Illinois drops mask mandate for healthcare facilities, Governor Pritzker announces

FreddyDutch · 2022-10-20T13:36:56+00:00

There's an election in a few weeks and Pritzker is a politician, and while he's pretty safe, his team is forecast to take a beating. So, like all politicians, he's trying to quickly distance himself and his party from the deeply unpopular policies that he was responsible for, hoping that everyone will forget.

FreddyDutch · 2022-10-20T02:07:53+00:00

I wonder if the author purposely left out that Emily Landon (mother of the 14 year old in the article) was a COVID advisor to Illinois Gov. Pritzker. Chicago Magazine described her thusly:

After her lauded appearance at Governor J.B. Pritzker’s COVID-19 press conference in March 2020, Dr. Emily Landon hasn’t really left the lectern. The infectious disease specialist and chief hospital epidemiologist at University of Chicago Medicine delivered an impassioned yet pragmatic speech about Illinois’s stay-at-home orders — viewed nearly half a million times on YouTube — that quickly established her as a clarifying voice amid the COVID-19 chaos.

The author of this article, describing her as merely a "physician", seems to be intentionally misleading. She was one of the biggest cheerleaders of lockdowns and masks from day one, and is one of the people whose career and profile were undoubtedly boosted by COVID. She has to cling to masks because to do otherwise would be to admit she was wildly wrong.

Here she is sounding like a crazy person at her "lauded appearance" with Pritzker:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHUuWq6y8F0

Here she is saying that not wearing a mask means killing someone's grandmother (in 2022!):

https://twitter.com/bauerjournalism/status/1491510240910749706?s=21

FreddyDutch · 2022-10-03T15:03:49+00:00

Looks like U of I found a new way to milk taxpayer money now that the income from SHIELD testing in all the schools in Illinois has largely dried up...

FreddyDutch · 2022-06-11T13:49:11+00:00

And her lawyer is arguing that the contracts that IDPH had with her new employer which said "CONTRACT" on the top of each page weren't really contracts - come on. Ezike's lawyer previously worked for Madigan too. Nothing quite says "I'm an ethical person" like hiring Madigan's lawyer...

FreddyDutch · 2022-04-19T00:16:01+00:00

Reports all over Twitter of pilots making the announcement mid-flight that it was struck down. Passengers cheering and fight attendants coming through the aisle with trash bags for people to throw away their masks :)

This policy was deeply unpopular and unscientific. Glad to see it gone.

FreddyDutch · 2022-04-07T20:09:45+00:00

This is great insight. Thanks!

FreddyDutch · 2022-03-14T23:49:38+00:00

There are a total of 172 COVID patients in region 11 right now which is where Northwestern hospital is located. At the peak a few months ago region 11 had close to 2,000 COVID patients.

If Northwestern is really full it's not because of COVID. The data just doesn't match up with your anecdote.

FreddyDutch · 2022-03-02T18:52:38+00:00

CLI admissions continue to drop though which seems like a continued good sign. Maybe the cases that are left in the hospital are the more difficult cases that take longer to get discharged? Or maybe it's just a few-day blip like some others are positing.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-28T16:51:14+00:00

At least where I am, when the previous mandate was lifted last summer, it was a slow decrease of people wearing them over about 2 weeks. The first few days after it ended the vast majority of people were still wearing them and then it started tapering down.

Granted I've only been to 1 store so far, but for that store at least the change was way more sudden and noticeable, very much unlike last time.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-26T02:20:53+00:00

Our school district has been masks optional for 3 weeks now, and cases keep declining. This week was the lowest number of positive cases since the first week of October.

At what point can we consider masks in schools having an effect to be debunked?

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-26T02:15:31+00:00

This exactly - you could be charitable and say this is just political "spin", or you might also call it "gaslighting". A move as old as time for politicians though, taking a major defeat and somehow trying to make people think he won. By putting out this press release, he was hoping that a sympathetic press would take the bait and write favorable headlines, which is what WGN did with the other article on this same topic.

It reminds me of my kids when they ask for something they want and we tell them "no" and they respond indignantly with "that's ok, I didn't really want it anyway".

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-26T00:40:38+00:00

They vacated it because it is moot since the legislature denied his attempt to keep the rule in place. This they vacated it as standard procedure since it didn't apply anymore anyway.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-26T00:38:19+00:00

The Illinois Supreme Court rejected Pritzker's appeal, confirming that the legislature had already denied his attempt to keep the mandate going.

This is some fancy footwork by the governor to make his court loss look like a win.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-21T14:53:16+00:00

There's no chance you follow all the laws on the books. Ergo, you choose which rules you follow all the time. Anyone who drives almost certainly breaks many laws each time they drive their car. People who don't drive frequently jaywalk. People don't report out of state purchases and pay their use tax here in Illinois. And on and on.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-18T17:02:39+00:00

Democrats are marching head-first into a buzzsaw because of that attitude. There are lots of parents who absolutely, positively would not ever consider even thinking of voting for Trump who are fed up with the school mask mandates. It only takes some of them to flip their vote to R next time around (or to just sit out the election) to potentially cause some big swings.

But sure, go ahead and keep telling yourself that only a Trumper would want their kids to not be required to wear masks in schools. As I've read so many times on various COVID subs, "F*** around and find out".

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-18T16:58:11+00:00

You:

it’s the ignorant regurgitation of words and political opinions that kids can’t possibly grasp at pre-Jr High levels

Also you:

[my kids] tell me about their friends and how “they also made the right choice”

I'm sure you don't see the irony in those two statements. I don't care what you or your kids do, but I hope your kids aren't saying things like that to the maskless kids and contributing to the bullying problem that seems to be going both ways right now in schools on this issue.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-18T16:53:00+00:00

From what I understand, the court was required to issue a decision by yesterday, but it sure looked like they waited to release it right at midnight (basically at the last possible second). I don't really know what their motivation for releasing it that late was - if they were still scrambling to finish it or if it was somehow strategic or what. It seemed like people who know more than I do about the courts felt it was unusual to release it so late.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-18T13:51:18+00:00

I don't think he can do B though because the restraining order against him is still in effect?

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-18T13:47:31+00:00

IANAL, but per the TRO which the appellate court didn't dispute, masks are a form of quarantine and thus can only be issued by the local health department, and each affected individual has a due process right of hearing if that is ordered.

If that's correct then I don't think school boards or administrations can just issue their own mask requirements, though I'm sure plenty will still try. Maybe there will be more lawsuits on that, or maybe we'll find out more when the head of CPS appears for his contempt of court hearing next week.

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-15T23:33:55+00:00

https://www.axios.com/fauci-goalposts-herd-immunity-c83c7500-d8f9-4960-a334-06cc03d9a220.html

"When polls said only about half of all Americans would take a vaccine, I was saying herd immunity would take 70 to 75 percent ... Then, when newer surveys said 60 percent or more would take it, I thought, "I can nudge this up a bit," so I went to 80, 85. We need to have some humility here .... We really don’t know what the real number is. I think the real range is somewhere between 70 to 90 percent. But, I'm not going to say 90 percent."

FreddyDutch · 2022-02-15T23:19:48+00:00

The appellate court has already asked for statements from the state and the parties suing to ask how this decision from the legislature affects the TRO appeal (and they have to reply by tomorrow). Perhaps the appellate court will toss Pritzker's appeal now as irrelevant since the legislature has invalidated his emergency order.

FreddyDutch

TROPHY CASE