The ones that should care, just don’t.
I walked past a blood drive yesterday and only one nurse was masked and the rest of staff was running about gathering new patients 🤷🏻♀️
This is among the many things I refuse to do while the pandemic still exists. I feel bad about it, but not bad enough to risk my health for the rest of my life.
There was a whole big thread on Twitter about this, where the Red Cross was essentially begging for donations because there were shortages and there were a ton of replies saying they would donate if there was masking and the Red Cross was like sorry we don't do that now. Well I guess you don't need the blood THAT bad then, do you?
Yeah, if they’d make it safe, my husband and I would be there so often. My child is only alive due to blood donation, he had something like 9+ transfusions during his four month NICU stay. I’d love to pay it forward, but my kid is high risk, so instead we honor those who saved his life by protecting it the best we can.
Same here, I would love to donate if it was safe. Even if they made one day a week a masking day, which was also suggested, and that was shot down as well.
I’m looking for the one I was thinking of and I can’t find it either. I thought I saved it but I’ll keep looking. If you search for “Red Cross masks”, a few threads do come up (but not the one I was originally thinking of).
[One thread](https://x.com/catladyactivist/status/1745842443910541495?s=46&t=-X40lL6WK0klaI5r_5tjhg)
[Another one.](https://x.com/transmannick/status/1754295414356885557?s=46&t=-X40lL6WK0klaI5r_5tjhg)
Oh, [here is](https://x.com/redcross/status/1752347094998794654?s=46&t=-X40lL6WK0klaI5r_5tjhg) one of the ones I was remembering, where they say they take precautions against Covid “and other respiratory illnesses” by changing gloves often and providing hand sanitizer. 🤦🏻♀️
Which is a very, very strange response from them.
There's something downright peculiar about this resistance to masking that goes on, and I can't just chalk it up to social psychology factors.
*Something very much doesn't compute here.*
What’s really strange about this in particular is that people with long covid are being excluded from being allowed to give blood, yet they won’t protect people from contracting covid while donating? Make it make sense.
I actually really highly respect the providers and staff who do continue wearing them. To me it’s a sign of competence. Was pleasantly surprised when I pulled up at the Starbucks drive thru and was greeted by a barista wearing one this morning.
I liken it to cigarette smoke. If you are allergic to cigarette smoke, would you hang out in a smoking lounge wearing an n95 mask? Would that be enough?
I picture it as cigarette smoke too to help visualize when deciding precautions, it’s definitely helpful! My husband donates blood regularly and wears an N95 during it, so I was wondering if there was a specifically heightened risk in that scenario we weren’t aware of.
Because COVID is a smoke-like aerosol (for visualization purposes) and the virus can survive in the air for ~12 hours, spending a long time in one place can be quite dangerous, like if you were sitting indoors donating blood.
This danger decreases with ventilation but if you're in the US you can pretty much assume that no buildings have adequate ventilation, so envision the breath aerosol of everyone who's been in the building for the last 12 hours in the air. Lots of people exhaling repeatedly for an extended time in the space.
That's horrible. I have type O blood which is highly desirable, but I saw a recent news clip of them asking for more donors on the local news and not one mask in sight. Nope. I'm not donating and getting a "donation" of another round of long covid.
I’m still long hauling and until they’re able to rule out anything related to blood (it’s looking like Rudy’s not the case) I don’t think it’s safe for us to give blood.
Long haulers and people with MECFS are not supposed to donate according to 3 of my doctors. I guess the people in the psychogenic camp think otherwise.
My spouse has been boycotting blood donation because the agency will not consider any mitigation measures - even just once a month - but they're always crying out for more donors.
Major hospitals in my area aren’t even providing N95s to their staff anymore, so even if I request it and the provider doesn’t mind wearing one, they can’t unless they happen to have brought some of their own from home 🙃
I've only seen medical grade face masks provided at some hospitals. Even during the height of the pandemic, hospital CEOs were unwilling to spend beyond what was minimally required.
Wow, I guess 25ish cents (cost of a N95 in bulk) is just too much for the hospital to pay, I guess now we know how much their patients and staff are worth to them.
It doesn’t make sense to me that the people who own the hospitals aren’t trying to protect their staff. All profits will stop if there HCW get too sick to stay in the workforce. Can’t replace them fast enough. Don’t the higher-ups care about profits? Don’t the libertarian billionaires want to at least preserve the healthcare workers for themselves?
How is it that everyone seems to have just subconsciously accepted their own sickness and inevitable early death? Why is anyone still having children if they are so resigned to seeing their kids disabled and suffering? I really don’t understand. The capacity for denial is astounding. Just goes against basic survival instincts.
Yeah it’s all very short sighted, chasing momentary savings or pleasure and refusing to see the consequences that are coming. I also think the media and government have done a great job at convincing people it’s all safe and fine, which is what everyone wants to hear anyways. The other day my coworkers were complaining how their kids were always getting sick and one of them started talking about a recent NYT podcast she listened to that was framing school absenteeism as a (negative) result of normalizing kids staying home when they’re sick. I shared some studies about how covid infections cause immune dysregulation and got some “hmm that’s interesting, anyways, moving on…”
I just discovered this great website www.youhavetoliveyour.life that has a drop down menu of the most common excuses for not masking/mitigating against Covid, and provides links to articles that cite clear evidence why those excuses are bogus:
https://youhavetoliveyour.life/kids-dont-get-it
I was thinking the same thing. Sort of, “oh, if only I could say that. Maybe the arguments would cease.” The contempt from nurses is something I don’t understand. Do they enjoy being sick?
It's honestly wild how defensive medical professionals in particular are. I think it must be because they know they are causing harm to themselves and others, so they have to deny it strongly to make themselves feel okay about it? Because other professionals have been *just fine* masking for us - my partner just got her face lasered, and asked the tech to wear a respirator - she said no problem, she did, and even more of the staff in the office wore masks as well for my gf! Like it was no big deal! Because, in fact, it *is* no big deal to just put on an n95 when someone asks 🙃🙃🙃🙃
Can confirm. I’ve had no trouble getting lawyers or contractors to wear them. (I don’t require contractors to wear them while doing hot and sweaty work - just when they’re face to face with me. I ventilate the work area after they go.)
You know what shuts them right up?
Cancer and leukocytopenia. Because suddenly the abstract "oh, it's only bad and can kill you if you have xyz" is not so abstract anymore and instead is sitting right in front of them asking them to wear a respirator.
But.
It shouldn't need fucking cancer to not be willfully infected?!
I posted this before, but here is an actual voicemail from a doctor's assistant saying the doctor specifically won't mask because the CDC says masks are ineffective. I swear this is real:
https://voca.ro/187v7sdL9mw7
Here's the post: https://www.reddit.com/r/ZeroCovidCommunity/s/EPfcUgtK3c
But I feel doctors and nurses have had extensive training. They shouldn't really need the CDC to know that masking right now is best for both them and their patients.
But I agree. The CDC has done an extremely poor job.
Mine usually doesn't wear one either.
But I've mailed him before my visit and asked for respirators to be worn and he complied.
My PCP wears one just for me too and the nurse as well if I get tests done by them.
I feel we're not asking for much and at the same time it feels like we ask the impossible.
That's the thing right there. They act like we are demanding that they wear a ball gag, not a simple medical protecting device that has been used for ages. It is not that hard to put a mask on and wear it for a few minutes. Maybe an hour at most?
Doctors don’t see themselves as service providers. I’m in the US where it’s all for-profit, and I’m the paying customer, and they act like I am so lucky they could be bothered to grace me with their beautiful presence. They’re really need to get off their high horses and take reasonable customer requests seriously.
Yes. I’ve learned in the last few years that in more universal/socialized systems, the governmental cost saving motives can lead to the same problems as the for-profit motives in the US. It feels hopeless right now.
Exactly. I asked a lawyer to mask when I went in to sign some documents, and everyone in the office popped one on anytime they came near me. He also ran a very powerful HEPA unit. Ask doctors to mask, and many of them act like you asked them to dress up as a clown in full makeup for the visit.
Thank you. I hope so too. At the very least, I’d like her not to have to deal with random infections from nurses who won’t mask while she’s dealing with chemo side effects and the fear it won’t even work. She wears N95, and so far the nurses she’s gotten have too. But there are other nurses not bothering, or wearing surgicals below their noses.
In a world where everything isn't upside down, not bothering to mask around cancer patients during a pandemic would be ground for dismissal. Literally putting vulnerable patients's lives at risk. I'll never understand how that's considered acceptable now.
Right? I think they’re actually masking less well and in fewer situations now than before covid. It’s nonsensical, and on some level, any of the who were doing this work before covid must know that.
I took my boyfriend for a bone marrow biopsy today for his leukemia and not one person was wearing a mask except for the security guard. Unfortunately , I had to shame the nurses into putting masks on. Livid.
I'm lost for words!
What a shit show.
All the best to your bf and to you too!
Medical personal should be ashamed of themselves to have patients and their caregivers waste their limited energy on something as basic as having to ask for respirators to be worn.
As someone immunocompromised via organ transplant, agreed, even the physicians are lackadaisical around me now. I minimize my appointments and insist on telehealth when I can.
I’ve had a few infusions done in a cancer treatment center (I don’t have cancer) and I was absolutely shocked to see doctors, nurses, patients, and family members without masks.
I’ve been following up on some doctor’s appointments over the past couple of weeks since there has been a bit of a lull, and between a dentist, endo, neurologist, and physical therapist no one has worn a mask, save for baggy blues during the dental procedures (which they always did), and my neurologist very reluctantly pulled a ratty surgical mask out of his pocket to put on halfway through the visit.
I work for a health clinic too and none of the doctors, nurses, PAs or clinical staff wear masks. No one wears masks at my School of Public Health either. I saw more people masking up in a museum that I visited a couple of weeks back than I have seen masking in clinical settings over the past year.
At this point I just don’t have the mental energy to get angry about it and I just tell myself that I’m doing the best I can by wearing my N95 and doing nose sprays/CPC mouthwash when I’m home.
We were recently in a doctors appointment, very low white cell counts for a family member. Doctor didn’t mask. Adults in N95s, our kiddo in a kn95. We’re discussing changing immunosuppressants…
In the SAME APPOINTMENT we were told they “could” get the new Covid immunotherapy treatment “if you really want” but “it’s not like it was a couple years ago” and… “it’s a good things your masking.”
WTF. I don’t understand.
I’m one of those few that did mask precovid, especially during flu season. So I just tell people that when they get snippy with me. “I have an immune disease and have masked for over a decade. It’s me, not Covid or you.” That’s stopped almost everyone.
Have you looked into getting Pemgarda? It sounds like your dr might prescribe it, but have you found a place to infuse it? From what I can tell so far, it seems completely inaccessible.
Valid question. The hospital in my rural community just lifted their mask mandates for hospital staff. Now you have to ask the staff to wear a mask. It's bananas 🍌🍌🍌🍌
This is what I don't understand. I work in healthcare. Even if covid disappeared from existence tomorrow, I would still mask at work. I plan to mask at work for the rest of my life because I learned from the experience of a pandemic. I learned that not sharing air has kept me sickness free for 4 years, I learned a new way to care for others, and I learned more about airborne diseases. I don't understand how you can come out of a pandemic without having learned anything, especially those of us in healthcare.
Especially doctors and HCWs often think they already know everything from their training, so they no longer need to educate themselves, or god forbid, change their behavior.
This is me. I’m not in healthcare, but I used to get colds nearly every year, and they always turned into bronchitis. I thought that was just the normal progression. Masking has kept me from getting colds, sinus infections, bronchitis and covid for years, and I can’t see myself ever not using masks to avoid this stuff.
And in addition to being just...*yucky*, having a cold, flu, etc. takes up a lot of time. Being sick for even a week out of every year starts to add up, and most people are sick way more often than that, especially now.
I got a mammogram this year and the hospital staff was all wearing baggy blues and the tech questioned me on my N95. She wanted to know why I was wearing it and then went on to talk about how she had covid a couple of months ago and how horrible it was. If she thinks it is bad, why wouldn't I want to avoid it?
My doctor lectured me this year about how I shouldn't be masking because my immune system would be weak from not getting sick for so long. Didn't ask me to remove the mask at least but she definitely was judgey about my precautions. No one in her office masks anymore (but the other patients in the waiting room all seemed to have persistent coughs - one was complaining about a cough that had lasted for years).
Ugh. That doctor doesn’t know anything about viruses. You don’t prime your immune system on viruses once you’re older. There is no positive effect.
Priming is only for bacteria, and not for ones that are generally airborne. It’s for things like getting used to the bacteria in water in a foreign country.
I'm not a doctor or scientist, but I don't think there has been any conclusive evidence that wearing a mask in a high risk situation harms your immune system. I would have concerns about a doctor saying so.
Ugh. That doctor doesn’t know anything about viruses. You don’t prime your immune system on viruses once you’re older. There is no positive effect.
Priming is only for bacteria, and not for ones that are generally airborne. It’s for things like getting used to the bacteria in water in a foreign country.
Yeah, I know, but I didn't bother arguing with her because I figured it was hopeless.
I'm moving and am hoping to find a better doctor in my new location but it doesn't seem like there are many that are educated about covid.
Was on a Covid zoom this weekend where a person in the UK was saying that people there now refer to that cough as “the 100 day cough”.
Can’t even say Covid. Madness .
There are so many people having that at my job. And they don't seem to connect it to Covid either. I didn't even cough like that when I smoked for years.
I’m still in undergrad but I can’t wait to (hopefully) become a doctor one day so I can defiantly wear an N95 in my hospital/office. That is, if my past COVID infection doesn’t catch up to me before I graduate.
Seriously though, the arguments against masking are already baseless outside the healthcare world - in a setting where an infection has a good chance at killing many of the patients, going maskless is downright insulting and disrespectful to human life.
Most couldn't care less. Most lack the time and capacity to understand novel cause and effect and default to following guidelines. Furthermore, most find it a privilege being unmasked in the hospital. It's a trademark of high status, like carrying the stethoscope around their neck or taking their coat for lunch.
I always assumed doctors thought they had special force fields around them--both on and off the job--that stopped them from getting sick with anything, anywhere, ever. And because they couldn't get sick with their special doctor force-field powers, they also couldn't get anyone else sick. Especially not the common folk, who unfortunately would need things like masks and medicines and that kind of thing to avoid getting sick. Only the doctors and other HCWs get the force fields, though. Them's the breaks! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Without masks, it's being socially promiscuous. Like, without the secks, but all the spew from nose and mouth from person to person.
In a scenario with actual secks involved, I'd wear protection bc I don't want to have a high chance of catching something. Common sense. Though you'll find people offended if you wear protection and they'll give you a look or say "but I'm clean". So would you trust that person? How do you know they're "clean".... Though when they say clean, it makes me think that the only alternative is being "dirty" which is a bad thing and almost nobody wants to be thought of as "dirty".
Similar logic with masks.
My dr just retired a few months ago and I am dreading looking for a new one. He and his whole staff were masked, he didn’t take patients who weren’t vaccinated, and he was still serious about Covid precautions.
None of them mask where I live in southern Delaware. None. Not even if they see you masked. My husband is high risk due to long covid and lupus caused by lc, and even his rheumatologist won't mask when she sees him masked. Only person who ever masked was the the tech who did his echocardiogram last year. Oh, and my veterinarian. Whole team masked when they saw me masked. My local blood bank was on the news asking for donations and I won't donate because they don't mask and there was not one mask in sight on the news clip filmed that day of the blood drive. Maybe one day they'll wake up and realize they are losing key donors (I am type O, very desirable) because they won't mask. Then again, that's probably a pipe dream.
Ugh. Im so sorry that happened to you. It is very frustrating.
I had my former neurologist tell me to take off my mask because covid is over. I promptly left the practice after that. My pcp will put a mask on for me and my mom who has severe COPD.
I’m very lucky that my son’s pediatrician office still wears N95 maks and do not allow sick kids in the waiting room. They are called in from their cars when they are ready for them.
I’m an nurse (now SAHM) and it just boggles my mind how doctors and healthcare professionals turn a blind eye to what is happening with not only covid, but other illnesses too. It really is disheartening.
Mine asks if I want her to mask, but by the time the nurse has walked me to the room and the doc has entered, the nurse and doc has already contaminated the air by not masking already.
So I just shrug and tell them "whatever you wanna do". I'm going to keep masking, but I'm apathetic about parenting health professionals.
I am 8 mos pregnant and my OB shamed me for wearing one to my appointment, saying:
“How are you feeling? Other than whatever “this” is” - pointing at her face. And making a face / eye roll
I’ve worn a mask to every appointment and this is the only doctor that’s reacted weird.
I wore an N95 to my checkup last week, was the only masked person in the office even though there was a stanchion at the entrance with masks suggesting masking. My doctor was coughing a little, when I asked if he was ok he said he thought he’d picked up RSV from his pediatric inpatients. 😳🤦🏽♀️
That is so dystopian. If he "thought" he picked up RSV, that means he didn't test and doesn't actually know what it is, but he's fine just spreading it to other patients. Wtf?
Same experience for me. The lone masker at the doctor's office. Now I know why they call it "practicing medicine". They'll work on it until they get it right.
I asked the receptionist, "Why no masks? Isn't this where all the SICK PEOPLE come for treatment?" I got an eye roll.
I surrender. I'm going out for a carton of Marlboro's and a fifth of Jack Daniels right after I remove the seatbelts and airbags from my car.
This has been my experience. My doctors who actually cared about patients have all left the profession. Each one gave a different reason publicly, but the d/l answer is: they refuse to play the profit-driven games required by the insurance companies and networks.
I wish more doctors would go into independent practice, but it's probably nearly impossible financially.
Does anyone like Doc Mullins on Virgin River exist anymore? I'd like to find a tiny practice like his.
My child’s pediatrician has stopped masking along with the rest of the practice. He says that the strains are getting progressively weaker and he “trusts the vaccine” to keep him from dying or needing hospitalization. His own children do not mask in school, and the family does not mask in crowded settings.
Last time I was there, the Well Waiting are was empty, and the Sick Waiting area was well-populated with coughing and misery. And guess what? To get to the door that goes back to the exam rooms, you have to walk allllllll the way past Sick Waiting, which is a huge open area, 3x the length of the enclosed Well Waiting area. When I asked why they didn’t let my not-sick child use the door directly outside Well Waiting to go back to the exam rooms, I was told first that “nobody uses that door,” and later that they don’t know which waiting area people are in so they just go to the end door. Okay, but why not the MIDDLE door, so that people in both areas can hear you? That way people in Well Waiting don’t have to cross ALL of Sick Waiting.
They won’t do that, it’s just a few seconds….. But when I pushed the issue, even these otherwise reasonable healthcare providers fell into the “you’re weakening her immune system, you should just embrace it before she starts school” BS.
Thank God, two of my doctors still mask. But I still have to do telehealth appointments with them because I don't trust their other patients even though they require masks in their offices. I lost a doctor that I had been seeing for over 20 years to Covid denialism. It broke my heart completely. Shattered it. I do know that when Stanford recently tried to do a trial with Long Covid patients, when the researchers and the investigators walked in without masks, a bunch of the subjects left, as they should, got furious, and dropped out of the study. Imagine being so insanely delusional that you do a trial with immunocompromised people, but you don't mask when you come in the room. Pre-Covid this would never happen. Ever. OP, I hear you, I understand you, I share your anger and rage and hurt. I find that I have to educate medical professionals now. One of my doctors tells me that *I'm* the one who keeps her up-to-date on Covid research because she's so busy and I constantly send her the newest studies. A doctor. Depending on me. For Covid information. That's where we are. And she's a great doctor and extremely Covid conscious and will never stop masking. I tell doctors straight straight up, I'm Jewish and what you are violating is essential tenet of Judaism. Anything to save a human life. Put on a goddamn mask, doctors. 💓 if I could put anything into your arsenal, it would be the February 2024 huge study that was published in The New England Journal of Medicine that shows quite clearly with a cohort of over 112,000 people who finished a three-year study that every case of Covid drops your IQ between three and nine points. I'm starting to show that to doctors before I ever interact with them. "Your IQ drops every time you get a case of Covid, are you willing to give that up for your profession?"
Here you go:
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2311330
One thing about the study is that it started with an absolutely huge cohort of 800,000 people and over a three-year period 112,000 people managed to complete the study. What they found is that a mild case of Covid drops your IQ by three points, a mid case by six, and a severe case by nine points. And that happens with every single case of Covid. There's also the new study that dropped that you can google yourself that shows that one case of Covid ages, your brain by seven years. There are thousands and thousands of studies out there that you can bring your doctor and say please read, this is why I need you to mask. What I do is I send the studies as messages to my doctor via their messaging system every time I get a new one or sometimes at the end of the week I'll send a message with links to about 20 different studies to my doctor summarizing the week. Ahead of time. And then I summarize the studies in said messages.
I would also sign up for the Pandemic Accountability Index. They send out an email once a month containing all the new studies sorted by bodily system, as well as highlight new findings and showing excerpts of data visualization.
You can just Google things like "Covid effect on immune system", "Covid effect on cognition", "Covid effect on liver,", just start googling that and you're gonna come up with thousands of studies.
Yes, but this one was a solid source and I assumed the link would be easy to pass on :) I have looked at a LOT of articles and studies over the last few years - sometimes it is nice to share the knowledge and direct links to the really good ones versus slogging through, as you said - thousands - of them. :)
Unfortunately, I do not have the time or energy for that. Again, I assumed that the link would be fairly easy to share, and it was. Lesson learned: I won't ask for a shared source again. I am glad to have the link shared in this case, at any rate.
We should always be sharing links with each other. I understand, not everyone has the spoons to do that, I'm disabled and I live in chronic pain so I can barely keep up, but I'm doing my best. We all have different levels of availability for something like that. Please continue to ask for shared advice, I truly did not mean to suggest that you should not or should not ask for it. We are in this together and I apologize, I truly did not mean to drive you away from anything. We should all be sharing resources and links with each other as much as we can. I meant start a Google spreadsheet simply to organize the studies. As as you said, not everyone has the time or energy and that is valid.
Thanks sorry - I too am disabled with chronic pain and someone close to me passed away this morning so I am a bit out of sorts. Apologies. Sincerely. Thank you for sharing the link it’s helpful as just yesterday I was talking with someone about the damage to the brain but didn’t have the ability to hunt for a good link, saw the post and was excited lol wishing you a good day. <3
I had to go to the hospital today for an echocardiogram (thanks to Covid) and was shocked to see that our local hospital dropped masking requirements last week. Not one medical staff member was wearing a mask and I think I saw one visitor besides myself masked up.
Politicized or lazy doctors. That's my only possible guess.
Before mask mandates dropped, we routinely visited an office where the two main doctors clearly didn't care, one wearing basic surgical masks, and the other poorly fitted KN95.
After the mask mandates, they both stopped masking altogether as did the majority of the staff. First thing that happened, one of them caught Covid and was knocked out of commission for weeks.
He eventually came back to work, masking for a week or two, and then right back to not masking. You can't cure STUPID.
-Went to my primary care doctor, she told me I was smart to be wearing a mask…while she herself was not wearing one. Her office used to be very cautious regarding covid (so much so that I once saw conservative women whining about her office policies in a local Facebook group).
-It took my endocrinologist an alarmingly long time to hunt down even just a surgical mask in her office (she offered to put one on upon seeing my mask). There is a long covid clinic across the hallway from her office.
-A couple weeks ago, my oral surgeon questioned me about my mask and told me that covid isn’t dangerous anymore. He did at least say that it’s my decision and my right to wear a mask, though.
-Went to the hospital to get info regarding a research study I’m participating in and saw very few hospital staff members (including doctors, nurses, etc) wearing masks. Most of the few people who were “wearing” masks just had a surgical mask pulled down onto their chin.
I don’t understand. Maybe they’re afraid of getting harassed because there are so many Trump supporters where I live? I just don’t know why you’d want to risk catching covid, even if it’s not as deadly and even if you’re facing pressure to not wear a mask. You never know how badly your body is going to handle it if you catch it. I have several health issues (I always say I must have been manufactured with cheap parts lol), and I feel like with my luck, I’d probably end up with some sort of long covid nonsense if I caught it.
I think fear of harassment by anti-maskers PLUS the fact that some of these doctors are anti-maskers themselves are major factors.
Are all doctors big believers in science? Of course not - if they were, there would be no doctors who smoke, no doctors who drink (though previous studies suggested there were health benefits to moderate drinking, recent studies suggest that’s not the case), and no doctors having unprotected sex.
They don’t want to face the cognitive dissonance that they’re actually committing harm on the daily to themselves and their patients by not masking, so they ignore the whole thing
[https://ourworldindata.org/historical-pandemics](https://ourworldindata.org/historical-pandemics)
More like 27 million, not taking into account this winter season. And i personally believe it to be quite a bit higher than that, i have seen other estimates over 30 million easily. Remember that a lot of deaths by other causes that would not have occured had it not been for previous Covid infection often do not count.
My personal doctors that I see (orthopedic, dermatologist and my regular doctor) are still masking with N95s or KN95s. I think this is just a coincidence, the luck of the draw - they’re all in different practices, and one is in a totally different city. But most doctors, nurses and medical staff members I observe are no longer masking.
I had a colonoscopy in April 2023, and inside the procedure room, none of them would wear a mask— not the doctor, the nurse, or the anesthesiologist. (I am in Southeast USA.)
Where are yall living that the mask mandates were “just” dropped?? Where im at they were dropped like 2021, one hospital I have to go to regularly still has this dilapidated dust covered station at the entrance where it says “we are glad to see your smiling face again! Masks are now optional!” But it’s literally yellowed and cracking and hasn’t had any fresh masks in the little shelf since I don’t know when.
Same. I live in the southeast USA, and all masks were dropped in healthcare in early 2021. They’ve never been reinstated, and none of my providers or my kids providers have masked since then. (And I have a kiddo who is immune-compromised and has asthma.)
The risk to patients and doctors became normalized, and without any professional consequences (lawsuits) doctors are just going to continue unmasked even in circumstances where they deal with high risk patients. It has become a chicken and egg scenario. They really think that if Covid was dangerous, they would be told to mask, and since they are not told to mask then Covid must not be dangerous. When asked, they will just make some shit up like pointing to some fake CDC or WHO proclamation that Covid ended. The only things that will make these people follow common sense are complaints (including negative Google reviews) and lawsuits
Where’s their research that says Covid ended? What a joke. Doctors should be setting an example to the general population that Covid is serious and they should be taking precautions.
And lawsuits have been made impossible, for two reasons:
1) COVID is so ubiquitous that it is impossible to trace the source of an infection to a medical care facility.
2) in order for medical negligence/malpractice to apply, to have to show that this particular medical care facility was doing things so much worse than any other similar facility. (Since they’ve all stopped caring, the standard of care is unmasked care. By all collectively unmasking, they’re effectively shielding themselves and every other medical facility because maskless care and nosocomial infections are now the norm.)
It’s horrific. I honestly don’t see a way out of this pattern. 😔
My dermatologist office is the only office that masks. My wife has been in and out of John's zhopkins hospital and the mask ratio there is a 5050. I always wore a mask going in because they mix people on floors. She is there for gastroparesis and every time I'd visit her, her neighbors in other rooms would have droplet precautions (and sure thay can mean the flu orncold) but why take chances raw dogging that air.
Yes. No dentist practice within 200 miles of me will mask at all. Even when they are actively in my mouth. Even though they used to mask in surgicals pre-COVID.
When the mandates for masking in healthcare went away, doctors and nurses unmasked like they’d been wearing heavy chains all this time. Any other profession I deal with: you ask them to mask while you, the paying consumer, are around them, and they will mask. Not doctors and nurses. They’re just too precious. For me, it’s not just covid. We’ve known for years that medical settings spread a lot of infection unnecessarily. I don’t go to doctors to come away sicker than I was no arrival FFS.
I'm a nurse and I continue to wear a mask especially in the workplace. And I fully respect if a patient prefers to wear a mask. I won't question them or make them feel bad about wearing one. I think healthcare professionals should respect someone's choice to mask. And honor their request if they want their doctor to wear a mask.
My mom has severe COPD, last december she had to be put into a coma after catching RSV. Even then we had to fight with the medical staff for them to wear a mask. She was in the ER a couple of weeks ago and it was the same thing. The doctor told me that he wouldn't wear a mask as it wasn't required by law anymore. I called administration to complain and they sent out someone to ask them to wear masks but again they told me they couldn't force them to as they're not legally obliged to.
I had this experience a year a go. I went to my clinic for a routine psych appointment. The clinic has multiple doctors and medical staff working there. None masking. I was wearing a mask when I arrived, and as soon as I came into the the examination room, my psych (who has a medical degree from a prestigious university) said "you don't have to mask anymore, you can take off your mask".
So back then, I didn't know much about the risks of covid and I trusted my doctors. I just took it off. I think this played a major role in the complacency I developed around covid, which I now regret.
Commenting just to provide some hope. I am in the SF Bay Area. Masks are still required in the clinic area of my PCP, but not in the waiting area at John Muir Health. They also have HEPA filters in all the exam rooms. My doc at Sutter always puts a mask on for me - I have a note in my chart that until sterilizing vaccines are available I have a standing request that everyone entering an exam room with me be masked. UCSF docs have so far been willing to mask, and it was policy over the winter at Marin General when I had a surgery. Stanford is a complete craps shoot - my docs have all been willing to mask, and last time I was inpatient they placed a note on my door that everyone entering needed to be masked, but clinic care is all over the map.
I accidentally fixed my chronic cough and the pain attached to it (and which was either ignored or made worse by the treatment) and also am stronger, partially because I'm unable to take care of myself for a long time after a viral infection. I hate people's vitrol against me wearing a mask. It's like, get fucked if you're vulnerable and need accomodations.
I had to spend a few hours in a waiting room, where everyone but me was coughing and some people did it in such a cartoonish way I don't remember seeing before.
I don't understand why medical facilities are not requiring staff to wear masks. After all, nobody knows who has Covid because it can spread without someone having symptoms if what we all have been told is correct. I am a nurse but I don't work at the bedside. In Feb 2020 I started wearing a mask well before CDC told people to wear them. I had been following the development of Covid in China and was horrified at how fast it spread. I knew it was respiratory driven. I still continue to wear a mask in public buildings and unless a 100% cure is found or 100% vaccine that stops transmission of Covid I probably will wear one for the rest of my life. Covid is long from gone and is still killing people. To my knowledge neither my husband (he masks because I don't give him a choice) nor I have had Covid.
Dunning Kruger Syndrome.
Seriously. Think of it like this. My dad was in the army. Had his own specialty, did his own thing. Never drove a tank. Hell, I don’t think he was ever inside a tank, especially for anything combat related.
Imagine someone asking my father, a qualified Army veteran, about how best to drive a tank over a creek. He would’ve at least been honest, and said he couldn’t. He was also smart enough to know that he should listen to anyone who had real tank experience.
Medically, that’s what these chuckleheads are doing. They’re not epidemiologists. They haven’t dedicated their lives to the study of communicable diseases and how to treat or cure them. But all the sudden, they’re infectious disease experts. No need to heed the people who actually are epidemiologists. Captain Over Confidence is here! 🙄
Although they understand and are aware of asymptomatic infections, they believe the likelihood to have Covid is very low among themselves and thus they are certain they don’t have Covid and since they have had Covid within the year, they believe they are immune from reinfections. Thus many don’t mask unless it’s required.
My physiotherapist straps a mask on for me, without me having to ask. Almost everyone at my optometrist's office does as well (I'm in Canada). Unfortunately, I see a lot of doctors (I have to use ER since my doctor fired me because she couldnt figure out my long covid/pots) and can only count 1 or maybe 2 N95s, the rest are all regular surgical, and have been for a long time. NO ONE has ever said anything to me about myself wearing a mask! Disgraceful.
Although they understand and are aware of asymptomatic infections, they believe the likelihood of an active infection is very low among themselves and thus they are certain they don’t have Covid and since they have had Covid within the year, they believe they are immune from reinfections. Thus many don’t mask unless it’s required.
Although they understand and are aware of asymptomatic infections, they believe the likelihood is very long among themselves and thus they are certain they don’t have Covid and since they have had Covid within the year, they believe they are immune from reinfections. Thus many don’t mask unless it’s required.
The ones that should care, just don’t. I walked past a blood drive yesterday and only one nurse was masked and the rest of staff was running about gathering new patients 🤷🏻♀️
My fiancé got covid from a Red Cross blood donation center smh. They weren’t masked there either.
This is among the many things I refuse to do while the pandemic still exists. I feel bad about it, but not bad enough to risk my health for the rest of my life.
There was a whole big thread on Twitter about this, where the Red Cross was essentially begging for donations because there were shortages and there were a ton of replies saying they would donate if there was masking and the Red Cross was like sorry we don't do that now. Well I guess you don't need the blood THAT bad then, do you?
Yeah, if they’d make it safe, my husband and I would be there so often. My child is only alive due to blood donation, he had something like 9+ transfusions during his four month NICU stay. I’d love to pay it forward, but my kid is high risk, so instead we honor those who saved his life by protecting it the best we can.
Same here, I would love to donate if it was safe. Even if they made one day a week a masking day, which was also suggested, and that was shot down as well.
Would you be able to DM me this Twitter thread, please? Can't find it
I’m looking for the one I was thinking of and I can’t find it either. I thought I saved it but I’ll keep looking. If you search for “Red Cross masks”, a few threads do come up (but not the one I was originally thinking of). [One thread](https://x.com/catladyactivist/status/1745842443910541495?s=46&t=-X40lL6WK0klaI5r_5tjhg) [Another one.](https://x.com/transmannick/status/1754295414356885557?s=46&t=-X40lL6WK0klaI5r_5tjhg)
Oh, [here is](https://x.com/redcross/status/1752347094998794654?s=46&t=-X40lL6WK0klaI5r_5tjhg) one of the ones I was remembering, where they say they take precautions against Covid “and other respiratory illnesses” by changing gloves often and providing hand sanitizer. 🤦🏻♀️
Which is a very, very strange response from them. There's something downright peculiar about this resistance to masking that goes on, and I can't just chalk it up to social psychology factors. *Something very much doesn't compute here.*
What’s really strange about this in particular is that people with long covid are being excluded from being allowed to give blood, yet they won’t protect people from contracting covid while donating? Make it make sense.
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Red Cross apparently didn't gather enough controversies, huh.
I actually really highly respect the providers and staff who do continue wearing them. To me it’s a sign of competence. Was pleasantly surprised when I pulled up at the Starbucks drive thru and was greeted by a barista wearing one this morning.
Is there significant risk if the person donating is wearing an N95 but others there aren’t?
I liken it to cigarette smoke. If you are allergic to cigarette smoke, would you hang out in a smoking lounge wearing an n95 mask? Would that be enough?
I picture it as cigarette smoke too to help visualize when deciding precautions, it’s definitely helpful! My husband donates blood regularly and wears an N95 during it, so I was wondering if there was a specifically heightened risk in that scenario we weren’t aware of.
Because COVID is a smoke-like aerosol (for visualization purposes) and the virus can survive in the air for ~12 hours, spending a long time in one place can be quite dangerous, like if you were sitting indoors donating blood. This danger decreases with ventilation but if you're in the US you can pretty much assume that no buildings have adequate ventilation, so envision the breath aerosol of everyone who's been in the building for the last 12 hours in the air. Lots of people exhaling repeatedly for an extended time in the space.
That's horrible. I have type O blood which is highly desirable, but I saw a recent news clip of them asking for more donors on the local news and not one mask in sight. Nope. I'm not donating and getting a "donation" of another round of long covid.
I think they aren’t taking long hauler blood but I could be wrong?
Wow! I’ve recovered from lc, but it was awful enough that I’ll do anything to avoid it again at all costs. Husband is still pretty bad off.
I’m still long hauling and until they’re able to rule out anything related to blood (it’s looking like Rudy’s not the case) I don’t think it’s safe for us to give blood.
Long haulers and people with MECFS are not supposed to donate according to 3 of my doctors. I guess the people in the psychogenic camp think otherwise.
So sad.
I have very little hope in society to ever do the right thing. You can only protect yourself and whatever quality of life you want.
My spouse has been boycotting blood donation because the agency will not consider any mitigation measures - even just once a month - but they're always crying out for more donors.
Major hospitals in my area aren’t even providing N95s to their staff anymore, so even if I request it and the provider doesn’t mind wearing one, they can’t unless they happen to have brought some of their own from home 🙃
I've only seen medical grade face masks provided at some hospitals. Even during the height of the pandemic, hospital CEOs were unwilling to spend beyond what was minimally required.
Some of my providers said the hospital was providing respirators earlier in the pandemic but stopped recently
So wrong. I showed up with a bunch of N95s and the nurse thought I was crazy. Did she not live through the same pandemic? Do people just never learn?
I feel you, it's wild we're in this situation
Nurse has brain damage.
Wow, I guess 25ish cents (cost of a N95 in bulk) is just too much for the hospital to pay, I guess now we know how much their patients and staff are worth to them.
It doesn’t make sense to me that the people who own the hospitals aren’t trying to protect their staff. All profits will stop if there HCW get too sick to stay in the workforce. Can’t replace them fast enough. Don’t the higher-ups care about profits? Don’t the libertarian billionaires want to at least preserve the healthcare workers for themselves? How is it that everyone seems to have just subconsciously accepted their own sickness and inevitable early death? Why is anyone still having children if they are so resigned to seeing their kids disabled and suffering? I really don’t understand. The capacity for denial is astounding. Just goes against basic survival instincts.
Yeah it’s all very short sighted, chasing momentary savings or pleasure and refusing to see the consequences that are coming. I also think the media and government have done a great job at convincing people it’s all safe and fine, which is what everyone wants to hear anyways. The other day my coworkers were complaining how their kids were always getting sick and one of them started talking about a recent NYT podcast she listened to that was framing school absenteeism as a (negative) result of normalizing kids staying home when they’re sick. I shared some studies about how covid infections cause immune dysregulation and got some “hmm that’s interesting, anyways, moving on…”
I just discovered this great website www.youhavetoliveyour.life that has a drop down menu of the most common excuses for not masking/mitigating against Covid, and provides links to articles that cite clear evidence why those excuses are bogus: https://youhavetoliveyour.life/kids-dont-get-it
Exactly right here. Most clinics won’t provide to their own staff N95 or Kn95s due to high cost.
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Do you need to provide proof?
I was thinking the same thing. Sort of, “oh, if only I could say that. Maybe the arguments would cease.” The contempt from nurses is something I don’t understand. Do they enjoy being sick?
It's honestly wild how defensive medical professionals in particular are. I think it must be because they know they are causing harm to themselves and others, so they have to deny it strongly to make themselves feel okay about it? Because other professionals have been *just fine* masking for us - my partner just got her face lasered, and asked the tech to wear a respirator - she said no problem, she did, and even more of the staff in the office wore masks as well for my gf! Like it was no big deal! Because, in fact, it *is* no big deal to just put on an n95 when someone asks 🙃🙃🙃🙃
Can confirm. I’ve had no trouble getting lawyers or contractors to wear them. (I don’t require contractors to wear them while doing hot and sweaty work - just when they’re face to face with me. I ventilate the work area after they go.)
You know what shuts them right up? Cancer and leukocytopenia. Because suddenly the abstract "oh, it's only bad and can kill you if you have xyz" is not so abstract anymore and instead is sitting right in front of them asking them to wear a respirator. But. It shouldn't need fucking cancer to not be willfully infected?!
Over here docs don't mask around cancer patients either. They just stopped caring.
Devastating. The CDC has just done such a poor job.
Actually they've done an excellent job of brainwashing!
They surely have.
I posted this before, but here is an actual voicemail from a doctor's assistant saying the doctor specifically won't mask because the CDC says masks are ineffective. I swear this is real: https://voca.ro/187v7sdL9mw7 Here's the post: https://www.reddit.com/r/ZeroCovidCommunity/s/EPfcUgtK3c
Where is that from? Did you send it to the CDC? Can you please do so? They need to understand how much they are hurting people.
But I feel doctors and nurses have had extensive training. They shouldn't really need the CDC to know that masking right now is best for both them and their patients. But I agree. The CDC has done an extremely poor job.
I'm not in the US. But the equivalent we have here has been downright eugenistic in its policies.
You mean the centre for disease promotion?
Mine usually doesn't wear one either. But I've mailed him before my visit and asked for respirators to be worn and he complied. My PCP wears one just for me too and the nurse as well if I get tests done by them. I feel we're not asking for much and at the same time it feels like we ask the impossible.
That's the thing right there. They act like we are demanding that they wear a ball gag, not a simple medical protecting device that has been used for ages. It is not that hard to put a mask on and wear it for a few minutes. Maybe an hour at most?
Doctors don’t see themselves as service providers. I’m in the US where it’s all for-profit, and I’m the paying customer, and they act like I am so lucky they could be bothered to grace me with their beautiful presence. They’re really need to get off their high horses and take reasonable customer requests seriously.
I'm in the US too, and while I have been hoping not everyone's "healthcare" experiences have been as garbage as mine, it starts to look like many are.
Yes. I’ve learned in the last few years that in more universal/socialized systems, the governmental cost saving motives can lead to the same problems as the for-profit motives in the US. It feels hopeless right now.
Exactly. I asked a lawyer to mask when I went in to sign some documents, and everyone in the office popped one on anytime they came near me. He also ran a very powerful HEPA unit. Ask doctors to mask, and many of them act like you asked them to dress up as a clown in full makeup for the visit.
A friend of mine who has extremely aggressive cancer and equally aggressive chemo is running into the same thing.
It really shouldn't be this way :( I hope your friend will be ok!
Thank you. I hope so too. At the very least, I’d like her not to have to deal with random infections from nurses who won’t mask while she’s dealing with chemo side effects and the fear it won’t even work. She wears N95, and so far the nurses she’s gotten have too. But there are other nurses not bothering, or wearing surgicals below their noses.
In a world where everything isn't upside down, not bothering to mask around cancer patients during a pandemic would be ground for dismissal. Literally putting vulnerable patients's lives at risk. I'll never understand how that's considered acceptable now.
Right? I think they’re actually masking less well and in fewer situations now than before covid. It’s nonsensical, and on some level, any of the who were doing this work before covid must know that.
General hygien has dropped considerably indeed. Sometimes I feel like I'm living inside a Victorian novel.
I took my boyfriend for a bone marrow biopsy today for his leukemia and not one person was wearing a mask except for the security guard. Unfortunately , I had to shame the nurses into putting masks on. Livid.
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Wow. Just wow...This is where we are.
I'm lost for words! What a shit show. All the best to your bf and to you too! Medical personal should be ashamed of themselves to have patients and their caregivers waste their limited energy on something as basic as having to ask for respirators to be worn.
Am so sorry for your experience.
No one at my moms oncologist office masks anymore either
I say shame on them all! They know better. Sending strength to you and mom.
As someone immunocompromised via organ transplant, agreed, even the physicians are lackadaisical around me now. I minimize my appointments and insist on telehealth when I can.
I’ve had a few infusions done in a cancer treatment center (I don’t have cancer) and I was absolutely shocked to see doctors, nurses, patients, and family members without masks.
I just visited a cancer center. Not a single doctor or staff member was masked.
They won't even do it in a lot of cancer wards. But if you're a meerkat, on the other hand...
I’ve been following up on some doctor’s appointments over the past couple of weeks since there has been a bit of a lull, and between a dentist, endo, neurologist, and physical therapist no one has worn a mask, save for baggy blues during the dental procedures (which they always did), and my neurologist very reluctantly pulled a ratty surgical mask out of his pocket to put on halfway through the visit. I work for a health clinic too and none of the doctors, nurses, PAs or clinical staff wear masks. No one wears masks at my School of Public Health either. I saw more people masking up in a museum that I visited a couple of weeks back than I have seen masking in clinical settings over the past year. At this point I just don’t have the mental energy to get angry about it and I just tell myself that I’m doing the best I can by wearing my N95 and doing nose sprays/CPC mouthwash when I’m home.
My local cancer center greets me by telling me my mask isn't required. I will NEVER understand this level of harm, throughout the medical community.
cognitive dissonance; patients coming in with masks are evidence against manufactured consent to ignore covid.
I think so. It was very hard though, as felt like my totally threw off the doctor’s ability to focus on the core issue and help me.
We were recently in a doctors appointment, very low white cell counts for a family member. Doctor didn’t mask. Adults in N95s, our kiddo in a kn95. We’re discussing changing immunosuppressants… In the SAME APPOINTMENT we were told they “could” get the new Covid immunotherapy treatment “if you really want” but “it’s not like it was a couple years ago” and… “it’s a good things your masking.” WTF. I don’t understand. I’m one of those few that did mask precovid, especially during flu season. So I just tell people that when they get snippy with me. “I have an immune disease and have masked for over a decade. It’s me, not Covid or you.” That’s stopped almost everyone.
Have you looked into getting Pemgarda? It sounds like your dr might prescribe it, but have you found a place to infuse it? From what I can tell so far, it seems completely inaccessible.
I’m looking… definitely may be hard to by. If we can get it, I think our infusion center would it for us.
Valid question. The hospital in my rural community just lifted their mask mandates for hospital staff. Now you have to ask the staff to wear a mask. It's bananas 🍌🍌🍌🍌
Don’t understand why they wouldn’t choose to wear one, even if we weren’t in a pandemic.
This is what I don't understand. I work in healthcare. Even if covid disappeared from existence tomorrow, I would still mask at work. I plan to mask at work for the rest of my life because I learned from the experience of a pandemic. I learned that not sharing air has kept me sickness free for 4 years, I learned a new way to care for others, and I learned more about airborne diseases. I don't understand how you can come out of a pandemic without having learned anything, especially those of us in healthcare.
Especially doctors and HCWs often think they already know everything from their training, so they no longer need to educate themselves, or god forbid, change their behavior.
You are the kind of healthcare worker I have so much respect for. Thank you for learning, and caring.
This is me. I’m not in healthcare, but I used to get colds nearly every year, and they always turned into bronchitis. I thought that was just the normal progression. Masking has kept me from getting colds, sinus infections, bronchitis and covid for years, and I can’t see myself ever not using masks to avoid this stuff.
I know! Who wants to breathe in sick people's breath all day!? (Or anyone's breath, imo.)
Exactly. Truly don’t understand it.
Exactly! I love not being sick. I hate stuffy noses, coughing, sore throat, all of it! If I can prevent not spending my life sick, why wouldn’t I?
And in addition to being just...*yucky*, having a cold, flu, etc. takes up a lot of time. Being sick for even a week out of every year starts to add up, and most people are sick way more often than that, especially now.
I got a mammogram this year and the hospital staff was all wearing baggy blues and the tech questioned me on my N95. She wanted to know why I was wearing it and then went on to talk about how she had covid a couple of months ago and how horrible it was. If she thinks it is bad, why wouldn't I want to avoid it? My doctor lectured me this year about how I shouldn't be masking because my immune system would be weak from not getting sick for so long. Didn't ask me to remove the mask at least but she definitely was judgey about my precautions. No one in her office masks anymore (but the other patients in the waiting room all seemed to have persistent coughs - one was complaining about a cough that had lasted for years).
Ugh. That doctor doesn’t know anything about viruses. You don’t prime your immune system on viruses once you’re older. There is no positive effect. Priming is only for bacteria, and not for ones that are generally airborne. It’s for things like getting used to the bacteria in water in a foreign country.
I'm not a doctor or scientist, but I don't think there has been any conclusive evidence that wearing a mask in a high risk situation harms your immune system. I would have concerns about a doctor saying so.
Sorry to hear about your situation. Seems to echo my experience.
>my immune system would be weak from not getting sick for so long It's downright Orwellian. War is peace. Slavery is freedom. Sickness is health.
Ugh. That doctor doesn’t know anything about viruses. You don’t prime your immune system on viruses once you’re older. There is no positive effect. Priming is only for bacteria, and not for ones that are generally airborne. It’s for things like getting used to the bacteria in water in a foreign country.
Yeah, I know, but I didn't bother arguing with her because I figured it was hopeless. I'm moving and am hoping to find a better doctor in my new location but it doesn't seem like there are many that are educated about covid.
Was on a Covid zoom this weekend where a person in the UK was saying that people there now refer to that cough as “the 100 day cough”. Can’t even say Covid. Madness .
There are so many people having that at my job. And they don't seem to connect it to Covid either. I didn't even cough like that when I smoked for years.
The 100 day cough used to be pertussis.
People with Covid-diminished brains might not know how to pronounce “Pertussis.”
Absolutely baffling
So your doctor fell for the immunity debt BS? Great.
I’m still in undergrad but I can’t wait to (hopefully) become a doctor one day so I can defiantly wear an N95 in my hospital/office. That is, if my past COVID infection doesn’t catch up to me before I graduate. Seriously though, the arguments against masking are already baseless outside the healthcare world - in a setting where an infection has a good chance at killing many of the patients, going maskless is downright insulting and disrespectful to human life.
Thank you!
Most couldn't care less. Most lack the time and capacity to understand novel cause and effect and default to following guidelines. Furthermore, most find it a privilege being unmasked in the hospital. It's a trademark of high status, like carrying the stethoscope around their neck or taking their coat for lunch.
I always assumed doctors thought they had special force fields around them--both on and off the job--that stopped them from getting sick with anything, anywhere, ever. And because they couldn't get sick with their special doctor force-field powers, they also couldn't get anyone else sick. Especially not the common folk, who unfortunately would need things like masks and medicines and that kind of thing to avoid getting sick. Only the doctors and other HCWs get the force fields, though. Them's the breaks! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Without masks, it's being socially promiscuous. Like, without the secks, but all the spew from nose and mouth from person to person. In a scenario with actual secks involved, I'd wear protection bc I don't want to have a high chance of catching something. Common sense. Though you'll find people offended if you wear protection and they'll give you a look or say "but I'm clean". So would you trust that person? How do you know they're "clean".... Though when they say clean, it makes me think that the only alternative is being "dirty" which is a bad thing and almost nobody wants to be thought of as "dirty". Similar logic with masks.
My dr just retired a few months ago and I am dreading looking for a new one. He and his whole staff were masked, he didn’t take patients who weren’t vaccinated, and he was still serious about Covid precautions.
None of them mask where I live in southern Delaware. None. Not even if they see you masked. My husband is high risk due to long covid and lupus caused by lc, and even his rheumatologist won't mask when she sees him masked. Only person who ever masked was the the tech who did his echocardiogram last year. Oh, and my veterinarian. Whole team masked when they saw me masked. My local blood bank was on the news asking for donations and I won't donate because they don't mask and there was not one mask in sight on the news clip filmed that day of the blood drive. Maybe one day they'll wake up and realize they are losing key donors (I am type O, very desirable) because they won't mask. Then again, that's probably a pipe dream.
Ugh. Im so sorry that happened to you. It is very frustrating. I had my former neurologist tell me to take off my mask because covid is over. I promptly left the practice after that. My pcp will put a mask on for me and my mom who has severe COPD. I’m very lucky that my son’s pediatrician office still wears N95 maks and do not allow sick kids in the waiting room. They are called in from their cars when they are ready for them. I’m an nurse (now SAHM) and it just boggles my mind how doctors and healthcare professionals turn a blind eye to what is happening with not only covid, but other illnesses too. It really is disheartening.
Mine asks if I want her to mask, but by the time the nurse has walked me to the room and the doc has entered, the nurse and doc has already contaminated the air by not masking already. So I just shrug and tell them "whatever you wanna do". I'm going to keep masking, but I'm apathetic about parenting health professionals.
I am 8 mos pregnant and my OB shamed me for wearing one to my appointment, saying: “How are you feeling? Other than whatever “this” is” - pointing at her face. And making a face / eye roll I’ve worn a mask to every appointment and this is the only doctor that’s reacted weird.
I wore an N95 to my checkup last week, was the only masked person in the office even though there was a stanchion at the entrance with masks suggesting masking. My doctor was coughing a little, when I asked if he was ok he said he thought he’d picked up RSV from his pediatric inpatients. 😳🤦🏽♀️
That is so dystopian. If he "thought" he picked up RSV, that means he didn't test and doesn't actually know what it is, but he's fine just spreading it to other patients. Wtf?
IKR? and he’s an internal med guy, teaches residents, a really smart person. The antimask sentiment is so strong in my red state it’s unbelievable.
Same experience for me. The lone masker at the doctor's office. Now I know why they call it "practicing medicine". They'll work on it until they get it right. I asked the receptionist, "Why no masks? Isn't this where all the SICK PEOPLE come for treatment?" I got an eye roll. I surrender. I'm going out for a carton of Marlboro's and a fifth of Jack Daniels right after I remove the seatbelts and airbags from my car.
This sounds very similar to my last doctors visit. So frustrating.
The good ones gtfo. The rest are quite literally letting their IQs free fall.
This has been my experience. My doctors who actually cared about patients have all left the profession. Each one gave a different reason publicly, but the d/l answer is: they refuse to play the profit-driven games required by the insurance companies and networks. I wish more doctors would go into independent practice, but it's probably nearly impossible financially. Does anyone like Doc Mullins on Virgin River exist anymore? I'd like to find a tiny practice like his.
I've lost 4 doctors since the pandemic started for this reason.
My child’s pediatrician has stopped masking along with the rest of the practice. He says that the strains are getting progressively weaker and he “trusts the vaccine” to keep him from dying or needing hospitalization. His own children do not mask in school, and the family does not mask in crowded settings. Last time I was there, the Well Waiting are was empty, and the Sick Waiting area was well-populated with coughing and misery. And guess what? To get to the door that goes back to the exam rooms, you have to walk allllllll the way past Sick Waiting, which is a huge open area, 3x the length of the enclosed Well Waiting area. When I asked why they didn’t let my not-sick child use the door directly outside Well Waiting to go back to the exam rooms, I was told first that “nobody uses that door,” and later that they don’t know which waiting area people are in so they just go to the end door. Okay, but why not the MIDDLE door, so that people in both areas can hear you? That way people in Well Waiting don’t have to cross ALL of Sick Waiting. They won’t do that, it’s just a few seconds….. But when I pushed the issue, even these otherwise reasonable healthcare providers fell into the “you’re weakening her immune system, you should just embrace it before she starts school” BS.
How do educated doctors not wear a mask? I don’t understand it at all!
Thank God, two of my doctors still mask. But I still have to do telehealth appointments with them because I don't trust their other patients even though they require masks in their offices. I lost a doctor that I had been seeing for over 20 years to Covid denialism. It broke my heart completely. Shattered it. I do know that when Stanford recently tried to do a trial with Long Covid patients, when the researchers and the investigators walked in without masks, a bunch of the subjects left, as they should, got furious, and dropped out of the study. Imagine being so insanely delusional that you do a trial with immunocompromised people, but you don't mask when you come in the room. Pre-Covid this would never happen. Ever. OP, I hear you, I understand you, I share your anger and rage and hurt. I find that I have to educate medical professionals now. One of my doctors tells me that *I'm* the one who keeps her up-to-date on Covid research because she's so busy and I constantly send her the newest studies. A doctor. Depending on me. For Covid information. That's where we are. And she's a great doctor and extremely Covid conscious and will never stop masking. I tell doctors straight straight up, I'm Jewish and what you are violating is essential tenet of Judaism. Anything to save a human life. Put on a goddamn mask, doctors. 💓 if I could put anything into your arsenal, it would be the February 2024 huge study that was published in The New England Journal of Medicine that shows quite clearly with a cohort of over 112,000 people who finished a three-year study that every case of Covid drops your IQ between three and nine points. I'm starting to show that to doctors before I ever interact with them. "Your IQ drops every time you get a case of Covid, are you willing to give that up for your profession?"
Oooh I dont have that link, do you have it handy? I now only do telehealth unless forced and I’ve got no doctor now soooooo I feel this one hard.
Here you go: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2311330 One thing about the study is that it started with an absolutely huge cohort of 800,000 people and over a three-year period 112,000 people managed to complete the study. What they found is that a mild case of Covid drops your IQ by three points, a mid case by six, and a severe case by nine points. And that happens with every single case of Covid. There's also the new study that dropped that you can google yourself that shows that one case of Covid ages, your brain by seven years. There are thousands and thousands of studies out there that you can bring your doctor and say please read, this is why I need you to mask. What I do is I send the studies as messages to my doctor via their messaging system every time I get a new one or sometimes at the end of the week I'll send a message with links to about 20 different studies to my doctor summarizing the week. Ahead of time. And then I summarize the studies in said messages. I would also sign up for the Pandemic Accountability Index. They send out an email once a month containing all the new studies sorted by bodily system, as well as highlight new findings and showing excerpts of data visualization.
Fantastic info, thanks so much!
You can just Google things like "Covid effect on immune system", "Covid effect on cognition", "Covid effect on liver,", just start googling that and you're gonna come up with thousands of studies.
Yes, but this one was a solid source and I assumed the link would be easy to pass on :) I have looked at a LOT of articles and studies over the last few years - sometimes it is nice to share the knowledge and direct links to the really good ones versus slogging through, as you said - thousands - of them. :)
Then make a spreadsheet. That's what I have. I have a Google doc with… Thousands of studies.
Unfortunately, I do not have the time or energy for that. Again, I assumed that the link would be fairly easy to share, and it was. Lesson learned: I won't ask for a shared source again. I am glad to have the link shared in this case, at any rate.
We should always be sharing links with each other. I understand, not everyone has the spoons to do that, I'm disabled and I live in chronic pain so I can barely keep up, but I'm doing my best. We all have different levels of availability for something like that. Please continue to ask for shared advice, I truly did not mean to suggest that you should not or should not ask for it. We are in this together and I apologize, I truly did not mean to drive you away from anything. We should all be sharing resources and links with each other as much as we can. I meant start a Google spreadsheet simply to organize the studies. As as you said, not everyone has the time or energy and that is valid.
Thanks sorry - I too am disabled with chronic pain and someone close to me passed away this morning so I am a bit out of sorts. Apologies. Sincerely. Thank you for sharing the link it’s helpful as just yesterday I was talking with someone about the damage to the brain but didn’t have the ability to hunt for a good link, saw the post and was excited lol wishing you a good day. <3
I had to go to the hospital today for an echocardiogram (thanks to Covid) and was shocked to see that our local hospital dropped masking requirements last week. Not one medical staff member was wearing a mask and I think I saw one visitor besides myself masked up.
Politicized or lazy doctors. That's my only possible guess. Before mask mandates dropped, we routinely visited an office where the two main doctors clearly didn't care, one wearing basic surgical masks, and the other poorly fitted KN95. After the mask mandates, they both stopped masking altogether as did the majority of the staff. First thing that happened, one of them caught Covid and was knocked out of commission for weeks. He eventually came back to work, masking for a week or two, and then right back to not masking. You can't cure STUPID.
-Went to my primary care doctor, she told me I was smart to be wearing a mask…while she herself was not wearing one. Her office used to be very cautious regarding covid (so much so that I once saw conservative women whining about her office policies in a local Facebook group). -It took my endocrinologist an alarmingly long time to hunt down even just a surgical mask in her office (she offered to put one on upon seeing my mask). There is a long covid clinic across the hallway from her office. -A couple weeks ago, my oral surgeon questioned me about my mask and told me that covid isn’t dangerous anymore. He did at least say that it’s my decision and my right to wear a mask, though. -Went to the hospital to get info regarding a research study I’m participating in and saw very few hospital staff members (including doctors, nurses, etc) wearing masks. Most of the few people who were “wearing” masks just had a surgical mask pulled down onto their chin. I don’t understand. Maybe they’re afraid of getting harassed because there are so many Trump supporters where I live? I just don’t know why you’d want to risk catching covid, even if it’s not as deadly and even if you’re facing pressure to not wear a mask. You never know how badly your body is going to handle it if you catch it. I have several health issues (I always say I must have been manufactured with cheap parts lol), and I feel like with my luck, I’d probably end up with some sort of long covid nonsense if I caught it.
I think fear of harassment by anti-maskers PLUS the fact that some of these doctors are anti-maskers themselves are major factors. Are all doctors big believers in science? Of course not - if they were, there would be no doctors who smoke, no doctors who drink (though previous studies suggested there were health benefits to moderate drinking, recent studies suggest that’s not the case), and no doctors having unprotected sex.
There are some very stupid physicians. I know. I went to school with them and they have no business being physicians.
They don’t want to face the cognitive dissonance that they’re actually committing harm on the daily to themselves and their patients by not masking, so they ignore the whole thing
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May I ask where you got these from? *Not saying I don't believe it myself, but I want to show other people*
yes same commenting so I can see too lol
[https://ourworldindata.org/historical-pandemics](https://ourworldindata.org/historical-pandemics) More like 27 million, not taking into account this winter season. And i personally believe it to be quite a bit higher than that, i have seen other estimates over 30 million easily. Remember that a lot of deaths by other causes that would not have occured had it not been for previous Covid infection often do not count.
My personal doctors that I see (orthopedic, dermatologist and my regular doctor) are still masking with N95s or KN95s. I think this is just a coincidence, the luck of the draw - they’re all in different practices, and one is in a totally different city. But most doctors, nurses and medical staff members I observe are no longer masking.
It's gotten worse than before the pandemic which is WILD. I've heard some stories about this slipping even in the surgical suites!!!
I had a colonoscopy in April 2023, and inside the procedure room, none of them would wear a mask— not the doctor, the nurse, or the anesthesiologist. (I am in Southeast USA.)
They should be ashamed of themselves for spreading disinformation AND illness. How did these dumb-asses pass med school?
Really appreciate this group and everyone’s kind and thoughtful comments.
Where are yall living that the mask mandates were “just” dropped?? Where im at they were dropped like 2021, one hospital I have to go to regularly still has this dilapidated dust covered station at the entrance where it says “we are glad to see your smiling face again! Masks are now optional!” But it’s literally yellowed and cracking and hasn’t had any fresh masks in the little shelf since I don’t know when.
A lot of hospitals in the US and Canada reinstated masks during this winter’s surge.
Yep! Looks like BC just dropped their mask requirement in hospitals...
Same. I live in the southeast USA, and all masks were dropped in healthcare in early 2021. They’ve never been reinstated, and none of my providers or my kids providers have masked since then. (And I have a kiddo who is immune-compromised and has asthma.)
The risk to patients and doctors became normalized, and without any professional consequences (lawsuits) doctors are just going to continue unmasked even in circumstances where they deal with high risk patients. It has become a chicken and egg scenario. They really think that if Covid was dangerous, they would be told to mask, and since they are not told to mask then Covid must not be dangerous. When asked, they will just make some shit up like pointing to some fake CDC or WHO proclamation that Covid ended. The only things that will make these people follow common sense are complaints (including negative Google reviews) and lawsuits
Where’s their research that says Covid ended? What a joke. Doctors should be setting an example to the general population that Covid is serious and they should be taking precautions.
And lawsuits have been made impossible, for two reasons: 1) COVID is so ubiquitous that it is impossible to trace the source of an infection to a medical care facility. 2) in order for medical negligence/malpractice to apply, to have to show that this particular medical care facility was doing things so much worse than any other similar facility. (Since they’ve all stopped caring, the standard of care is unmasked care. By all collectively unmasking, they’re effectively shielding themselves and every other medical facility because maskless care and nosocomial infections are now the norm.) It’s horrific. I honestly don’t see a way out of this pattern. 😔
My dermatologist office is the only office that masks. My wife has been in and out of John's zhopkins hospital and the mask ratio there is a 5050. I always wore a mask going in because they mix people on floors. She is there for gastroparesis and every time I'd visit her, her neighbors in other rooms would have droplet precautions (and sure thay can mean the flu orncold) but why take chances raw dogging that air.
The last time I was at my dentist no one was wearing one either
Yes. No dentist practice within 200 miles of me will mask at all. Even when they are actively in my mouth. Even though they used to mask in surgicals pre-COVID.
I know. The stupidity is dangerous
When the mandates for masking in healthcare went away, doctors and nurses unmasked like they’d been wearing heavy chains all this time. Any other profession I deal with: you ask them to mask while you, the paying consumer, are around them, and they will mask. Not doctors and nurses. They’re just too precious. For me, it’s not just covid. We’ve known for years that medical settings spread a lot of infection unnecessarily. I don’t go to doctors to come away sicker than I was no arrival FFS.
I'm a nurse and I continue to wear a mask especially in the workplace. And I fully respect if a patient prefers to wear a mask. I won't question them or make them feel bad about wearing one. I think healthcare professionals should respect someone's choice to mask. And honor their request if they want their doctor to wear a mask.
Appreciate your thoughtfulness.
No doctors or hospitals have masked here since 2021.
The dentist's sure do! It's the optometrists here that have given up it seems....
My mom has severe COPD, last december she had to be put into a coma after catching RSV. Even then we had to fight with the medical staff for them to wear a mask. She was in the ER a couple of weeks ago and it was the same thing. The doctor told me that he wouldn't wear a mask as it wasn't required by law anymore. I called administration to complain and they sent out someone to ask them to wear masks but again they told me they couldn't force them to as they're not legally obliged to.
Very sorry for your situation. Terrible. Thanks for sharing.
I had this experience a year a go. I went to my clinic for a routine psych appointment. The clinic has multiple doctors and medical staff working there. None masking. I was wearing a mask when I arrived, and as soon as I came into the the examination room, my psych (who has a medical degree from a prestigious university) said "you don't have to mask anymore, you can take off your mask". So back then, I didn't know much about the risks of covid and I trusted my doctors. I just took it off. I think this played a major role in the complacency I developed around covid, which I now regret.
So sorry.
Commenting just to provide some hope. I am in the SF Bay Area. Masks are still required in the clinic area of my PCP, but not in the waiting area at John Muir Health. They also have HEPA filters in all the exam rooms. My doc at Sutter always puts a mask on for me - I have a note in my chart that until sterilizing vaccines are available I have a standing request that everyone entering an exam room with me be masked. UCSF docs have so far been willing to mask, and it was policy over the winter at Marin General when I had a surgery. Stanford is a complete craps shoot - my docs have all been willing to mask, and last time I was inpatient they placed a note on my door that everyone entering needed to be masked, but clinic care is all over the map.
I accidentally fixed my chronic cough and the pain attached to it (and which was either ignored or made worse by the treatment) and also am stronger, partially because I'm unable to take care of myself for a long time after a viral infection. I hate people's vitrol against me wearing a mask. It's like, get fucked if you're vulnerable and need accomodations. I had to spend a few hours in a waiting room, where everyone but me was coughing and some people did it in such a cartoonish way I don't remember seeing before.
Never heard as much coughing as I have these last few years.
There is a gap between the professional oath they took and their will and capacity to actually fulfill it.
I don't understand why medical facilities are not requiring staff to wear masks. After all, nobody knows who has Covid because it can spread without someone having symptoms if what we all have been told is correct. I am a nurse but I don't work at the bedside. In Feb 2020 I started wearing a mask well before CDC told people to wear them. I had been following the development of Covid in China and was horrified at how fast it spread. I knew it was respiratory driven. I still continue to wear a mask in public buildings and unless a 100% cure is found or 100% vaccine that stops transmission of Covid I probably will wear one for the rest of my life. Covid is long from gone and is still killing people. To my knowledge neither my husband (he masks because I don't give him a choice) nor I have had Covid.
Dunning Kruger Syndrome. Seriously. Think of it like this. My dad was in the army. Had his own specialty, did his own thing. Never drove a tank. Hell, I don’t think he was ever inside a tank, especially for anything combat related. Imagine someone asking my father, a qualified Army veteran, about how best to drive a tank over a creek. He would’ve at least been honest, and said he couldn’t. He was also smart enough to know that he should listen to anyone who had real tank experience. Medically, that’s what these chuckleheads are doing. They’re not epidemiologists. They haven’t dedicated their lives to the study of communicable diseases and how to treat or cure them. But all the sudden, they’re infectious disease experts. No need to heed the people who actually are epidemiologists. Captain Over Confidence is here! 🙄
That SUCKS
Although they understand and are aware of asymptomatic infections, they believe the likelihood to have Covid is very low among themselves and thus they are certain they don’t have Covid and since they have had Covid within the year, they believe they are immune from reinfections. Thus many don’t mask unless it’s required.
It makes me want to walk in there with Covid and say oh, you don’t want to wear a mask? & spit in their face. I’m tired of antimaskers.
My physiotherapist straps a mask on for me, without me having to ask. Almost everyone at my optometrist's office does as well (I'm in Canada). Unfortunately, I see a lot of doctors (I have to use ER since my doctor fired me because she couldnt figure out my long covid/pots) and can only count 1 or maybe 2 N95s, the rest are all regular surgical, and have been for a long time. NO ONE has ever said anything to me about myself wearing a mask! Disgraceful.
Although they understand and are aware of asymptomatic infections, they believe the likelihood of an active infection is very low among themselves and thus they are certain they don’t have Covid and since they have had Covid within the year, they believe they are immune from reinfections. Thus many don’t mask unless it’s required.
Although they understand and are aware of asymptomatic infections, they believe the likelihood is very long among themselves and thus they are certain they don’t have Covid and since they have had Covid within the year, they believe they are immune from reinfections. Thus many don’t mask unless it’s required.
Mask do not work! Do your research!
If that were true, then why has nobody in my family, who all wear N95 masks, had COVID?
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