Category: politics

On Medicine Today

by jcafesin, posted in civil rights, politics

Got Covid again last month. Second time, close to a year after my first go-round with it. I’m fully vaxed. Workout 5 miles a day, 5 days a week. No underlying medical conditions. Low-risk age group.

I got Covid the first time at a karaoke bar when the person sitting next to me literally spit in my mouth. Not purposefully. She was singing with the tone deaf performer, along with most of the bar. It lasted 5 days. I had the typical symptoms and I thought it was done, but 4 weeks after I tested negative, I ended up with a vitreous detachment in my right eye. Two weeks after that, I was in the hospital with vertigo.

My husband took me to Emergency, and after throwing up in the empty waiting room for 20 minutes we followed a nurse into a small glass enclosure. She instructed me to get into the bed while she asked me questions I could barely answer, entered my information into her iPad, and left. The doctor came in 30 minutes later and asked the exact same questions as the nurse. The doctor instructed the nurse what medication to give me intravenously, and what prescriptions I should pick up on my way home, then left. I did not see him again, and was released from the hospital half-hour later.

I was at the hospital for about two and a half hrs, 20 minutes of which I spent in the waiting room, and another 30 waiting for the doctor. Besides the nurse, the only other person who came into the enclosure was a woman collecting $350, credit cards accepted into her handheld payment device. I received a saline solution for hydration, and Metoclopramide to curb the nausea, (though by the time it was administered, my nausea had passed). Oh, and I saw the doctor for less than 5 minutes.

The hospital bill for my Emergency visit was over $3,500. I personally paid out-of-pocket close to $1,200, though I am fully insured and pay $700+ monthly for Blue Shield medical insurance.

Getting the picture why I was scared out of my mind of having Covid again?

Beyond the damage to my health the virus was undoubtedly doing, how much was this second round of Covid going to cost me in downtime and money?

I’d heard of Paxlovid from their constant TV commercials. Pfizer, and their like seem to sponsor most network news these days. “If taken within 5 days of symptoms, Paxlovid reduces severe Covid symptoms in high-risk patients by 86%,” the authoritative male voice-over proclaimed. The ad closed with a quick list of all the reported side effects, including, but not limited to death.

The commercial ran through my head as I lay awake with body aches and sweats. Four days into suffering from this new round of Covid, I asked my husband to call the doctor I’d seen only once, the previous year, for my Long Covid symptoms, and get a prescription for Paxlovid. A part of me didn’t think the doctor could legally prescribe the drug since I don’t exactly fit the ‘high-risk’ profile. The on-call doctor who I’ve never met prescribed me Paxlovid, assuring my husband it was the best course of action to shut down the virus and minimize the risk of another round with Long Covid.

Promises. Promises.

During the time DH was procuring the Paxlovid from our local pharmacy, I searched the internet for data from studies on the drug. The first 5 pages of Google returns were from Pfizer and other Big Pharma corps. Big Pharma pays Google billions annually to advertise their offerings, so of course, Google’s top search results are from their highest paying clients. Google’s returns also included a range of ‘medical’ websites, like WebMD, CVS.com, and Medical News Today, supported by pharmaceutical giants through affiliate marketing. Nine out of ten medical sites pulled their content from Pfizer’s website, all proclaiming the wonders of Paxlovid.

Feverish and exhausted, I searched for FACTS. I started crying reading all the lies from Pfizer, and every other site Google returned, all of them dismissing the complaints from people on Reddit or other discussion forums about their horrible reactions to Paxlovid. Pfizer, and therefore every site that got their content from Pfizer, were all spreading PR lies claiming there was no proof the ill effects reported from taking Paxlovid were related to their drug.

Frustrated and desperate to get the TRUTH, I called the doctor who’d given me the prescription. Talking to him was on par with reading Pfizer’s website — he literally quoted their PR, told me everything I’d read already. When I questioned him about, well, anything negative I’d read in my research, he told me, “Don’t get on the internet and look this stuff up. All it’ll do is scare you.” He went on to instruct me to take the Paxlovid for the next 5 days as prescribed, and I’d be fine. “You may get a slight metallic taste in your mouth, but that’s about it, and that hardly happens to anyone, like 3%.” This was a direct quote from Pfizer I’d read many times in my research. My doctor was repeating to me the same bullshit that the sexy, busty, bubble-headed female Pfizer rep sold to him about Paxlovid.

I had almost every side effect, other than dying, (though some moments I wished I would) from taking Paxlovid. The metallic taste in my mouth was so severe it made me sicker than Covid. I could barely eat. It made me dizzy, and nauseous. I had trouble sleeping while on it. But worse, I got Covid again, a third time, 2 weeks after I had a negative test. And Pfizer KNEW I WOULD. They call it “Rebound” cases, and if you look on Reddit, you’ll find MOST WHO TOOK PAXLOVID GOT A REBOUND CASE — meaning they tested positive for Covid again, weeks after they thought it was over. Without Paxlovid, I got over my first round of Covid in 5 days. It took me almost a month to clear my system of the virus on Paxlovid.

Until Covid, I’d been in the hospital 3 times in my life. I wiped out on my bike and screwed up my knee at 23. I ended up at a Public hospital without insurance at the time (staffed by young intern doctors and training nurses relatively clueless about medicine beyond gunshot wounds and ODs). The other two were to birth my kids.

What these recent experiences have taught me:

  • Google returns and promotes LIES. Google is the ONE (and only) SOURCE MOST USED to get their information.
  • Doctors LIE. They are clueless about most new pharms they prescribe. They simply repeat what these pretty young women are selling them, accepting ‘gifts’ of cash and vacation perks; or maybe they’ll check out the link Pfizer sent them about their new ‘targeted’ cure for Covid.
  • Big Pharma LIES. They consistently over-promise and under deliver. They steal from consumers because our govt lets them. Hundreds of billions of our tax dollars go to fund Pfizer and their like. They should be GIVING AWAY THESE DRUGS because U.S. citizens have PAID FOR THEM WITH OUR TAXES. Yet, they charge us fortunes while making themselves billions annually.
  • Our medical system is BROKEN. Medical debt is the #1 reason for bankruptcy in this country. Money for medicine DOES NOT WORK for anyone other than the wealthy, and the U.S. congress, and our elected officials.

What to do with these FACTS?

  1. Get your information from MANY SOURCES, not just Google!
  2. Don’t blindly believe your doctors, as they choose to remain ignorant to the fact that 74% of the 50 new drugs approved by the FDA in 2022 had little proof they actually worked. Research! Reddit. Discord. DuckDuckGo. Bing. White papers, valid medical studies (called Abstracts)…etc.
  3. VOTE BLUE, as Republicans want to take away Medicare, Medicaid, and most social services. They believe in “Trickle Down Economics” which has created more oligarchs than any other socioeconomic practice — loosening regulations and providing tax ‘incentives’ for corporations and individuals with high incomes. Democrats, though not much better as they are still slaves to Corporate America’s lobbyists, at least have an eye out for the middle class in this country. They support more social services, like the Affordable Care Act (‘Obamacare’), mental and reproductive healthcare, Medicaid and Medicare, and lower prescription drug costs. In 2024, close to 69% of the world’s population has some form of Universal Healthcare, while the U.S. still does not. UHC is not socialism. Access to quality medical care regardless of income should be a Civil Right. Let’s do better — serve the many, not just the few! VOTE BLUE.

    Boy Scouts of Faith-Based America

    by jcafesin, posted in atheism, atheists, christians, dads, Family, family life, jews, K-12, Kids, Middle School, moms, parenting, parents, politics, psychology, racism, Religion, republicans

    On the short ride home from his Boy Scout meeting, my 11 yr old son was quiet and sullen. I asked him what was up. Had anything happened at the meeting that he wanted to talk about? I saw him looking at me from my rear view mirror, gauging how to tell me disappointing news.

    “I found out tonight that I can’t become an Eagle Scout.”

    He’d never been all that enamored with Boy Scouts. He didn’t much care for camping, or the tough kid role so many of his contemporaries played out with the survival skills and competitive war games his scout leaders chose. He’d decided to ‘bridge’ from ‘Webelo’ Cub Scout to a full-fledge Boy Scout to become an Eagle Scout for the prestige sold to him by his troop leaders. “Presidents, senators, and successful icons like Bill Gates, Steven Spielberg, Neil Armstrong were Eagle Scouts.”

    “College admissions officers recognize the award and consider it in their decisions. Eagle Scouts are eligible for many scholarships. Many employment recruiters look for “Eagle Scout” on a resume.” These are just a few of the perks on an Eagle Scout information page for the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), and one of the reasons we agreed when our son said he wanted to stay in their program.

    I assumed he wanted to quit Boy Scouts, as he was the outlier in his troop, and had complained of being bullied at meetings and on camping trips more than a few times. I was down with him quitting, as I too felt Scouts wasn’t the right fit for him, but it was the context of what he’d said that stuck in my head, so I sought clarity. “What do you mean you can’t become an Eagle Scout?”

    Again we made eye contact in the rear view mirror, and I got that my son wasn’t sad, but bemused, bordering on angry. “Mr. Baker told me tonight that even if I get all my merit badges, and fulfilled all the other Boy Scout requirements through middle school and high school, I’m not qualified to become an Eagle Scout.”

    I felt my heart start pounding. “Why?”

    “The new scout master said in order to achieve Eagle Scouts, or any other rank, Boy Scouts must live the Scout Oath, which means we have to believe in God.”

    My husband and I introduced our son to scouting when he was 5 yrs old. Fourteen Christians and one Jew, and our kid was the only member of his Webelo troop being raised without religion. Most of our neighbors, and our kids classmates attended the local church. My husband and I are Atheists. Our kids are not privy to the benefits of participating in this tight-knit religious network. Scouting seemed like a positive way for our son to meet other boys his age in our area.

    We didn’t consider the Boy Scouts an exclusively religious organization. We’d heard stories, of course, and knew of the pending lawsuit in the supreme court filed by a father for discrimination against his son who claimed to be an atheist. It motivated me to ask the women at the Cub Scout table during school registration if their troop was religious, and if so, how. Both women assured me their Den had several different faiths among its members, and their policy was to keep religion at home, not practice it in scouting.

    They were true to their word during the first five years our son belonged to their Den, participating in most events from hikes, to community drives for food banks, and even popcorn sales. He earned quite a few merit badges along the way. Religion, even prayer, was never practiced or promoted in any way. He bridged from Cub Scout at the end of fifth grade, and at 11 yrs old became a full Boy Scout with the aim of eventually becoming an Eagle Scout in high school.

    Picking him up from his first official Boy Scout meeting a few months back, my son informed me the troop he’d bridged to said prayers at the end of their meetings. I asked him how he felt about that. He confessed he’d already branded himself a non-believer. The scout master asked him to lead the prayer at the end of that first meeting. He’d refused, stating he wasn’t sure there was a God, and he thought praying was a waste of time because he was certain there wasn’t anyone listening. Though he’d been publicly labeled “misinformed” by the scout master at that meeting, and endured jeers and taunts from several of the boys, every Webelo he’d been with the last five years had bridged to this new troop. Our son didn’t want to look for a new non-religious troop, with a bunch of kids he didn’t know. He just wouldn’t recite what he didn’t believe, he’d told me.

    That wasn’t good enough for advancement, according to his new scout master, who asked him again last Friday night to say a closing prayer. No matter how lax about religion our son’s lower division den, rank of Boy Scouts and higher stuck to the rules of the BSA, he told our son. A religious association, and faith in God is required for rank advancement. Commitment to community service, practicing Scouting’s core values of “honesty, compassion,” as well as continually exhibiting “diligence as a contributing team member,” were irrelevant. Belief in a god was more important than social service. Atheism is a sin, the scout master assured our son at the end of last Friday’s meeting.

    “I could lie that I believe,” my son suggested, “If I have to…”

    “Think that’s a good idea?” I asked, glad to be driving, which made it easier to keep emotional distance and sound casual.

    “Maybe. I just don’t get why I have to pretend I believe in God. The Boy Scout handbook says we’re supposed to ‘respect and defend the rights of others to practice their own beliefs.’ But they’re not.”

    Ah, from the mouths of babes…

    He’s right, of course. Click on the ‘Litigation’ link on the official BSA website, and bring up the “Duty to God” page. Part of the Scout Oath proclaims the scout will ‘do his duty to God [and country].’ Every level of advancement requires a promise or show of faith in God. Boy Scouts are instructed to respect the beliefs of others, but this respect should only be awarded to those that believe in the Christian/Judaeo God. Turns out, prejudice, hate, racism are systemic to the Boy Scouts of America, and a large part of what they promote.

    Nowhere in the BSA literature we received and perused before or after our son joined the Boy Scouts did they say they were a faith-based organization that required their members to be believers to receive equal rights and privileges as those granted to religious members. Had they disclosed this with all transparency, as do churches and other religious organizations pushing their beliefs, I doubt my husband and I would have channeled our son to participate.

    We impose no religion on our kids. We discuss it often— the concept of one god verses many; various cultures and their belief systems from ancient to modern man, using everything from the Tao to biblical references. Our kids get additional religious education through their friends, and faith-based celebrations with extended family. My husband and I hope to expose our children to many possibilities, and let them discover their own spirituality.

    Parents who provide religious training for their kids early on, and, it would appear, register them in Boy Scouts, are looking to validate their beliefs by indoctrinating their kids with the religion in which they were raised. And most of these parents have never stopped to consider whether the rhetoric their parents sold them is truth. They are blind believers, and turn their children into the same.

    “The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) takes a strong position, excluding atheists and agnostics,” according to Wikipedia. In 2014 the BSA finally voted to allow gay kids. They still ban atheists.

    Perhaps the BSA is a front for the church, and works to convert unsuspecting non-believers working to advance in their organization. Hook the kids without religiosity when they’re young, in Cub Scouts. Get them to work hard for advancement, then deny them further advancement unless they convert to Christianity. Whatever BSAs agenda, and our son now sees they clearly have one, the meeting with his troop leader last Friday night soured him to continuing in scouting. It’s a shame, really, because the Boy Scouts have so many positives to offer. Weirdly enough, they tout much of the same morality I preach to my kids, like being courteous, and honest, loving and compassionate. The only difference between us is I don’t believe a god gave us this wisdom. I give credit to humanity, over eons, watching what works to build thriving societies.

    There is no god that’ll save us from hate, prejudice, nationalism, and exclusionary religious sects like the BSA who lure kids in, like the Pied Piper, under the guise of community involvement, then change the rules mid-play. Regardless of our differences, religiously, culturally, politically, PEOPLE, me and you, must use our collective wisdom to unite as one race—the Human race—for our continued existence.

    The Difference Between Men and Women

    by jcafesin, posted in Busiess, careers, Family, family life, Kids, parenting, parents, politics, psychology, science, sexism, Silicon Valley, Teen, Tween, Uncategorized

    I’m a guy’s girl, meaning I’ve spent most of my life hanging out with men instead of women. Like the freight train comin at ya, I prefer men’s straightforward nature, their directness, their unwavering, solution-oriented trajectory. Men are simpler than women. Not less intelligent, just not round-about, underneath, from behind.

    Women, by contrast, are the poison in your food. Eons of subjugation have forced us to become puppet-masters to get what we want. Not a judgment call, simply a fact that until very recently might was right, and men assumed they controlled the household with superior strength—at first to kill the mastodon and be the provider of food, and in the modern world, until recently, be the supplier of money. Back as late as the 1990s, women were still, and believe it or not still are, the primary homemakers, caring for the kids, shopping for and preparing the meals…etc. In fact, 99% of all household product commercials still show the women cleaning up, even when the men create the mess.

    Notice I said, “men assumed they controlled the household.” Well, you know what happens when you ass (of) u (and) me…; -}

    Seriously though, probably pretty early on, like cavemen times, women figured out how to get men to do what we want using our wiles—wits. Genetic transfer of memory over thousands of generations of women passing on how to be manipulative eventually became woven into our DNA and imprinted on our XX chromosomes.

    Regardless of why women became…complex, the fact that we are scares me about us. Women don’t only manipulate men. Quite often our children, sometimes even our friends. I’d much rather face a freight train because if I’m paying attention I can get off the tracks before getting slammed. This also plays to why I’m a guy’s girl, why most of my friends have been men.

    I knew I wanted kids for as long as I can remember. Two boys, I’d told any possible stakeholders, because boys are easier to raise. I now have two kids—a boy, 19, and a 16 year old girl, both of whom I’m madly in love with. Beyond proud, I’m humbled to know them. True to their ‘nature,’ my son is very direct with his feelings, practically the instant he feels something. He rarely lies, probably because he sucks at it, his facial expressions to the pause in his delivery clear indicators he’s not telling the truth or copping to. He’s a consummate whiner, but he respects the family rules and parental restrictions. My son is trustable, for which I’m eternally grateful.

    My daughter, on the other hand, listens carefully, expresses just the right amount of contrition and understanding with every lecture, then does whatever she wants, whenever she wants, if she can get away with it. Went to kiss her goodnight a few nights ago and she was underneath her blanket watching Manga videos on her cellphone. She’d been viewing nightly since we took away her Kindle two weeks ago for watching videos on it instead of reading. Reading is all she’s allowed to do on the tablet, per our agreement when she got it for her birthday. (Is it too much to expect a 16½ year old to honor such an agreement when she gets plenty of electronics time on the weekends?)

    While my son barely notices his reflection, my daughter spends hours in front of the mirror, preening. For eons a huge part of a woman’s value was/is defined by our physicality, so it’s natural, part of our nature now that our looks are important to us, or at the very least, more important to us than most men. My son likes violent movies. My daughter does not. She is deeply affected when families split up, or a parent or child dies in films, and even in books. Maternal instincts—reproducing and then caring for our offspring—is genetically encoded in our DNA. In fact, her reaction is not uncommon for most women.

    Violent movies and video games are targeted at men because they are by far the predominant audience to engage with them.

    Times truly are changing, though. Want part of a mastodon, a small ice-age relic? Buy one on Amazon. Most educated women who pursue a career path can pay their own way through life now, even if we still typically make less than men. Most of us don’t need a man’s support to survive, or even thrive. Technology, from the Pill to the personal computer has made it possible for women to control our own destinies, and function equally along side men in today’s business environments.

    Sociological shifts in behavior are glacial, and true sexual equality is probably still a few generations in coming. Perhaps our great-grandchildren will share equal incomes, and split the household tasks of rearing the children to doing the dishes equitably as well.

    From the dawn of man to present day the divide in humanity is not our race, religious orientation, education or income level. Our greatest division has been between men and women. I’m humbled to bear witness to a quantum shift in our evolution, that, for first time in our history, technology is providing us the ability to become an egalitarian race, and close this great divide.