With the massive declines of new cases and new deaths in The US and specifically Florida/SunBelt, I am no longer certain that a vaccine is even necessary. I believe we may be very close to herd immunity and would not be surprised to hear that 150 million Americans had been infected as of now.
I'd agree with you, but then we'd both be wrong. The cases and deaths in the Sunbelt are rising rapidly and are going through the roof.
So much for "school choice"... According to DeSantis Tampa-area schools will be open --- no matter what health experts say. Seeing that school districts in Georgia lasted a mere 5 days before becoming widely infected with COVID and having to go remote.... let's see how this works out in Tampa. In Florida, a coronavirus showdown as DeSantis rejects Tampa-area schools plan https://www.politico.com/states/flo...antis-rejects-tampa-area-schools-plan-1306786 Gov. Ron DeSantis took a hard line on school reopenings Monday, standing firm against Florida's third-largest school district in a showdown over classroom instruction and Covid-19. DeSantis and Education Commissioner Richard Corcoran on Monday traveled to Hillsborough County to reiterate their case for re-opening schools just days after they rejected a plan from the county school district to hold online-only classes for its 223,300 students during the first four weeks of the fall semester slated to begin Aug. 24. The potential educational benefits of in-person instruction outweigh the health risks of opening schools during the pandemic, DeSantis said at a Monday roundtable held at Winthrop College Prep Academy in Riverview. “Some of this stuff is just not debatable anymore,” DeSantis said. “We’re going in a good direction in this area and that’s just the reality.” Hillsborough County, which includes Tampa, last month submitted a plan to reopen classrooms, but backtracked after local doctors warned that school closures were likely to ensue. The county revised its plan to limit classes to online instruction, but Corcoran on Friday rejected that approach, saying it denies parents the option of sending their children back to school. Hillsborough reported a 13 percent Covid-19 positivity rate on Monday, the fifth-highest in the state. School officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The district can revert to offering in-person and online classes, which it originally planned, or draw up a new plan that details how many students requested in-person learning and explains why Hillsborough can't deliver on that option, Corcoran wrote. Alternatively, the district can withdraw its reopening plan altogether, limit itself to online instruction, and run the risk of losing state funding. Corcoran gave Hillsborough County until Aug. 14 to make a decision. The standoff comes as the state defends a lawsuit from the Florida Education Association in which teachers are challenging the state policy, saying pandemic is creating an unsafe environment at schools. The Department of Education in July issued an emergency order requiring brick-and-mortar schools to open by Aug. 31, a mandate that caused confusion among local leaders. The department has since shown a willingness to let schools begin the year online, but Corcoran took a tougher line in his letter to Hillsborough: In-person classes are a must unless the county is still in the early phase of re-opening other parts of its economy. Corcoran on Monday painted Hillsborough County as an outlier, as the majority of Florida’s 67 counties prepare to offer a mix of in-person and remote courses. Only Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach and Monroe counties are slated to begin the year with strictly remote learning for most students. Hillsborough County has the right to keep schools closed, Corcoran said, but the move does wrongby parents, students and teachers. “We have 66 districts all very content with the plans they have submitted,” Corcoran said Monday. “We have one district that submitted a plan, liked their plan, and then suddenly went back.” DeSantis and Corcoran on Monday fended off questions from reporters about the Hillsborough County case, saying that the Tampa area is in much better shape than south Florida. Hillsborough County reported 868 new Covid-19 cases over the last three days, compared to 4,205 in Miami Dade County, according to the Department of Health. The county has had 1,396 hospitalizations and 388 deaths. Broward County has reported 3,904 hospitalizations and 821 deaths from the coronavirus. Democratic state lawmakers used Monday's event to bash DeSantis for his response to the pandemic and schools. Sens. Janet Cruz (D-Tampa) and Lori Berman (D-Delray Beach) said the Republican governor needs to keep students safe instead of holding a “self-congratulation tour.” “The governor is failing miserably at leading this state through one of the worst disasters in our history,” Cruz wrote in a statement. With teachers in at least 10 districts returning to classrooms this week, the Florida Education Association lawsuit against the state has yet to be heard. The case as of Friday has been assigned a judge in Leon County, but no hearing currently is scheduled.
Even an individual of the meanest intelligence can look at the chart below and see that the average number of new cases daily is declining significantly in The US. You may not want to admit it, but the vaccine may not even be necessary.
Following the lead of Florida's leader, DeSantis... Florida Sheriff Bans Masks As State's Covid-19 Death Toll Breaks New Daily Record https://gizmodo.com/florida-sheriff-bans-masks-as-states-covid-19-death-tol-1844696169 Billy Woods, the sheriff of central Florida’s Marion County, banned masks for all deputies and visitors to the sheriff’s office starting Tuesday, according to a new report from the Ocala Star Banner—a strange decision to make in the middle of a pandemic that’s still wildly out of control. Sheriff Woods has instructed staff not to wear masks while on duty and said that any public visitors to the sheriff’s office, which currently employs about 900 people, should be told that masks are banned. Anyone who doesn’t want to remove their mask will be told to leave, according to a memo written by Woods and obtained by the Ocala Star Banner. “Effective immediately, any individual walking in to any one of our lobbies (which includes the main office and all district offices) that is wearing a mask will be asked to remove it,” Woods wrote. Masks are a vital public health tool to help slow the spread of coronavirus, according to the CDC, and the sheriff’s mask ban comes as Florida broke a new record for daily deaths from covid-19. The Sunshine State recorded 277 new deaths on Tuesday, with 13 of those deaths in Marion County. The U.S. as a whole reported 1,339 new deaths yesterday. (More at above url)
Trump is furious with DeSantis , the expression says it all. Trump furious that he can’t do rallies in Florida after its GOP governor made COVID spread ‘worse’ President Donald Trump is reportedly furious at one of his allies for taking his advice. According to Vanity Fair’s Gabriel Sherman, the president is angry that he can’t hold any of his trademark campaign rallies in Florida amid its weeks-long surge in COVID-19 cases. What’s more, Sherman’s sources say Trump is putting the blame for this predicament at the feet of Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has been eager to follow the president’s commands to reopen state economies even as the country records more than 50,000 infections and 1,000 new deaths from the novel coronavirus every day. “He thinks Ron has made it a lot worse,” one Republican who spoke with Trump said. Trump was forced to cancel his planned RNC acceptance speech in Jacksonville after public health officials told him there was no way to safely hold a mass gathering in the city without risking mass COVID-19 infection. Nonetheless, one aid tells Sherman that “rallies are his jam” and that “Trump won’t be happy until he is doing multiple rallies a day.”