Coronavirus (university, shop, rail)

[goodheathen]

Originally Posted by sav858

There's no reason vaccinated employees should have to wear masks though.

Vaccines aren't magic bullets. People can still catch COVID-19 if vaccinated, especially as it wears off many months later or if the virus variant is particularly nasty or the vaccine itself is the less effective Johnson & Johnson kind. Scientists haven't even ruled out transmission from fully vaccinated people. As such, there's workplace outbreak potential unless the vaccination rate is very high. Even if CalOSHA weren't going to require masks, many employers wouldn't want that risk and would require masks anyway. I guess CalOSHA might allow fully vaccinated employees to be unmasked if they work in physically separate departments.

[sav858]

Originally Posted by CA4Now

From the article you posted above: "the presence of one unvaccinated person in a room full of otherwise vaccinated employees would mean everyone has to don a mask."

Ok? I said there is no reason they should have to wear one. Obviously I'm pointing out how it's unnecessary they are making vaccinated people do so.

[sav858]

Originally Posted by goodheathen

Vaccines aren't magic bullets. People can still catch COVID-19 if vaccinated, especially as it wears off many months later or if the virus variant is particularly nasty or the vaccine itself is the less effective Johnson & Johnson kind. Scientists haven't even ruled out transmission from fully vaccinated people. As such, there's workplace outbreak potential unless the vaccination rate is very high. Even if CalOSHA weren't going to require masks, many employers wouldn't want that risk and would require masks anyway. I guess CalOSHA might allow fully vaccinated employees to be unmasked if they work in physically separate departments.

The chances are negligible and should not be guiding any policy.

I'd be willing to bet we are the only or one of the few states that will unnecessarily have this requirement.

[wac_432]

I don't see why it's such a big deal. If my employer wants me to wear a mask, Stetson, and clown nose, I'll happily do so, as long as I'm getting paid.

Complaining about OSHA mask rules sounds a bit like whining that one can't wear Birkenstocks on the shop floor.

[sav858]

Originally Posted by wac_432

I don't see why it's such a big deal. If my employer wants me to wear a mask, Stetson, and clown nose, I'll happily do so, as long as I'm getting paid.

Complaining about OSHA mask rules sounds a bit like whining that one can't wear Birkenstocks on the shop floor.

Except that actually has a safety justification behind it.

If you want to wear one go ahead but don't see why people who don't need to wear one should be forced to.

[goodheathen]

For the people who want to listen, it's simply the principle of herd immunity on a smaller scale. That and the fact that most offices have not been open since early last year. Nobody should assume that COVID-19 is over when the work world hasn't returned to normal and only a small majority of adults are fully vaccinated.

[sav858]

Looks like the doomsayers were wrong again:

COVID-19 cases declined at 'virtually the same rate' after CDC mask guidance

Despite fears that the CDC's mask reversal could potentially lead to a COVID-19 spike, cases in the United States remain in decline.

In the weeks since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that fully vaccinated people mostly don't need to wear masks or socially distance anymore, new COVID-19 cases "have continued to decline at virtually the same rate as during the month before the" announcement, The New York Times' David Leonhardt wrote Wednesday. New COVID-19 cases have been down by almost 75 percent since the middle of April, the Times noted, and the seven-day average recently declined to less than 20,000 for the first time since March 2020.

[CA4Now]

Originally Posted by wac_432

I don't see why it's such a big deal. If my employer wants me to wear a mask, Stetson, and clown nose, I'll happily do so, as long as I'm getting paid.

Agreed.

[CA4Now]

Originally Posted by sav858

Looks like the doomsayers were wrong again:

COVID-19 cases declined at 'virtually the same rate' after CDC mask guidance

[i]Despite fears that the CDC's mask reversal could potentially lead to a COVID-19 spike, cases in the United States remain in decline.

From your article: "A crucial point is that the loosened guidelines probably did not cause many people to change their behavior in ways that created new risks," (The New York Times' David) Leonhardt writes. "Vaccinated people went maskless more often, but they are extremely unlikely to get the virus. And even before the CDC change, many unvaccinated Americans were already not wearing masks, particularly in Republican-leaning communities."

And the NYT study quoted in your article is about the entire country; not California. For example in the last 14 days, California's confirmed virus case rate per 100 K is 48.3, contrasting that with, say Florida, at 145.5. CA death rate per 100 K: 1.4; Florida, 3.1

[wac_432]

Originally Posted by sav858

Except that actually has a safety justification behind it.

If you want to wear one go ahead but don't see why people who don't need to wear one should be forced to.

Believe me, there are a whole slew of more annoying, productivity-reducing, and dumber CalOSHA rules than wearing a cloth or paper mask during a pandemic, vaccinated or not.