Hawaii Governor David Ige made a couple of unusually direct appeals to travelers yesterday.
“Tourists should stay away from Hawaii, and residents should restrict travel to essential business only at least through the end of October,” Gov. David Ige said Monday, according to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser.
“I’m asking all residents and visitors alike to restrict travel, curtail travel, to Hawaii to essential activities only,” Ige said.
His comments reflect both concern with the new and dramatically higher levels of new Covid-19 cases, and rising hospitalization numbers which have left some medical facilties filled to capacity. There’s also a concern that while hotels are enjoying relatively high occupancy, visitors are finding restaurants operating at reduced seating capacity, creating long lines and extended waits, while other event venues are again facing strict limits on both indoor and outdoor events and gatherings.
We’ve been hoping to take a long-planned trip to visit friends and family near San Francisco in mid-September, and carefully watching how the current covid spike is playing out in places where we are hoping to spend time. Ige’s call to avoid non-essential recreational travel now puts us on the spot, along with many others, I’m sure.
What’s the proper response? If we ignore the governor’s call, are we aligning ourselves with irresponsible anti-maskers and dangerous anti-vaxxers, and suddenly becoming part of the problem ourselves?
It poses one of those ethical questions. While it may not matter whether we choose to make a less-than-essential trip to the mainland, if everyone makes the same choice, it would probably undercut attempts to get this surge in cases under control.
So how should we be processing the governor’s call to avoid travel?
[Update 8/25/2021: Today I’m cancelling the various parts of our previously planned September trip to California. After considering the different moving parts of the Covid-19 situation, including growing evidence fully vaccinated people can be asymptomatic carriers of the Delta variant–meaning they may not know they are infected but can spread it to others–we decided to heed Governor Ige’s call to defer nonessential travel at this time. Luckily, it’s a disappointment, but not a huge sacrifice for us. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.]
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Today I’m cancelling the various parts of our previously planned September trip to California. After considering the different moving parts of the Covid-19 situation, including growing evidence fully vaccinated people can be asymptomatic carriers of the Delta variant–meaning they may not know they are infected but can spread it to others–we decided to heed Governor Ige’s call to defer nonessential travel at this time. Luckily, it’s a disappointment, but not a huge sacrifice for us. Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
And you get to spend more quality time with the cats!
Thanks for sharing, Ian. I go through a smaller version of this debate every day. There are many regular choices that involve this calculus IMO. Is it okay to dine out? Do I need to go to the store for a few dinner ingredients or should I cook with what I have? Should we go to the beach in Waikiki (close by) or opt for a less crowded beach? Is it okay to have friends over who we haven’t seen in a while? I suppose the point is clear.
The thing that trips me up is that it’s impossible to follow the guidance completely. So then, everyone must find a balance between bending the rules (or advice) and preserving sanity. It’s banal, but a significant stressor.
I found the following content a bit over the top. And a too worn and too frequent narrative.
“Pandemic of the Unvaccinated.”
By your own admission you now realize you are a potential “spreader event”. According to the CDC the virus thrives in the air passages of the vaccinated.
Reminder. With great glee the CDC celebrated that the vaccinated could gather indoors in numbers with no concern for distance. Gee. Wonder what resulted from that?
Then of course a little over a couple weeks ago it was hey sorry bout that. You need to get those masks back on.l
As soon as one is vaccinated one is in receipt of an “imitation infection.” This is the term of art used in How Vaccines Work. At essence you are infected. T-cells respond to the scene of the crime, macrophages are dispatched. And the virus is either succumbing…or….or
That’s right. It’s mutating. As much to the delight of fans the virus is capable of mutating ONLY in an infected host.
BINGO…let’s go back 3 months ago to the CDC encouraged abandonment of all protocols for the vaccinated. No mask, no distance, be inside with as many as you like. To my recollection this about corresponds the Varients. So did the CDC encourage a Super Spreader event? Are the variants a result of the vaccinated? Us each vaccinated individual a potential petri dish for a new and more dangerous variant
Am NOT anti vax. Nor am I anti critical thinking. I just like things to make sense. I keep my distance. Mask up when needed. But resent the vilification and the prescient coercion to compliance. Are we indeed safer. Initially the vaccinated were having outbreak infections but we’re generally escaping hospitalization. That is not the case now. The vaccinated are being hospitalized. 6 weeks ago it was 35,000 per week out of 162 million vaccinated. I do not know what it is today I’m trying to have a life. If Ige locks us down and allows tourism to remain open, and a potential spreader event with each off loaded plane. What then? Yeah. A pandemic if the unvaccinated. Thanks for sitting in.