See here. According to a chart at the link, 41% of Democrats think that one’s chances of having to go to the hospital if you have the virus are at least 50%, while two-thirds of Democrats think your chances are at least 20%. The actual figure is between 1% and 5%. These are the people who are driving the continuing lockdowns. Republicans were better, but there were still way too many who were overestimating.
I remember how hysterical people got a few months ago when they would say that there was another case in their area. I’d ask them for specifics: what symptoms do they have and are they in the hospital? At this point, they’d calm down a bit and say somewhat sheepishly that all they know was that someone had tested positive. I’d be unimpressed. Then there was the woman last summer who kept talking about all the cases in our county, which were surely going to lead to lots of deaths. “Maybe it will, and maybe it won’t,” I said. “We’ll see.” Ultimately, it did not lead to lots of deaths. And there is a person I know in Chicago who kept talking about how deadly children could be as carriers of the disease, though that has been discredited (as I mentioned a few days ago).
Recently, two people urged me to get vaccinated, one on the left and one on the right. The person on the left talked about how deadly the disease is, while the person on the right talked about how it will make it easier to travel in the future.
I have to wonder how historians a century from now will write about this episode, assuming there are still some sane ones left at that point.
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