Happy Vernal Equinox and the Arrival of Spring! My money is on Mother Nature's getting persnickety and hitting us with one more batch of freezing or frozen precipitation. Of course, her evil twin Lady Luck might side with us on this one.
The Professor has been noting each morning that the covid death counts for the US and some other countries (I think Canada is one) are no longer showing up on the site he checks every morning. (It may be Our World in Data, but I'm not sure). I was able to point out to him today that this is likely because we don't really have daily national numbers any longer. Seven states--Arizona, Hawaii, Kentucky, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, and South Carolina--as well as the District of Columbia now report case, hospitalization, and death data on a weekly bases. Wyoming report such information twice weekly. One big factor is the number of home tests that come back positive but are never reported. "So the data is pretty wonky," summarizes a senior scholar at Johns Hopkins University's Center for Health Security.
I shared with The Professor an article summarizing the thoughts of three K-12 teachers on the return to in-person classes after almost two years away. Some of the issues they cite are things The Professor has noted about his classes of college freshmen who spent the years immediately preceding college in virtual learning. It's been a year of "survival and triage." There are students who have returned who skipped virtual classes entirely; one teacher likened them as having fallen into an abyss. Students are having more panic attacks and showing more anger. Students have less academic stamina; they take longer to do lessons and request more breaks. This has been a big issue for The Professor.
Possibly because of their use of technology during virtual learning or even lockdowns, students rely more on technology, often in non-academic ways. Most students are not using their cell phones to take photographs of diagrams or bullet points written on the whiteboard. Absences are up this year, due in large part to covid or covid exposure, calling into question just what criteria should be met for promotion at the end of this year. Finally, schools are paying more for mental health services and tutoring than in past years, meaning there is less money to help meet other needs.
The state legislature in Idaho has approved the "Coronavirus Pause Act." The governor is expected to sign the act into law. Under the new law, businesses cannot turn away unvaccinated people. Vaccines cannot be required for employment unless required by federal law; think healthcare here. Local entities including school districts cannot impose vaccination mandates.
Finally, we should not be distracted by other diseases not yet contained. Five southeastern African countries are beginning a polio vaccination campaign in reaction to an outbreak's having been declared in Malawi last month. Polio is now endemic in only two countries--Pakistan and Afghanistan. We do not want it to spread any further.
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