll catch you all later. I’m going out to watch some youth sports (where ALL participants are masked) while wearing my mask even though I’m fully vaccinated. Call the cops on me if you want, I haven’t had a good laugh since I read Chip’s comments this morning!
2:16–no amigo, it’s mocking someone by providing a ridiculous analogy to highlight their original moronic point.
Take off the mask!!!
I’m afraid that’s just not in the cards. Being barefaced in public exposes everyone to all sorts of germs and viruses, not just covid. Masking is a step forward for our society and a small price to pay to help protect those who are vulnerable. People have learned that they should be afraid of what’s in the air and take comfort on the protection that masks provide. And remember, it’s not over once everyone gets the vaccine. Booster shots will be required on an ongoing basis. Your “immunity” is only partial and temporary, and we don’t have any data on how limited and temporary it is at this time.
Sac, you say that as if masks will not be required anymore. If there is one thing I have learned over the past year it is this. Whenever an expert says “if only everyone would (fill in the blank), we can all get back to normal” do not believe them.
Sac, I could care less if people choose to wear masks. I have my own thoughts about it and I choose not to wear one. Others are entitled to make their own decisions about it and I fully respect that. I think the issue gets a bit more complex when it comes to children who cannot make that decision for themselves. Adults are free to make their own choices, but I think forcing children to wear masks is abusive.
Covid is not a significant risk to children. According to the CDC, fewer than 300 children under 18 years old died from covid since 1/1/2020. By contrast, close to 1000 children drown every year. Requiring children to wear life preservers at all times would therefore do more good than requiring them to wear masks. Teaching children to be afraid of the air and wear a mask all the time is not healthy, has no medical benefit to them, and is abusive. If an adult decides to wear a mask that’s perfectly fine, but leave the kids alone and let them be kids.
Kids need to be sick to build up an immunity. Its the natural cycle. When we loose heard immunity to all sorts of viruses and such by being masked all the time, You will know how they were abused. Yes it a horrible virus and people do and will die but that is also the natural cycle.
Sacjon
None of those thigs you mention cut off a child’s air supply and discourages physical activity.
Chip seems to think 300 dead kids is not a big deal. I can think of 600 parents and lots of relatives and friends who would disagree.