We call that Coercion.

 

In the current situation, things are going from bad to worse.

We have slithered from "2 weeks to break the curve" to going on 21 MONTHS now...and from no masks, to masks, from no vaccine to a vaccine that the Dems denounced and refused because it came from he whose name shall not be spoken (T) to EVERYBODY WILL HAVE THE VACCINE.  And lets not forget that So-called "Herd Immunity" has been redefined from 65%, to 70%, to 78% to 85% and now to EVERYBODY WILL HAVE THE VACCINE, regardless of the risks. (REALLY, they are very small... Trust us. "Just take it" the pundits hawk, like carnival barkers, (Pay no mind to the patient behind the curtain).

With a Federal vaccine MANDATE, with some nebulous exemptions listed, but scoped so tightly and with so many dis-allowals that they make no sense and likely are causing more harm than good.  We have now passed into the twilight zone.

The so-called medical exemption statutes do NOT allow for an allergic reaction to a previous vaccination.  Nor do they allow for the natural immunity from already having HAD COVID.😠

Apparently it’s OK to deliberately induce a life-threatening anaphylaxis and treat THAT, for the dubious benefit of added (perhaps) immunity over the natural immunity gained from an all-natural COVID infection. (BTDT, was tough but not insurmountable...and I did it alone in a foreign country no less)

 If you have never experienced a severe anaphylactic reaction, the form it took for me was the sensation/reality of not being able to breathe...until I passed out. At some point afterwards I was injected with an Epi-Pen or something similar and revived.

So I'll invite anyone who wants to dismiss the possibility of the reaction to simulate it by taping a plastic bag over one’s head and struggling to breathe until they pass out. After you pass out, and someone else takes off the bag, come back and tell me that it’s OK, that its no big deal.You better chose someone you trust...maybe someone you owe money to?

 Were there a simple 1) get vaxxed or 2a) get tested regularly and on demand, that would be FINE...but the addition of 2b) OR Lose Your Job is not acceptable or ethical in any case that I can see. 

We Call That Coercion.

The straw men and red herrings abound...comparisons to Typhoid Mary, to deliberate killers roaming and coughing on the innocents to deliberately infect them.  To Selfish People who care not for their fellow denizens.  The list is almost as long as a NY phone book.

Yet, there are those for whom the vaccine is contraindicated, and we are scorned, shamed and called unpatriotic.  For those people, taking the vaccine can be likened to playing Russian Roulette with only one chamber empty instead of the traditional one chamber loaded.  Is it any wonder they do not wish to run the risks? And yet the scorn, the shaming and the firing from employment are heaped upon them like hot coals.  Is it any wonder that they are angry, hurt and feeling unwanted in society?

We are creating a divided society, one where the dividing line is the taking or not taking of a vaccine of dubious efficacy, one that doesn't PREVENT the disease! (The definition was even revised to account for this...WHAAT?)  Just change the rules of the game if its not going the desired way.

WHEN this currently perpetual pandemic finally blows over and the COVID-19 is little more than another type of flu (you know the one that kills 30K-60K folks every year?), how will the scorned and shunned reintegrate into society?  

Will they just shrug and embrace those who shunned, scorned and abused them?  Human nature tells me "Not so Much", this behavior, especially for those who lost their livelihoods, homes, friends (obviously, shallow ones) and sometimes loved ones will not go back like it was before.  I think that there will be a lingering animosity that will come out at unexpected intervals and in random situations and the pro-vax fraction will be surprised and stunned...and STILL not understanding how their actions brought this reaction upon them...  It's likely that those who were run out of employment and all that it enables will harbor a long-lasting anger and possibly a desire for vengeance.  Politics will change over this, as will habits.  Not for the better.

I think that history will not look kindly on the unkind side of humanity, on the scorn and humility and for the unvaxxed, the loss of incomes, homes and livelihoods and the resulting problems that brings.

And remember if you laugh scornfully and say "Quit whining and take the vaccine, I did!", what if you were one of the ones who died after taking it...normal, healthy, vivacious folks like a young mother who wanted to be a room mom to her daughter, like the single mom who took the vaccine to be an example to her daughter...and died for her wishes.  Like the folks who come out with an enlarged heart or other severe injuries and all the health problems that they brings, the other vaccine related injuries...will you also scorn them?  Or are they just casualties in the great drive forward...un-lamented but for their own people?  Maybe they are your family, daughters, sons, mothers, fathers wives, husbands parents and grandparents...is their loss just to be swept under the rug?

And finally why the lies about the deaths, the counting of decapitations, death from gunshot wounds, Motor vehicle incidents and a host of other NON-COVID causes that are logged as COVID deaths, is it the perverse incentive for the hospitals, that they get more money?  Why are the risks of taking the vaccines not laid out like the litany of risks for the latest wonder drug to fight one of our society's growing host of ills? Why are they hidden, the deaths downplayed, the permanent negative health effects not covered in the same light as the deaths and permanent negative health effects of COVID?  

Give people the FACTS and let them make an informed decision, allow them that, instead of the scorn and shaming that they do not follow YOUR choice.

Threatening ones livelihood is Coercion. It will come back to bite us as a society

Healthcare, delayed, can be fatal...

This post is a rather lengthy one with a friend's perspective as well as mine.  KK has watched both parents get ignored to death, literally, by the healthcare system.  Similarly, my brother may suffer (and i do mean SUFFER) the same fate.

From KK:

She heard a story in January 2019, that sounded quite familiar.  It was a tale of rejection, from an insurance company that has been the least successful, most stressful-to-deal-with when in poor health model of ineffective health care:  Group Health.  (commonly called Group Death, for reasons described to her as utterly horrific, which she will relate herein) 

The switch-over from Group Health to Kaiser Permanente in 2017 changed nothing, according to all the people in our Island County who have been denied air-ambulance services even though they are Island, with no ferry or roadway at all in times when a crisis occurs…spurs her to relate a very personal story about the denials of healthcare that turned her into an orphan, and now she is fighting for her life against the same board of directors who are making medical decisions that affect her ability to maintain her health.  Let’s begin…

Her Father was diagnosed with a small spot of malignant growth on the outside of his lung in 1986.  The oncologist at Group Death recommended a full body scan, due to familial cancer history, and it was denied by the board that oversees such needlessly expensive procedures.  Her Dad was treated, and declared cancer free…until a year later.  Her Dad wasn’t feeling great, and went to the doctor, who told him to just “take it easy”.  (for a guy who NEVER missed a day of work for sickness, and had no experience with regular healthcare due to vigorous health, this was expected.  It couldn’t be anything serious, right?)  This continued for 8 months, until the woman’s Dad had to put his foot down and ask for some tests to see why he was feeling worse and worse.  Of course…it was cancer.  Lymphocytic carcinoma, metastasized to every major organ and all his  bones.  They had no idea where it originated from, it was all over and the Dad had a very short time to prepare.  He died at 48 years old.  Could he have survived, with a PET scan 1 year and 8 months earlier?  Perhaps.  Guess she’ll never know.

Fast forward to 1992.  The woman’s mother was in need of a very large hernia repair, sternum to pubic bone.  Her doctor tried to get approval to do a lung-scan prior to the surgery, because the normal surgical approach could compress the patient’s lungs, and the suspected a severe case of emphysema in the patient’s lungs.  The procedure was denied by the board that oversees such needlessly expensive procedures.  The surgery did indeed compromise the patient’s lungs, and kept her in-patient for 14 days as her lungs would not re-inflate due to severe emphysema, also known as COPD.  The result was that the lungs never re-inflated, thus decreasing the capacity to move air, putting strain on the patient’s heart.  The disease progressed much more rapidly due to inability to do any sort of exercise that strained her need of air, as her heart would work so hard she would pass out.  She passed away from coronary complications of COPD, at age 65.  Could the woman’s mother have survived a longer lifetime, pain and heart-problem free?  Perhaps.  Guess she’ll never know.

Now we arrive at the present.  The woman has been diagnosed with Diabetes, high blood pressure, and COPD.  She is 53, and works hard to stay fit and vital.  She was only able to afford Group Health / Kaiser Permanente health insurance, and knows she has a fight on her hands with this insurance HMO and some chronic health issues.

Kaiser Permanente has switched her insulin from one that was a long lasting Lantus insulin to one she must use 2x a day instead of one.  More needles, more insulin, more money out of her pocket.  Then the medicine the woman had used successfully to treat her COPD is no longer covered, and she has been put on a less-effective, more required usage to get good result inhaled medication.  She actually had to fight to get this medicine at all, since the doctor doing vacation relief waited 5 days to answer a medication request for a rx to treat her COPD, and told the woman to ask the pharmacy for medical advice…  Yep, she was advised to ask the pharmacist what she should be placed on for a critical need.  The woman knows if she had not called the nurse line and gotten some emergency help, she could have died from lack of oxygen.

Can she survive the downgraded meds for 2 deadly chronic illnesses, the vacation relief that takes zero responsibility for the patients they are to care for, the increasing amount coming out of pocket for less coverage and benefits?  Probably not.  However…she is not a complacent patient.  She won’t just take “no” for an answer, if she feels in need of medical attention.  She knows how to self-advocate and will, without a doubt, go into the clinic and throw herself down on the floor, AGAIN,  and have a fucking fit, should this prove necessary, or should she feel she is being marginalized due to her health conditions.  She’s been treated better on Obamacare through Molina Health in the past.  She has had access to better care all her life, and will accept nothing less.

Bless you for listening to why Kaiser Permanente / Group Death should be dismantled and sold for pig-food.

And now to my brother...

He has been having INCREASING back pain after multiple surgeries, and for nearly 2 years has been going to his Dr and requesting an MRI to see what is going on in there...which his Insurance carrier refused each time the request and INSISTING that he needs physical therapy EACH time when he has already told them that the PT does NOTHING but INCREASE the pain. So finally he assented and did the PT...and the insurance STILL declined to spend the money on the MRI. This continues for probably 8 evolutions until the events of January 2019.  I and the rest of our brothers feel that this egregious failure of the healthcare system at the behest of penny-pinching for-profit healthcare may have killed our brother...or as one put it, "the for F-ing profit Healthcare system may have Murdered our brother."  The 2015 MRI showed no signs of issues.

A letter from him last Friday:

Well, some less good news. About three weeks ago, I was bending down to pick something up, and something in my back went, “pop”, and then it hurt like hell. I took some extra drugs and hobbled off to work anyway, but by the end of the day, I couldn’t stand it anymore, and had the wife take me in to the hospital.
They gave me some meds and took an xray and waited for the meds to take effect. They weren’t doing the trick, so they gave me another dose, then the doc came by and said that I had fractured my L2 vertebrae, and that they were taking blood samples and giving me a CT scan.

If you notice, the L2 has what looks like a big hole in it. That’s sort of the case. It has essentially demineralized, and is kinda soft. The doc said based on that image and some proteins in my bloodwork, that, “you probably have cancer called Multiple Myeloma”, and recommended I see an oncologist.

LOTS of blood work, tests, a bone marrow sample (5”, 14 gauge needle into the pelvis), a full-body X-ray survey, an MRI, a full-body PET CT, and they have confirmed that I do have stage 1 Multiple Myeloma, a blood cancer (specifically, the plasma cells grow out of control, attacking the bones and the kidneys.)
So far, the L2 looks like the only bone that is affected (at least to this degree), and it hasn’t attacked my kidneys yet, so prospects for long-term survival can be quite good (5 years is 70%, 10 years is 50%), some folks make it 20-30 years.
Unfortunately, this cancer is never considered ‘cured’, and basically everyone relapses eventually. It can be treated again, though the second treatment is usually a little less effective than the first. Depending on how quickly you relapse, they can either use the same treatment, or a different, stronger, and more harsh treatment.
Lather, Rinse, Repeat.

So, at the moment, I’m looking forward to a standard treatment plan of: Radiation on the affected bone(s), followed by 3-4 one-month rounds of a three drug cocktail. After that, they give you a drug to stimulate the production of stem cells, and they take a week to filter them out of your blood and freeze them to use later. Next is a massive dose of Chemo to kill all the remaining cancer, and your bone marrow. Once confirmed that it’s gone, they put your stem cells back in, and the cells rebuild (hopefully) a healthy blood supply, free of cancer. The stem cell process and recovery takes two months, mostly isolated since I won't have an immune system after the chemo. There is about a 1% chance of death due to complications during or directly after the stem cell part of the treatment, primarily from infection, or bleeding/clotting issues. (and that’s if you use your own stem cells. If you can’t produce enough, and have to use cells from a matched donor, like a relative, then the percentage jumps to 25% because the donor stem cells could see your body as foreign and attack it.)
If the treatment is successful, I’d be on some kind of suppressing medication, and be monitored periodically, forever.

At some point, a spine specialist will go in and inject some plastic compound into the damaged L2 bone to fill in the hole, and will probably also do some work on my L5-S1 fusion to clean it up a bit, do something about the new disc bulge/herniation at L4-L5, and probably install a nerve stimulator implant to knock out the chronic pain I have in my low back and right leg. That will hopefully reduce the amount of pain medication that I have to take, which will un-burden my liver and kidneys a bit (they’re going to need all the help they can get).
So, I’m going to get to explore the Wide World of Medicine a lot more… whether I like it or not.

I’ll keep you posted.

 

Where did the time go?

This morning's snowfall brought me up sharp with the thought that its WINTERY...not the summer of the SO recent thoughts and the Oh SO too busy life.

On the slippery commute, interupted by those who cannot seem to drive with a slip of snow and slickness (its NOT dry pavement folks), punctuated by red and blue flashing lights, I had some time to reflect on the whirlwind that the last 8 months have been.

Off time, firewood permits and woodcutting, stacking the little blue S-10 to its capacity with firewood, cut off the slash piles, unloaded and stacked for splitting down to stove size later.

Turkey hunting on a friend's ground and very successfully to boot! Some time in the hills with a rifle, around trips to the Land of the Rising Sun, but no deer to fill the freezer with.

 The occasional peek into the woods that soothe my soul and refresh my mind.  Even ONE trip out on the water...very short trip...mostly spent playing tug boat captain with my old boat for another boaters broken boat.

All of those things rammed into and around an incredibly heavy, every expanding workload...hiring 5 folks wasn't enough, 15 more followed and STILL the workload climbs past capacity.  As it turns out...various minor models are NOT Red, Blue and Green Legos...and do NOT fit together that way.  Integration is the watchword, the curse and the muttered password, said with rolling eyes.

My boys and I spent the last few evenings checking out the trucks and preparing them for the forecast foul weather...shovels, tire chains, flashlights, gloves (axes, chainsaws, ropes, logging chains, peavy and safety gear in mine) sandbags and raingear.  Its seldom that we cannot get where we need to go, in spite of the conditions of the roads and other drivers.

Ah well... such is life, today will pass, safely one hopes and tomorrow will come.

Jobs, work and steady employment!

Having been at the same Salt Mine for just shy of two decades, I sometimes regard management, managers and the whole idea of direction a bit askance. ( Lots of !WHAT! were they THINKING????)

After the last 6 years of extreme stress and unending toil, dismaying new discoveries, incessant globe trotting and not nearly enough sleep, I've suddenly found myself doing something I hadn't chosen to do. Apparently several of the management types decided that they needed an experienced Sr Manufacturing Engineer to attempt to side-step some of the hassles that have befallen the previous program.

I was shanghaied.

Much to my surprise things are much better, while not by any means laid back, I have some control of the trajectory short of turning in my badge and I get to choose the folks who will be working on my assigned work-package.

Per the last visit with the Doc, the BP is down 20 points or so...I'm sleeping again (well sorta) and I see daylight NOT through a window but actually walking about in it producing Vitamin D the old fashioned way. At least I will as soon as the Deluge ends.

It appears that there MIGHT be something TO this gig after all!

While the financial strictures of the program tell me that we will be doing anything and everything with very little resources, I'm confident that we DO know how to make THIS project work and be a moneymaker in spite of a very Scotch bid to get the work.

I'm working on the initial estimates to get the workload, to spec out and hire a crew and get down to doing what we are known the world over for... making flying machines. This time for the USAF, a very demanding customer.

I've even been told that a smile has crossed my visage in the last few weeks.

What next, Sunshine?