I try not to mix my TV job with my blogging, but something happened during an interview this week that I can’t get out of my head.
The interview was with Clara Reynolds of the Crises Center of Tampa Bay. We were talking to her about Covid fatigue and kids going back to school.
Clara is great. One of my favorite people. One of my favorite people to interview. She just gets it.
Toward the end, I asked Clara about the calls coming into the Crises Center. It’s always a good barometer of where we are.
She told me they had 31 suicide calls in one day. The most ever. 31. It stunned me. I kinda lost it. That’s an indication of how people are struggling right now. Covid fatigue is real.
It’s understandable, too. I look at these numbers in Hillsborough County. It now has over 12,000 students and teachers in quarantine. That’s about five percent of the entire district.
So far, Hillsborough is the only local district to defy Governor DeSantis’ ban on masks in schools. Sarasota could be next. The school board meets today to discuss a potential mask mandates.
I saw this in the Washington Post. It had a story that had previously been the Tampa Bay Times.
An obituary for a gentleman named Clark Allen. He died recently at 84 over in Lantana, Florida.
Mr. Clark was fully vaccinated, but contracted Covid anyway. A breakthrough case. His two daughters wrote this in his obituary:
“He was infected by someone who chose to not get vaccinated and his death was preventable. It is the wish of his family that everyone get vaccinated in order to prevent further death, sickness and heartbreak.”
How and where Mr. Clark contracted Covid is still unclear. It’s a good indicator to me though that we can’t let our guard down right now. The Delta variant is everywhere. It’s far more contagious than what we dealt with last year.
I’m heading into the weekend. Fully vaccinated and masked up. Back in my bubble. When will this end?
I am furious when I watch the mothers & fathers at meetings saying their children “will not” wear masks. They are putting nonsense into their children’s heads as well. If there is something we can do to prevent illness & possibly death, we should do it….Do these same people think if they run into traffic they’ll be okay too? Same thing!!!
Russ, Ive been your fan since your first day on 13. it wasn’t FOX then was it? As I’ve told who ever would listen, we’ve had 13 on in our house almost from the beginning. yours not mine. I remember sitting around the beautiful radio we had and then walking to my Sunday School teacher’s on Saturday night (in the dark) to watch TV for an hour or so. Don’t know if that was 13, but I do know not too long after we got our TV and it was set on 13 most all the time. I’ve lived in my house since the day I was born, 79 years ago. Don’t know why I thought I needed to share all that. But I wanted you to know how much I enjoy your blogs. I’ve not read much or anything I disagree with. Often wonder what happened to Anne. Take care and please be safe.
Thank you so much. You go a long way back with me. I feel like you are an old friend. Take care.