This week, the hammer came down on COVID-19 mandates. I’ve been seeing it coming for weeks.
I’m talking about more than the bar and restaurant mandate locally. If you want to attend a Huskies game, a Seahawks game, a Kraken game, a Storm game, a Sounders game, and yes, even a Cougars game, you have to show your vaccination card — with the caveat (for now) that at the outdoor sporting events, people can show proof of a negative COVID-19 test within 72 hours of the game.
If the Mariners make it to the October postseason, you will also have to be vaccinated to attend a Seattle playoff game. No word on whether a negative COVID test will be good enough yet for T-Mobile Park.
And at all of these venues, you have to be masked at all times.
Added to these mandates are some new ones that flew under the radar a bit. More concert venues in Seattle, including Climate Pledge Arena, are requiring proof of vaccination. If you want to see a big show in Seattle during the next few months, be prepared to show your vaccination status.
I’ve been telling people for months to expect this. And to expect more employers to require vaccination. And to expect more insurance companies to begin charging higher premiums to people who choose to remain unvaccinated.
Delta Airlines has already done this to the tune of $200 a month for its employees. Honestly, I’m surprised more insurers haven’t already done this. They charge higher premiums for smokers and people who are overweight. I think they’re waiting for more full FDA approvals of vaccines.
What I keep wondering is … how did people not see this coming? How are they surprised by it? The infection rate both locally and statewide has been climbing, climbing, climbing for weeks, to levels we didn’t remotely see in 2020. My gosh, seven COVID-19 deaths were reported Wednesday on the Olympic Peninsula.
Wrap your head around that.
Seven. Deaths. In. One. Day.
Not in Seattle. Not in Tacoma. Here.
This is not normal. It is not OK.
What is it going to take for some people to get it? This is a crisis. The health care system is at a breaking point.
Honestly, if you’re so determined to not get vaccinated, you can sit outside on a nice deck at a few places locally and enjoy the sun and warm fall weather with your beer or burger. You can get takeout. Really, in the grand scheme of things, it isn’t much of a sacrifice. People gave up a lot more than that during World War II and during the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic.
And it’s temporary. Hopefully, not more than a few months. However long it takes for delta to burn itself out. Because this is a crisis.
If people are unable to care about what’s best for society, if they’re unable to think beyond their own nose, I say to them: OK, if you’re determined to remain unvaccinated, even though people have been getting safely vaccinated for nine months now with no major side effects, whatever, it’s your body and your choice.
But you will be sacrificing your ability to go to a Mariners game, a Seahawks game, a Kraken game, a Sounders game, a Huskies game, live concerts in Seattle, etc. You can’t go to Canada, either. At least for the foreseeable future. You’re making a choice to segregate yourself from the rest of society to in order to make some kind of point … about something. What that is, I’m really not sure anymore.
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Sports Editor Pierre LaBossiere can be contacted a plabossiere@peninsuladailynews.com.
