robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

That lack of exposure to germs etc. as children in our modern society has long been thought to be why modern urban adults don't seem to have the i****e s****m people in the past had. The difference in death rates for certain things seems to be in access to modern medicine in spite of a less efficient i****e s****m.

I was raised in a small farm town and spent lots of time on my Grandparent's farm plus hunting and fishing, to include cooking fish on a stick over a camp fire instead of going back to the camp or house to eat. I spent 3 years in the regular Army with over 2 years in Vietnam and sometimes ate under conditions that would make a maggot puke. I do the rinse or if really dirty/greasy soap and rinse quickly thing, I drop food on a clean table I will pick it up and eat it. My wife is a now retired Surgical RN/OR Charge nurse and it freaks her out.

David Martin Loc: Cary, NC

Actually, in many ways the lack of exposure to germs or pets has resulted in an overly efficient i****e s****m rather than a weaker i****e s****m. Which in turn results in more environmental allergic reactions, increased asthma, etc.

Books like "Let Them Eat Dirt: How Microbes Can Make Your Child Healthier" explain this in easily understood language.

The same applies to bad medical advice, for example "don't feed infants peanut products until the age of 2", which has resulted in so much peanut allergy. It bypasses the phenomenon of "Oral Tolerance" where humans learn which foreign proteins, particularly dietary proteins, should not trigger an immune response.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

If it is me you refer to with the three !!!, well I follow the old thing of "three times I say it" used in the past to show that you really mean something or it is the t***h. (History teacher-retired variant)
And I am not anti-v*****e, I have had the two doses and the booster. It is just now with the new variants and the stats of people with the vax still getting C***d I am doubting the effectiveness of these v*****es. They do definitely seem to make the illness less severe for all but those with major health problems and for that alone they are worth it. But for people with some conditions the vax's have a down side and in those cases if they (and hopefully their Doctor) decide it isn't worth the risk then they should not be "mandated" to get the vax.
These v*****es were all developed in an emergency "we need it now" manner and done so in much less time than usual. In fact so fast it is a near man-made miracle. So it is not surprising they aren't as effective as say the polio and other v*****es I took as a kid. But they were an emergency solution. Hopefully they are still working on modifications or entire new v*****es to replace them with that will be more effective in prevention and even more effective at making cases milder.
However from research I have read by several institutes from around the world the normal course for most v***ses is they mutant to a more contagious but less serious form over time. The super deadly variants k**l off their victims too fast for them to spread the v***s around as much and after a while the v***s has died off with its victims. One study speculated that the 250 or so (when I was a kid they said up to 600) v***ses that cause the "common cold" were mostly at one time in the far past very deadly.

bonjac Loc: Santa Ynez, CA 93460

Peer reviewed? Only mortality studied?

Vince68 Loc: Wappingers Falls, NY

Having the v*****e and booster may be effective in that you won't get as sick as if you did not have the shots, but it has not been 100% effective in keeping you from getting C***d. Also, not sure if the shots are effective against the newer variants such as Omicron or newer.

I'm 71, and I had the 2 M*****a shots and the booster shot, and I wear a mask whenever I go out, which is pretty much only for shopping, and NYS also has had the mask mandate in effect for all indoor gatherings. When I do go out, it is mostly alone and I try to avoid places where there are large gatherings of people. I still got C***d in the beginning of January 2022. I have been home alone since J****** 6th, and I only just started feeling better this past week. I did spend Christmas with immediate family, but none of them had C***d, or have come down with it either. I was the only lucky one despite being careful.

I have no idea where I got it from. I still wipe down the shopping cart when I go shopping. I still wipe down all the groceries with disinfectant wipes when I get them home as we were told to do when this all started. And after I put everything away I wash my hands, but I still got C***d despite taking all the precautions we have been told to take, and I don't go out to restaurants either.

So go figure... like one of the health experts said, "its not IF you will get C***d, its a matter of WHEN you will get it".

DirtFarmer Loc: Escaped from the NYC area, back to MA

I have been known to eat food that dropped on the floor. My wife hasn't gotten used to it yet. (She keeps the floor pretty clean, but I do it at other people's houses also). Sometimes I eat something with a spoon at my desk. I lick it off and set it down on the desk for another snack. If it falls on the floor in my shop I will clean it off with a paper towel or something (don't like to eat grit).

srt101fan

Sorry about your illness. Difficult to avoid this nasty bug, even if we take precautions. I am a firm believer in the benefits of mask-wearing but I recognize that masks are effective only if they are of proper design, fit properly, and are handled properly after use. The guidance on these three considerations has been appallingly poor from the very beginning of the p******c and generally continues to be inadequate. Every time we wear a mask in a potentially c***d-contaminated environment we run the risk of getting the v***s on the mask surface. After using them, we should therefore consider our masks contaminated and treat them accordingly. How many of us do that? And where is the guidance on how to do it?

[I use N95 or KN95 masks and try to get the best fit possible. When I return home I handle the used mask as little as possible and hang it up in an out of the way place. I have several masks and rotate them in use. I'll admit that I don't replace them as often as I should!]

David Martin Loc: Cary, NC

If you read the paper, it explains the nature of the journal and who the authors are on page 2.
You will also find that they studied the impact of lockdowns and mandates on C***d mortality, and placed it in context of the impacts on society of the lockdowns and mandates.

ShelbyDave Loc: Lone Rock, WI

Your comments made me curious. Do the majority of people wear masks and get the v*****e? If not do you have a theory as to why Australia has fared better than the US?

John Hicks Loc: Sible Hedinham North Essex England

I believe lockdown and mask wearing masks did work it was all we had until we rolled out the v*****es, in the UK we will will shortly have a pill that can be taken.
People decry lockdown and mask are another form of anti v*****e brigade. We have lost a of people in the UK but our fatality figures state of you had vivid in the last twenty eight days a lot of people died of other causes but were included in the figures.
Mercifully we did not have a flu epidemic in the UK for the last three years.

OldSchool-WI Loc: Brandon, Wisconsin 53919

____________________
As I have said---I don't know what I would have done if living in a major city---but out here in WI---nobody wears masks as I have seen. In fact, I don't think I have seen a person with a mask except in photos. I bought a box back at the time of the Trump/Biden e******n and brought one with me in case they were required. I forgot to put it on and in completing my b****ting---those at the table, merely laughed as I took the mask from my pocket. I have not v****d either. --Not the first shot, second or third. I see that the risks do not reach the rewards. If I had a bunch of health problems, I might see it differently.----ew

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

I resemble that, I have a set of plastic knife, fork, spoon on my computer desk that gets wiped off, sometimes rinsed if I take them to a sink and reused. If they land on the floor of the family room where I have my "retired guys hobby room and office" which I share with our two dogs I will actually wash them or just toss them and get another set (HUGE box of them from Costco in a storage cabinet in the garage.)

Stephan G

Depends on how one defines being "alive".

Old adage: One has to die to prove that they lived.

robertjerl Loc: Corona, California

Those "surgical" masks are meant to be tossed, my wife tells me that during long operations the staff may go through several of those masks and the gloves.
The N95 and KN95 are supposed to be one use and toss also but she said they usually only used them if the surgery patient had a contagious disease.
For bone surgery they sometimes wore the light weight "bunny suits" - sort of a one use hazmat suit.
She only worked at two hospitals that had a bone surgery OR of the type where they could actually open the bones during the surgery. They are very specialized and high tech. If anything gets into the bone marrow that is a VERY BAD THING. Wall size HEPA filters with huge slow speed fans to change the air frequently and the entry was a double doored airlock with its own filtration system. At every point air could come into the OR it went through air scrubbers and UV lamps etc. and all the air in the entry lock and the air exchange system went through their own filter/scrubber system. Both the OR and the entrance airlock had positive air pressure as a further precaution to keep outside air and germs out.
When they opened it they were so proud of it they had an open house to celebrate becoming one of the relatively few hospitals with one of those top level bone surgery ORs. It was for staff and family only and I took the tour - I was surprised that the double doors were really airlock style with sealing gaskets and "locks" like on the doors/hatches on submarines. The open house was after the contractor had finished, but before they sanitized it for use.

OldSchool-WI Loc: Brandon, Wisconsin 53919

______________________
I am in the midst of reading the 800page small point type autobiography of Leni Refenstahl, the great cinematographer/photographer/actress/dancer---who lived to age 102. It reads like a screen play with excitement and detail on every one of those pages. She did not have to "die to prove that she once lived" and she set the records straight for her nearly life-long enemies who held against her the stunning cinematic work she did for the Third Reich. She outlived all her critics an made the last word on her complicated and fruitfull life.------ew (A course at Harvard was designed to study her film Triumph of the Will.)