Dear Caminoheads,
Yesterday post, and specially the last paragraph speaking about COVID vaccination brought up lost of comments and while as pilgrims, we appreciate difference, and work daily towards being open-minded and tolerant, and all those good attributes, when it comes to taking care of the others and ourselves, we do not have grey areas: SAFETY IS FIRST.
Steve-O put it in a comment very eloquently, (talking about the Oasis or for what matters, coming to visit Phil or anyone, really):
“In this case, it could be a life and death issue for even vaccinated people who can still contract the Delta variant. People who are elderly or compromised by sickness, including the original Caminohead, are extremely vulnerable. To infect them is to risk their lives, and anybody can be a carrier.”
Phil was very clear himself when he spoke about the Oasis: he and Rebecca drew a line on this matter and asked for vaccinated people only at the Oasis, and it is the responsibility of each of us to make it happen. There is enough going on already in the world and in the ranch to add one more worry. The Oasis is a celebration.
Some of you may know that I have another job in addition to being the Caminoheads South American Bureau Chief. Not that I am complaining about the salaries that The Boss pays, but while I live in a third world country, I still need to have a second job to make my ends meet. My day job is in the area of clinical research, which is the area in medicine dedicated to the development of new treatments. Many of my work colleagues, the most knowledgeable of them, had to stop doing the research they were doing to dedicate their time to study, learn, observe, think and work on COVID research. And many of us had to pick up their projects so they could continue and add it to our full schedule, so as to free their time for them to be dedicated to the virus research. The vaccines are the result of the thousands and thousands and thousands of neurons working for thousands and thousands and thousands of hours. I have never been busier in my whole life. This is nothing to praise, this is what we do for a living and we are lucky enough to be in a position of privilege to contribute to the management of the pandemic.
You can contribute too. Getting the vaccine at this point is the best way to contribute. If you have questions or doubts and have not had the chance to discuss them with anyone, feel free to email me at [email protected] and I will do my best to provide you with reliable information. (I even attended a class this past Thursday to learn more about the delta variant and reply with more knowledge to one of you who emailed me specifically asking “how do I know it is safe?”)
As said, there are no grey areas here: The attendance to the “face to face” Oasis will be for COVID FULL VACCINATED people.
Scientific Loves,
Cris
Great post Cris and amen to that!
I’m off to Spain on Saturday, god willing. Here most folks still are wearing masks, but on my FB Camino groups there’s definitely a thing amongst some younger folks about my body, my choice. It has left me rather nervous.
I’ll be thinking of you all, esp you, Ron, Anne and of course Felipe.
Much love
Yes be careful as about 350 of the people who got it in Provincetown,Massachusetts where vaccinated.A big outbreak in Nanjing,China too.Come October here in the northern hemisphere we’ll have flu and the common cold to contend with too and we are missing two years immunity to them.These Lymphomas and probably other cancers too suppress the immune system by,in the case of Lymphoma, damaging the ability of the body to drain virus, bacteria, etc..
sadly no vaccines available yet for the under 12 set so we will leave the kids at home (they are very sad about this but I’ve promised to bring them back an ear of corn each if there’s spare and a jar of blackberries, and they’ve done some Phil’s Camino artwork decorations for the party ♥️♥️♥️)