just fucking look up already

Besides more people being vaccinated, which is good, things are worse this year than last. Cases are skyrocketing. Hospitalizations are going up while hospital beds are full and there isn't room for other needy patients. Healthcare workers are burnt out. Meanwhile, the CDC has cut the number of days for sick people to quarantine in half, and our government has done little to curb this surge, relying on people to just magically stop it themselves.

While it would be nice if more people took this seriously and were more proactive, governments can't and shouldn't just rely on people hopefully doing what's needed to prevent global pandemics. Consistent and aggressive measures need to be taken. Clear and universal guidelines and mandates need to be made and communicated. And they have to be enforced. Otherwise, things will continue to spread and mutate and spread until our current vaccines are effectively useless. Even if politicians lose elections, they should be focused on preventing the spread and saving lives. And the CDC needs to do more than adjust guidelines to appease political-economic demands and expectations. People are more important than the economy. People are the economy and should be the priority, but it sure as hell feels like corporate bottom lines and the opinions of obstinate opponents of strict quarantine measures have more weight at the moment. And I'm really pissed and disappointed about that.

Things didn't have to get this bad. This was preventable. But this is what happens when people in positions of power and authority don't give a shit because doing what's needed to protect people and saves lives costs them approval points and money and they just don't care enough about people in comparison to our GDP and the profit margins of corporate donors to do the right thing. This is just like Don't Look Up. Just replace comet with COVID. People have to demand better. We need systemic solutions to systemic problems, not reliance on every individual to do what's needed without material help and government coordination.

Every infection and death is a weight on my heart, and an indictment of our society and the unwillingness of those in power to do everything they can to help prevent them. I can't express how furious this makes me or that they've been making the same mistakes for two years. Our government's obsession with the economy and the hyper-individualistic morality that dominates both our culture and politics are murderous. I don't know how I'm mentally going to survive another year of this.