Tell me

[Nathan]

It's been a little over a year since COVID-19 changed the world and put everyone on lockdown.

I wanted to ask the community where you are from and what your experience has been?

Personally, I'm in the US and the US is definitely split into several camps with some being anti-maskers/anti-vaxxers and also those who are on the extreme other side who like living in a constant fear. My family and I ended up contracting COVID-19 in June 2020. It sucked. We ended up recovering but the linger effect of not being able to smell and have a hard time breathing did last longer than a month for us.

I unfortunately know of several people who have passed away due to complications with COVID. I think it's really real and pre-cautions should be made. But I also didn't like the way the government handled it.

Tell me about your experience.

[Gregersen]

Hello Nathan,
Sad to hear about your experience with coronavirus - happy to know that you have recovered and are doing well.

I live in Denmark, it's pretty much seperated into 3 groups..
The anti-mask/anti-vacine people
The neutral people
The afraid people

... I have only known four people, personally, who were infected with COVID, two of them with absolutely no effects (elderly couple), and two younger ones (20-30 y/o's) who both lost the possibility of tasting.

Personally, I am not afraid in any way - I see myself being neutral but respecting people who might be afraid, and I can also understand the people who are on the ANTI side. I don't know what to believe anylonger.
I'll jump onto your last sentence, our government has also handled it incorrectly.

It's there, no doubt.
What it is? No clue.
Will it ever go away? Doubt.
Must we adapt and live with COVID? Possibly, I believe we must.

Respect other people and their opinions, is my best advice. Do your business, but respect others. Stay safe. 

[JDC]

COVID-19 is real and proven by sound science. The anti-maskers / anti-vaxxers are stupid for not only disregarding sound science and health practices, but because they truly believe their convenience and 'muh fReEdoM' is more important than the right of other people to not get sick and die from COVID-19. IMO anyone who encourages others to violate health protocols and freely infect others should be thrown in jail.

The government here in the Philippines (under the madman Duterte, incompetent puppet of the country that started this pandemic) has handled the pandemic VERY poorly, turning us into the epicentre of COVID in the ASEAN. It doesn't help that a lot of people here have decided to be forgetful idiots too. So by now, when going outside, I carry around an umbrella I use to push doors and elevator buttons, enforce social distancing, and whack idiots who refuse to follow safety guidelines. (I've already whacked / prodded a few!) I haven't caught the virus at any point due to extreme vigilance, and hope I never do, especially since I also know people who died from COVID.

It does not help that the government dropped a good Pfizer deal in favor of the more overpriced, much less effective vaccine Sinovac, produced by the same country that started the pandemic. I believe in vaccines, just not distributing shitty ones with a ~50% efficacy rate. So I'll be going out of my way to procure something like Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, or AstraZeneca - all of which are far better.

[danipoz]

I live in Serbia and people are here seperated in 3 groups aswell. Anti-vacine people, The neutral ones that wear masks and follow some  of the guidelines and the people that are afraid and strictly follow guidelines but there are not a lot of them. Nobody in my family had covid but many of my coworkers, neigbours and some friends had it. One of my family friends died due to complications from his previous diseases that he had. The anti-vacine people are mostly againts the president and the party that he is in mostly because of some corruption, even tho the country has seen some development under him unlike previous presidents. Im neutral in the politics but i've seen some improvement. Mass vaccination is already present. The president is encouraging people to take the vaccine by giving away small amounts of money to people that get it. Also some bigger companies pay you to get the vaccine which leads the anti-vaccine people to enrage on social media because the president is 'buying' the people and risking their lives because of the vaccine which makes no sense.. They question how can Serbia a small country pay their people to get the vaccine but the more developed countries are not even mass vaccinating and how do we get so many vaccines but other countries dont have that many vaccines ( you can even choose which out of the 4 or 5 different vaccines you want). Anti-vaccine people just bring politics into this pandemic, this last sentence sums everything up. I am vaccinated with the Pfizer vaccine.

[Rei]

We here in Albania, none of us giving a damn or getting infected and suffering critical outcomes from Covid, so there's room in our mind to ask ourselves a question, the heck happen to IKHM, and why he's not a division leader anymore?

[Sawyer]

It's less than a week that everything is back to normal here in Greece, or at least close to normal, all of a sudden now that summer is almost here. What a coincidence, now most of the COVID cases are halved until September/October, which by then everyone's going to be infected once more. 

I'm one of those anti-maskers / anti-vaxxers and even though I believe in the existence of the virus, I don't believe in the drama that has been caused the last year worldwide. We had several other pandemics over the course of years most recently the H1N1 flu (which by the way was even more deadly), I cannot recall such shitstorm going on and basically the whole world being quarantined.

I've met plenty of people infected including a couple of elderly family members, nobody was nowhere near passing away and it was your 3-4 days flu that you usually have once or twice a year. Big deal. And no, I haven't known anyone passing away. Sadly it feels like we're not done yet and as much as I hate to admit it, this mess is going to drag longer.

I, by all means, am against the COVID vaccines. I do not want immunity to something I do not feel threatened from. I do not trust an emergency vaccine that was released in less than a year, while all of the other ones of similar kind took decades to be out there. I seriously am way more afraid of the side effects than the virus itself.

Anything involving politics, governments and media spreading fear all over, I choose not to trust and beg to differ.  You should do the same.

I hope you are all sharp and safe, been sometime I've dropped a bomb here on forums. 

[TheGreasyChopper]

Unfortunately out here the majority take the whole situation as a big conspiracy of the government in order to drain resources. I suppose all the other countries suffering are only reporting that so some people in here can grab some quick cash from the EU 

Working in the Clinical Trial/Research sphere has put a lot of weights on my back, as this pandemic has shortened a majority of schedules and deadlines by half if not more. Thankfully the majority of results of the treatment/vaccines I've worked on have shown positive results and I hope they become available to the public as soon as possible.

Stay positive and test negative ya'll 

[Chase]

It saddens me to the core that here in the US, we have become so politically divided that things as simple as wearing masks or not wearing masks have become politicized. So yeah, we're fucked and things are only going to get worse before they get better.

[Khm]

People in Tunisia are just stupid and ignorant. The experience has been absolutely terrible and the government is not able to do anything. People here in Tunisia took it further than being divided to antivaxxers and antimaskers. They know there's a pandemic, they know that they can get killed by it but they refuse to do anything. If the government takes measures to reduce the high rates of infection (reached 40% of daily tests being positive at some point), people protest and do not abide by the measures. If the government does nothing, people shit on the government for not doing anything and being incapable. Barely anyone wears a mask when they are in public, even the police people even refuse to quarantine when they test positive. Shops, transportation, bazaars, bars, schools, universities, casinos are all as packed as before covid. Even football hasn't stopped. The factories that produce oxygen have reached their limits, hospitals are over capacity since long ago (they reached to the point where they have to choose who to put next in the ICU). Vaccination is also going at a very slow pace.
Last year the government imposed a 2-month lockdown and reached 0 cases for almost the whole summer, until they opened borders to TUNISIAN tourists that brought the virus back because they refused to quarantine for 2 weeks. (the government wasn't intending to open the borders until people started protesting since they "missed" their relatives in others countries and want to meet them again...).

As for me personally, a lot of my family members got infected and a lot of them died which took a toll on the whole family. This pandemic isn't ending any time soon as the virus is mutating faster than the vaccination rates, which will render these vaccines useless at some point..

the heck happen to IKHM, and why he's not a division leader anymore?

I resigned as I do not have the luxury of time anymore, nothing bad happened.

[Sawyer]

It saddens me to the core that here in the US, we have become so politically divided that things as simple as wearing masks or not wearing masks have become politicized. So yeah, we're fucked and things are only going to get worse before they get better.

It could have been simple if it was a personal choice of the people. Once you force everyone in wearing a crappy mask which most of the time is carrying the virus itself due to not being washed correctly or simply being used more than it should be, then yes, it is politicized (if that's even a word).

I've had a couple of arguments with grandpas in the streets lecturing me of how I am not supposed to take out my mask while I am having a quick snack. Guess what. Do not go out shopping random crap or just taking a walk during the so called lockdown if you are so afraid of being infected. Now that's pretty simple.

COVID being true and present is one thing, brainwashing the entire universe as if humanity is in danger is another. It's only a flu that 90 percent of the time you end up recovering. Why no politicians, government officials and media-related workers ALL across the globe have been extremely healthy and have constantly been 24/7 on our screens non-stop telling us what we can and cannot do? I guess being a corrupt prick and a scandalous bitch makes you immune after all.

I'm sick of hearing death cases being addressed as COVID being the cause. My uncle passed away after years of trouble with his heart condition and even though he he ended up having a successful open heart surgery three months ago, he had a heart attack and died 3 days after the surgery, so much for successful. Guess what was the official cause of death.. COVID. 

It's a Goura kind of scam. Or to give any doubters the benefit of the doubt; it has become a scam.

[Aca]

I am vaccinated with the Pfizer vaccine.

[badboy.dhia]

The picture says it all.
Welcom to Tunisia 

[Khm]

It saddens me to the core that here in the US, we have become so politically divided that things as simple as wearing masks or not wearing masks have become politicized. So yeah, we're fucked and things are only going to get worse before they get better.

Why no politicians, government officials and media-related workers ALL across the globe have been extremely healthy and have constantly been 24/7 on our screens non-stop telling us what we can and cannot do? I guess being a corrupt prick and a scandalous bitch makes you immune after all.

To be real, a lot of them died across the globe. President of Tanzania died of COVID (this president said that the virus does not exist and did not take any measures to counter it, results are; he died at the age of 61 because of the virus and there's a new dangerous variant of COVID found in Tanzania), some members of parliaments died in Iran and an ex member died in Tunisia ( a lot of them got sick and recovered though). A known public personality in Egypt also died of COVID but to be honest you can't compare the rich with middle and lower classes, they'd pay anything to get the best treatment and they won't tell you obviously . However COVID is that dangerous, the issue of it isn't the visible cold-like symptoms it's the amount of oxygen that it blocks from the whole body which is why people with other diseases die of it as their bodies already suffer from these sicknesses and are barely hanging to be literally choked to death part by part all over the body, some of my friends although young still have symptoms of low oxygenation in blood and are always tired (due to the low oxygen levels in their muscles).

I am vaccinated with the Pfizer vaccine.

Good for you, congratulations.

[Thom]

The problem with the whole modern world is unreliability. Not just corona, the whole world. Here in Greece our media are heavily biased to the guidelines of the government, I know like 10 people or more who had the corona and none of them died other than one who was in a bad state but is overweight with unhealthy lifestyle and mid 50's. However, I've heard 5-7(not by media from my social circle) cases of people dying after the vaccine, usually after the 2nd dose. Specifically, my gf's grandpa whose last general exams were 6 months before after the 2nd dose of Pfizer he was dizzy for 3 days and eventually passed out and now is in clinic with greater of possibility of passing away.

Unfortunately, the whole situation doesn't seem worth the lockdowns. Worth the safety yes, worth the attention yes. Media is heavily exaggerating, nobody who is official recognises the benefit of doubt in this situation who is sketchy to the very core. However, my biggest concern isn't the safety of the vaccine, or how dangerous corona is.. but the fact that a global crisis arises and people have no respected trustworthy source of learning the unbiased truth. Our media is compromised, our officials are biased, the internet is as chaotic as ever to be fully trusted and that's what makes anti-vaxxers. Here our lead scientist of the pandemic, said 2 months before the first lockdown that corona is normal flu and that if you look at the yearly statistics of deaths due to flu you'd be suprised that every year we have a "pandemic".. Now, neither globally and in greece too our health officials haven't published yearly deaths due to flu and in USA it's zero. So the flu suddendly dissappeared.. I feel sorry for people who won't think the situation through and are running to get blood clots in their body because they've been told so.

The whole situation is sketchy and my opinion is that you can't not be careful with the godly solution that suddendly comes from the skies to answer our prayers. So, vaccinated/netrual/anti-vaxxers I respect all those who sweat their minds and are in search for an unbiased truth, otherwise no matter which 3 of those you are, you are a sheep.

Cause obviously, truth differs from country to country because most of the EU countries suspended AstraZeneca but greece officials and media claim that there's no need for concern.. When the company itself advised to suspend vaccinations under their product until they investigate the issue.

Coronavirus or not, this world saddens me cause it gives power to those who are corrupted.

[Pokedude]

Glad to know you're all fine and doing well.

India is going through a nightmare right now. Due to the population, the virus evolved in ways worse than before. The new strains are all double mutated and very deadly. In comparison, the original strain deteriorated a victim's health in no less than a week however, the new strain only takes 3 days at max to take its toll. The mortality rate is rising. People are unable to get beds and oxygen tanks in hospitals. Hospitals getting greedy and charging excessive money for their services, for instance, a police officer was charged 10k rupees for a 4 KM ambulance ride. Ambulance rides are usually free in the country. People are committing suicide out of fear, depression. Mental health is on a downward spiral for many and most but nobody is paying any heed to it.

My advice: Be with your people and support each other mentally. Take things seriously, take your vaccinations, stay at home, wear a mask.
Be sure to take all necessary precautions so that you may not go through what our nation is suffering through right now.

Personal experience: My own father was on the brink of death. He barely escaped. Oxygen saturation dropped to 60%. He spent 14 days in the CCU.
However, he's doing fine right now, almost recovered. As of today, he has been shifted to an isolation ward and out of ICU.
If things go well, he'll be back home by Wednesday!


Be well. Take care of yourself and your people. Peace.