The unseen covid-19 risk for unvaccinated people

[Ms. Toad]

3. As cases grow in the unvaccinated not wearing masks,

it will aso grow among the vaccinated. (More exposure = more breakthrough cases.) Wearing masks is a smart way to mitigate the additional risk.

I went to the grocery store (yesterday) that has been safe - until the idiotic CDC pronouncement. The new sign on the door invited unmasked vaccinaged shoppers. Despite only 39% of county in which the store is located being fully vaccinated, fewer than half of shoppers and employees were wearing masks. And I'm pretty certain that most of us wearing masks were already vaccinated.

The decline in cases in the US that was growing rapidly prior to the CDC announcement (a % every other day or so) has largely stalled at 22% (over the prior week), and may have reversed directions (popping back up to as low as 19%). (I need a few more days of data to see if it is just a stall or a reversal.)

My guess is that we'll continue to see a decline (but at an increasingly slower rate) over the summer while people are largely outside - then a surge in the fall. But - a strong push to get people back in the office could mean that the surge will start earlier.