If you still don't believe in - or care about - COVID, you can go straight to hell
As an immunocompromised individual, throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic, I have essentially lived under a rock, and have had the good fortune to be in a position that I have been able to do so.
My mom, however, is a nurse, and of course did not have the option to hide from COVID-19. She was on the front-lines of this disease from the very beginning. Luckily, however, I did not seem to get my compromised immune system from my mom, and she is one of the healthiest people I know. She is in her early fifties, is an avid hiker, is of a healthy weight, has zero pre-existing conditions, and almost NEVER gets sick. She is the type of person who didn't even let pneumonia slow her down when she had it during a rare bout of illness a few years ago.
This almost wasn't enough to save her from COVID-19.
She contracted COVID-19 after having to bag a patient who was not yet diagnosed with the virus, but who later passed away from it. Because of her excellent health, and her history of easily fighting off illness, I honestly really wasn't all that concerned. After all, she fit NONE of the criteria of at-risk individuals spouted over and over again by the media. My assumptions couldn't have been more wrong. She was the sickest she had ever been in her whole life. She broke out in a blistering, painful rash from head to toe. She had to sleep upright to breathe. She couldn't eat. She took her blood pressure periodically, and it kept dropping to levels BARELY high enough to sustain a heart beat.
And as she is suffering at home, horrifically ill from this illness exacerbated by blatant lies and indifference, an illness that she had, for months, dedicated all of her time combatting, as her blood pressure was dropping lower and lower - and she knows what this means, because as a nurse on the frontlines she has seen patient after patient spiral the drain in this exact same manner while fighting this disease - as she is CRYING to my stepdad, "I don't want to die, I don't want to die," she was STILL more concerned about the lives of others than her own, and refused to go to the hospital and "take a bed away from someone else." "Someone else," who, in my opinion, likely ended up in that position as a result of their own or another's willful ignorance. But that is the type of person she is.
Thankfully, I can say "IS" instead of "WAS"
She made it. But she is still dealing with the repercussions of this illness. For months, she could no longer be the avid-outdoorsman that she once was (though this didn't stop her from trying), she couldn't go up a simple flight of stairs without feeling like she was going to pass out, she couldn't lift anything even remotely heavy. This illness completely took away her autonomy. She went through severe depression, wondering if she ever was going to be the same. Six or so months later, my mom's heart is FINALLY starting to recover.
This is my MOTHER. The mother of three children, and grandmother of four, who love and adore her. This is our best friend, our advocate, our rock, not to mention our only parent. This is the person who goes with my grandma to all of her medical appointments to ensure she is adequately advocated for as a patient and to ensure that she is receiving proper treatment. This is the person who does so even after coming off of an evening nursing shift and getting absolutely no sleep. This is the person who takes care of everyone else before herself, even as she was literally DYING.
These are our mothers, our sisters and brothers, grandparents, friends, loved ones. LOVED.
And if you think that is okay, if you think that is a consequence of you having all the conveniences in the world that you had prior to COVID, if you think that her life and the lives of others like her who weren't as fortunate to have made it are expendable so you can go to a fucking bar, you can go straight to hell.
How dare you.
Edit:
In response to the "Blame China" comment- not sure whether it was facetious or not, but because this does seem to be a genuinely common opinion so it warrants stating this in the main post:
"Blame China!" i.e. "It's not my fault, so how I respond is entirely also not my fault!" Do you hear yourself?? Where is that personal responsibility you love so much? You DO BEAR RESPONSIBILITY for the way you REACT to something even if that something wasn't YOUR fault! It's called being a decent, responsible human.
Selfish. So selfish.
Edit 2:
Man, I should not have opened this can of worms while procrastinating studying for a test, I really did not expect this to blow up like this. But I do very much have to study for a test, and if I continue paying attention to this, I'm sure I will go down an hours-long rabbit hole, so I will try my best to respond more when I am able.
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