The Rules Should Apply To Everyone

When five people who work as closely with Pence as possible come down with COVID the rules say that he should quarantine. As the head of the Covid task force he knows this. So what does he do? He goes out to an in-person rally and uses the excuse that he is an essential worker. Even essential workers have to quarantine, but Pence is anything but essential at a political rally, let alone ever.

Yes, he and mother both tested negative, initially, but as we all know you don’t always test positive right away. Thus the need for quarantining. I am so tired of people thinking the rules that are for the good of us all do not apply to them.

Kansas had an excellent case study in mask wearing. The state allowed each county to decided if they were going to mandate wearing masks. 20 Counties of the 105 decided they would have a mask mandate and the others did not. Based on cell phone data people in both kinds of counties went out an equal amount of time over the months of the study. But no shock to me, the counties with the mask mandates had half the number of infections.

It could not be more clear that wearing masks and following the rules to quarantine if you are exposed can dramatically cut down on the spread of Covid. If you look at Covid data by state the places that have no mask mandates have higher percentages of infections. Take North Dakota, the worst state to live in if you don’t want to get Covid. They have no mask mandate and their infection rate is 50 people out of 1,000 in North Dakota have already had Covid. It is not like people in North Dakota even live that close to each other. They had to really work to catch the virus.

Just so you can compare, in Vermont it is 3 people out of 1,000 have had Covid. Even in NY a state that was the epicenter of the virus at first has a rate of 27 out of 1,000. In NY they took seriously wearing masks and have gotten their spread way down.

So wear a mask if you go out. Sign up for your states Covid Tracking App. In NC it is called Slow Covid NC. Go find it in the App Store and install it on your phone. And for God’s sake, if you come in contact with someone who tests positive, don’t be a Pence, quarantine. It’s your civic duty.