One of the best arguments for getting vaccinated and wearing masks


And it comes from Fox News, of all places, and was made by host Neil Cavuto during an interview with Howard Kurtz. Cavuto has multiple sclerosis, heart disease, and cancer and is thus severely immunocompromised. He was vaccinated and contracted covid-19 and has recovered. He feels that being vaccinated was what enabled him to survive the breakthrough infection.


He makes an impassioned and cogent argument for why everyone, whatever their political views, should get vaccinated. He says that the evidence for the benefits for the individual of getting vaccinated is overwhelming but it also benefits others. He says that his immunocompromised status is well known and people at his workplace are careful (and Fox News has imposed vaccine mandates) but there are people all around you, among your friends and family and co-workers and those next to you in stores and other public spaces, whose status you do not know and that you owe it to them to get vaccinated and wear masks. Do not make this all about yourself and your rights but think of the needs of other people.

The fact that Cavuto works for Fox News may persuade some resistant people to get on board with preventive measures but the current situation is so polarized that they may just dismiss him as having crossed over to the dark side. The fact that he says he has got a lot of angry reactions accusing him of being a never-Trumper and the like suggests that even working for Fox News does not matter. I wonder if his Fox News colleague Tucker Carlson, one of the most serious discouragers of vaccines, masks, and other pandemic prevention measures and mandates, is listening to him.

It is astonishing that people who should know better ignore this sensible advice. Take, for example, Florida’s nominee to be state surgeon general Joseph Ladapo who refused to wear a mask at a meeting in the offices of a state senator even after she told him that she had a serious health condition (breast cancer) that put her at risk.

Florida Senate leader Wilton Simpson, a Republican, sent a memo to senators Saturday regarding the incident at the office of Democratic state Sen. Tina Polsky, asking visitors at the building to be respectful with social interactions.

In the memo sent by Simpson, the president of the Florida senate, he said that while there’s no mask mandate in the Senate, senators can request social distancing and masking within their offices.

“It shouldn’t take a cancer diagnosis for people to respect each other’s level of comfort with social interactions during a pandemic,” he said. “What occurred in Senator Polsky’s office was unprofessional and will not be tolerated in the Senate.”

Lapado was nominated to his position by Florida governor Ron DiSantis, who has presidential ambitions and seems to think that being fervently opposed to any vaccines and prevention measures is a winning strategy.

Lapado was asked to leave the meeting after refusing to wear the mask and giving no reason for his refusal. No word on whether he is now whining that he has been canceled.

Comments

  1. Who Cares says

    Lapado only went to that senator to troll. His behavior and remarks cannot be interpreted otherwise

    from here:

    He just smiles and doesn’t answer. He’s very smug,” Polsky recalled. “And I told him several times, `I have this very serious medical condition.’ And he said, ‘That’s OK,’ like it basically has nothing to do with what we are talking about.”

    Eventually, Polsky said she asked Ladapo to leave her office, which he agreed to do, she said. But the Senator said before going, Ladapo remarked, “Sometimes I try to reason with unreasonable people for fun.”

    She is fucking immune compromised but he is the reasonable person for refusing to wear a mask to reduce the risk to her.

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