Marilyn Archer

Here is the latets viral activity level for canada. Infgluenza B is still listed at high and RSV is still moderate. link to the data soruce in the comments below.

I’ve said repeatedly, clean air/ ventilation remains the biggest missed opportunity / lesson from the pandemic. Because it’s about far more than just Covid. 👇🏽

I’m sorry but unless you’re living like a hermit there is no ‘after Covid infection’… we’re all being exposed in an ongoing way.

How do people who lived through the 80s and 90s stomach today. I can’t fathom it. Surely you must be depressed?

I beg you, please watch this event Launch window opens in ~7 hours. Plenty of streams featuring Artemis II coverage. This will be a massive moment in human history, and like Apollo 8, will spark a renewed interest in crewed spaceflight. To the moon! 🚀🚀🚀

Earlier tonight I threw on my N95 and went to go see Slavoj Žižek speak. I don't agree with a lot of his ideas, but I've been a fan for a long time because I find them interesting. One of them in particular feels deeply relevant to the current situation with Long COVID: what Žižek calls Cynical Ideology. As he would summarize it, "they know very well what they are doing, but still, they are doing it" The government isn't operating under the old model of ideology - it is not denying Long COVID exists. Even the people directly responsible for this mess, such as Jay Bhattacharya, acknowledge it openly. They express concern, they fund RECOVER, they post awareness infographics, and then....they do absolutely nothing that would actually change outcomes. The Minnesota DoH post that I flagged before is a perfect example. The people who wrote it probably genuinely believe they're helping. They're aware that Long COVID is real and serious. They acknowledge the history of post-viral illness. And yet, the net effect of their acknowledgment is to normalize the present inaction. The awareness IS the ideology. It structures reality in a way that makes the current state of affairs feel like progress rather than abandonment. Žižek argues that modern ideology doesn't work by lying to you. Instead, it works by telling you the truth in a way that ensures nothing changes. The acknowledgment almost paradoxically becomes the control mechanism. How to break through this? Not sure yet.