The View from the Hermitage, Day 463

The International Olympic Committee has decided to allow residents of Japan to attend Olympic events. Spectators will be allowed up to 50 percent capacity of a venue but capped at 10,000. Japanese health officials are not happy with this decision, though it could still be overturned should conditions worsen. Some 10,000 of the 80,000 volunteers scheduled to work at the Games have quit. As of now, 7.3 percent of the Japanese population is fully vaccinated while 18 percent are partly vaccinated. Over 80 percent of Olympic athletes have been vaccinated. There will be rules for spectators including wearing masks and not shouting. There will also be guidelines for travel to and from venues. 

The Olympic Village consists of 21 residential towers of 14 to 18 floors, for a total of 3,600 rooms. The 18,000 beds in those rooms will be made of recyclable cardboard. In case you were wondering about the math, assuming 18,000 athletes--one per recyclable cardboard bed--means each would get eight of the 160,000 condoms I've mentioned here before. I hope those cardboard beds can support the weight of two toned athletes. 

US vaccination rates for people over 65 lag behind the national level in 11 mostly Southern states: Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, Idaho, Missouri, West Virginia, and Wyoming. The lag means that at least 20 percent of the seniors in those states have not yet been vaccinated. For comparison, the national rate for people over 65 shows 87 percent partly vaccinated, 60 percent of those ages 18 to 64, and 31 percent of those ages 12 to 17. There are various factors at play in the low rates for seniors--conspiracy theories, belief in pseudoscience, and a more libertarian mindset. The potential outcomes are not good, says the associate dean for global health at the University of Alabama in Birmingham. "All epidemics are local at the end of the day, and transmission is person to person. There is going to be a hot pocket of transmission if someone becomes infected and others around them are unvaccinated, This is not Epidemiology 101, this is common sense." Especially considering the growing prevalence of the Delta variant, "We're sitting on a powder keg."

The US has extended restrictions on nonessential travel to Mexico and Canada until July 21 following Canada's restricting travel from the US until that same say. Tourism, leisure, and casual visits to Canada are forbidden. Some exceptions do exist for family members, foreign workers, and international students. 

Quickies on the domestic front: Over 80 percent of residents of Vermont and Connecticut are fully vaccinated. In 16 states and the District of Columbia, almost half of residents are fully vaccinated. Unfortunately, there are other states in which less than 35 percent of the residents have been fully vaccinated. US gym traffic in May was just six percent below the levels in 2019. The home fitness boom may be over. Online searches for at-home equipment spiked in April 2020 but fell to a pandemic-era low in May 2021. Bye-Bye, Peloton? Madison Square Garden just held its first full-capacity event since March 2020, a Foo Fighters concert. American Airlines has had to cancel flights because they don't have enough pilots. United Airlines is also experiencing a pilot shortage. The main cause is that they military is not producing as many pilots as it did in the days of Vietnam and the Cold War. In areas with high infection rates, households with recent birthdays are 30 percent more likely to yield positive tests. Finally, on a positive note, US deaths from covid dropped below 300 daily for the first time since March 2020.

My middle-of-the-year birthday approaches meaning I should ponder the resolutionI made six months ago and see how good I have been at keeping them. I have yet to use the Instant Pot this month, and while I have made a pie, it was a repeat of a pie made earlier in the year. Of course, if I'm hitting all the goals, I'll think I should have made them loftier. Goals are tricky like that.