A New Source Of Coronavirus Spread: 'Covid-19 Parties'

[appalachiablue]

Source: New York Times

SEATTLE — A county in Washington State dealing with a coronavirus outbreak has identified a confounding new source of spread: “Covid-19 parties” organized so that people can deliberately mingle with an infected person in the hope of getting their own illness out of the way.

Meghan Debolt, the director of community health for Walla Walla County, said Wednesday that county investigators had learned of two such parties in the area that occurred in recent weeks. Two people who went to one of the parties, which included at least 20 attendees, have since become sick and tested positive for the virus.

The discovery astounded local leaders who had been working in recent weeks to contain a large outbreak at a meat processing facility in the area. “We want to be able to start to reopen our community,” Ms. Debolt said in an interview. “But if our community isn’t practicing proper physical distancing and social distancing guidelines, and they are intentionally trying to go and contract Covid-19, that sets us back pretty far from being able to open.”

The prospect of infection parties for people who wish to quickly contract the disease in the hope of gaining immunity has been a fear among some health experts because the country has a long history of people choosing purposeful infection. Health officials, for example, worked in the past to halt chickenpox parties at which parents sought to expose their unvaccinated children to the disease. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in those cases said it “strongly recommends against hosting or participating in these events"...


Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/06/us/coronavirus-covid-parties.html

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The '2 Covid-19 parties' held in Washington State are believed to be the first events to be confirmed by public health officials who are working to avoid, not transmit the rapid spread of an illness linked to more than 72,000 deaths in the U.S. despite widespread stay-at-home mandates.

Ms. Debolt said the 2 people who became ill after attending one of the parties in the Walla Walla area were young and have not needed hospital care. They informed health investigators that they figured they would be able to quickly recover from the virus, apparently not considering that they could then spread it to others more vulnerable to serious health effects or death.

“They feel really bad now, knowing that they put families and friends and others at risk,” Ms. Debolt said...
________________________

~ Not 'considering,' not thinking and not caring-- reality.

[C Moon]

1. Selfish idiots.

We know someone who's husband (30's) had COVID-19: he didn't need to be hospitalized, but had a 101 fever for 21 days (last we heard); the wife and son had to stay away from him until he was better. The wife and son were also told not to go out.

What kind of idiot wants to deal with that when all you have to do is stay home?

[appalachiablue]

5. Selfish, reckless endangerment of others lives.

That man had a very strong family to have followed those restrictions and survive. Bravo to them.

[WheelWalker]

6. "Covidiots"

[madaboutharry]

2. Some people are just f***ing stupid.

It has always been that way.

[yuiyoshida]

14. I suspect this may fall under the meme of

the darwin awards.

[benld74]

3. Guess they are caught the stoopids b4 attending

[IronLionZion]

4. A friend in his 30s has COVID-19

it caused blood clots all over him, including his lungs requiring hospitalization. It affects people very differently and is not something for "getting their own illness out of the way". Young people have gotten strokes, heart attacks, and died from it already.

[CountAllVotes]

7. Good God!

What the hell next?

This is so damned exhausting, all of it.

I think I give up for the nights.

Cheers everyone and stay well would y'all?

CountAllVotes

[Initech]

10. I give up.

Shit like this is why people are preparing for this thing to stick around for eternity and that we'll be social distancing forever.

Sometimes the best remedy is a nice beer and to sit back and watch the madness unfold.

[yuiyoshida]

16. Not sure about the beer...

But Weed does help.

[Initech]

19. Thank god I live not too far from a dispensary!

We're going to need a lot of that to get through this!

[yuiyoshida]

20. Not only is my dispensary still growing and selling weed

its delivering it too!

[olddad65]

21. Trump warriors. Surprised he isn't encouraging this.

[Wawannabe]

8. My mother

Took us over to her sister’s house when my cousin got chickenpox. They wanted us to be exposed all at the same time. Yep. I got the chicken pox.

I don’t know if it is the thing to do but that is what they did.

[yuiyoshida]

17. Maybe for Chicken pox (For kids)

but this stuff is 6x worse than the flu. 6 TIMES!

[stopdiggin]

22. kinda stupid on the chicken pox front as well

let's not be providing any cover for sh*t-for-brains. They don't need the "understanding".. or encouragement!

--- -- -- ---

[yuiyoshida]

25. Trump wouldn't understand a virus even if

it RENTED A TRUCK AND RAN HIM OVER.

[wnylib]

30. It used to be common practice before

there was a vaccine for chicken pox. Children were expected to get chicken pox, measles, and mumps before reaching puberty. The concern was that a serious case after puberty could cause sterility. Also, a if a pregnant woman got measles, it could harm the fetus. The most common side effect for a fetus was deafness, but there were others, including miscarriage or still birth.

Before the vaccines, these illnesses were so common that it was assumed everyone would get them sooner or later. It was better to get them in early childhood to develop immunity and be protected from the harm they caused to adults. Under the circumstances of the times, it was the best that people could do. Those illnesses were harder on adults. Children were more resilient.

I had all 3 by the time I got to first grade. I still have two barely visible scars from chicken pox, one at the end of my nose, and one just above one eyebrow.

[Wawannabe]

32. Thanks

Felt like people thought I was advocating. Wasn’t. Just stating facts of what happened when I was a kid.

[forgotmylogin]

33. My parents did that as well.

https://www.discovery.com/science/Chickenpox-So-Much-Worse-Adults-Than-Kids

Everybody knows that you need to get the chickenpox when you're young. Once you've had it, you can never catch it again, and it's way worse for adults than it is for little children — it can even be deadly, and your risks only increase the older you get. But wait ... pretty much every other disease affects small children worse than healthy adults. So what makes chickenpox so special?

[LibinMo]

43. I didn't catch Chickenpox until I was 30 and 6 months pregnant

Believe me, it was not fun. My 6 year daughter and I had it at he same time. I was an only child and my Mom was "nasty clean" so I never caught it as a child. I wish I had.

[Turbineguy]

9. There's a certain attraction

to having the anti-bodies.

But there's still a lot we don't know.

[Wawannabe]

35. Hey

[Turbineguy]

39. :

[TeamPooka]

11. Just play Russian Roulette instead. It's faster and less painful.

[Igel]

36. One in 6,

versus one in a thousand or more.

Risk depends on age. Low age, low risk. Over 70, you're seriously screwed, and that really skews the average.

[calimary]

12. Sounds like a death wish to me.

Whether they realize it or not.

[Warpy]

13. This used to be the strategy for usual childhood diseases

Let the kid catch them and get them out of the way. My mother did it to me and antivaxers are doing it to their kids. My mother finally stopped when I was six and masles almost killed me and did kill the kid I caught it from.

These dimwits will. not. get. the. point. This disease is a potential killer and we don't yet know what the real risk factors are, beyond advanced age with multiple health problems.

[stopdiggin]

23. sorry for your experience

and glad that you learned .. and are (attempting) to pass that knowledge on.
Thank you.
--- ---

[Hekate]

15. IDIOTS. I blame the anti-vaxxers, who pass around the fables of 1950s "chicken pox parties"...

...to "get it out of the way." They think all those childhood diseases were/are benign. Never mind old graveyards chock full of little graves from one epidemic after another.

Gods help us all. Please.

[TomCADem]

18. Also Known as Anti-Lockdown Protests

It sometimes seems like we are heading to the American dark ages with the distrust of facts and science and the trust in evangelicals and Trump.

[Sin]

28. Heading I think we passed that threshold already.

All the snake-oil salesmen are starting to jump on that bandwagon as well and it's self feeding cycle Chiropractors, holistic health pseudoscience and all other manner of hucksters taped into the Q anon base because they are a pack of gullible rubes.
All they need to do is look like they believe their crazy ideas while hocking their products or patron accounts.
Heck they even further elaborate into the crazy so it makes it look like what they are selling is the answer or cure and it's getting worse every dam day.
The internet has changed how fast we learn and think. Unfortunately it has also kicked the spread stupidity up to speed of light as well.

[Jack-o-Lantern]

24. Why did they go to all the trouble of hosting parties to get the virus...

when all they had to do was drink bleach and inject Lysol to protect themselves?

[rpannier]

26. Gee, they feel really bad

Wonder how much that means to the people they've infected.

[Sloumeau]

27. If they are going to insist on doing this,

I hope they limit these parties to "Trump Fans Only".

[tanyev]

29. May the odds be ever in their favor.

[CountAllVotes]

31. The picture at the bottom of your post

I absolutely LOVE LOVE LOVE it!

(lol!!!!!!)

Don the Corona King Con!

[appalachiablue]

34. Borrowed from another DUer, it's wild

[CountAllVotes]

38. If you don't mind, I'll *borrow* it too!

Thanks!

[appalachiablue]

41. Go for it!

[CountAllVotes]

42. +1

Thanks I will use it believe me!

[Neerav B. Trivedi]

37. It's time to authorize the use of lethal force

Either you follow the law or you die......simple as that.

[madville]

40. Seriously? Don't tell the cops in Jersey City NJ

There’s video of white officers beating a black man with a baton as they tried to break up a group of 100 people in the street who were “not following social distancing guidelines” according to the police.

You would prefer they just roll up and start shooting? I’m sure some would be happy to do that.

[abakan]

44. Oh well!

Stupidity proves to be more contagious than the virus. Whatever happened to common sense?