If you jump in the time machine with me, we'll go back to the days of protests over mask mandates, business closures, social distancing, and lockdowns. In those days, many people were incensed that the government had disrupted so many lives with a list of restrictions and warnings that many credited with helping foment the social unrest in the months and years that followed.
COVID-19 protests are making a comeback. But this time, the shoe is on the other foot. Or, more appropriately, the mask is on the other face. This time around, protestors are gathering later this month to express their ire that the government is not taking COVID-19 seriously enough. And they are all gathering for a march in Washington, D.C., on March 15
Last week, Catherine reported on the updated CDC guidance that recommends treating a bout of COVID-19 in much the same way one would treat a bout of the flu. Gone was the mandate for five days of isolation, which was replaced by a unified plan to address respiratory illnesses. That new guidance says to stay home if one is sick, but that one can resume normal activities when they start to feel better and have not had a fever for 24 hours,
This has not sat well with the group LC/DC. This group says its members struggle with long COVID, and they are all coming together later this month for the march.
(Via American Wire)
https://t.co/6DXUeRTxe5 pic.twitter.com/WuyuTgQen2
— LC/DC (Awareness Day '24) (@LCDCmarch15) March 2, 2024
Organizer Paul Hennessy told Fox News that the march is intended to raise awareness about long COVID and that reducing the isolation period would lead to more people with infections, illnesses, and disability. He noted that the easing of the previous restrictions was being done during an election year. The group also contends that reinfection is being "normalized" to protect corporations and to ensure that disabled people are not seen in public places. That sounds eerily familiar to the concerns other groups of protestors had. Hennessy also asserts that the vaccinated and unvaccinated can still contract the virus or complications and pass it along to a vulnerable person.
LC/DC is advocating a return to a ten-day isolation period and two negative COVID tests before a person can resume their normal life.
The irony that people who suffer from long COVID and want to see a return to more draconian procedures are assembling for a march was not lost on some X users:
(Via American Wire)
Let me get this straight...people who are afraid of being around other people due to Covid will protest IN PERSON in DC over CDC guidelines. How does this make any sense?
— NanaBanana - #DeSantisConservative (@EmJHarris2) March 4, 2024
To say that COVID-19 did not present a danger to anyone is disingenuous. To some, contracting COVID-19 could be fatal. We lost a family member to it. However, those people who were at risk had co-morbidities and conditions that did not affect much of the population. A case of COVID-19 can be nasty. I knew several people who caught it and went through quite a rodeo. But we also saw businesses close, skateboard parks filled with sand, people lose jobs, struggles with substance abuse and suicide, and the national tension ramped up past Number 10 on the dial. Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, for example, seized the opportunity to assert her authority like no governor before her.
And then there was the COVID Superiority. We all saw at least one person driving around in their cars with the windows up and their mask firmly in place. The world was divided into the Cro-Magnon COVID deniers who did not believe in science and the "sensible people" who never missed an opportunity to wag their fingers at someone who was not wearing a mask or who, heaven forfend, was not wearing one correctly. For some, COVID-19 became a way of life.
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In the process, Americans underwent vaccination, isolation, and mental, emotional, physical, and fiscal distress, only to have the CDC eventually arrive at the conclusion many people claimed at the outset of the outbreak. Of course, the question on everyone's mind is, how do you do social distancing in a protest march?
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