Earlier today, the New York Times’ David Leonhardt had a must-read piece (truly) and thread on the real COVID crisis for children.
American children are starting 2022 in crisis.
I'm not sure that many people fully grasp the depth of it.
— David Leonhardt (@DLeonhardt) January 4, 2022
Mary Katharine Ham, herself a mom of three, followed up on Leonhardt’s thread with a must-read thread of her own:
Many grasped it long ago. “Kids are resilient” isn’t an answer. I got resilient kids, they went through some sh*t bf a pandemic. My job then & now: ensure they endured as little damage as possible, not congratulate them for being resilient while making them suffer for my anxiety. https://t.co/IPZysL2Fo8
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 4, 2022
Two things that will probably always shock me about all this.
1) That people were surprised a year of missed in-person school in blue cities would have very serious consequences (both real-life & political). It was a total outlier globally, historically to shut down that long.
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 4, 2022
2) That many don’t check whether their anxiety about COVID illness in their children aligns with reality of the risk. In so many cases, it just doesn’t, & children suffer more from the sheltering and imposed anxiety than they would from the virus.
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 4, 2022
I get it, to a degree. No one is looking to roll the dice on disease in their children. I’m not! And anxiety is real, not easy to reason away. Been there! But man, the response for children does not match the risk. And unfortunately media coverage seems intent on exacerbating it.
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 4, 2022
Recommended
Our media institutions and cultural embrace of extreme caution and sometimes insane (masking 2-yr-olds is again a global outlier and just against all common sense) mitigation measures with children validated and increased a lot of unnecessary anxiety.
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 4, 2022
And, yes, I know there are children who face real risks that we should try to minimize for them and not dismiss. But making practical public policy doesn’t work by pretending everyone has the same risk profile and never weight costs and benefits.
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 4, 2022
The fact that this thread will spur a bunch of people to yell at me about JUST WANTING CHILDREN TO DIE, as these things always do, is a symptom of the cultural problem that got us here, not a reflection of the risks of the actual disease.
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) January 4, 2022
We couldn’t have said it better ourselves.
This 🧵 captures my thoughts as a parent during COVID better than most things I've read/shared these past two years https://t.co/n4rZZOq1D1
— Aaron Zamost (@zamosta) January 4, 2022
This Mary Katharine Ham gal seems like someone more people should be listening to.
Thread.
So many refuse to acknowledge that A, “one size fits all” solutions are generally ineffective, and sometimes dangerous, and B, all government has to offer is “one size fits all” solutions. https://t.co/dxbsKfyPUW
— Smatt (@mdrache) January 4, 2022
The destruction of the young to preserve (maybe) the old is a societal sickness like no other. https://t.co/OFLEPFpw8N
— Jeremy Boreing (@JeremyDBoreing) January 4, 2022
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