Pandemic, Week 71 (PA/IA)

This week, 394,000 acres burned in the Bootleg fire in Oregon, resulting in the evacuation of over 2,000 homes. Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected 2 GOP picks for the House probe of the January 6th insurrection – Jim Jordan (who is expected to be called to testify) and Jim Banks (who pushed to overturn the election). In response, Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy pulled all five of his nominees from the committee. U.S. life expectancy fell 1.5 years. Jeff Bezos was the latest billionaire to travel to the edge of space, but due to new restrictions in the definition just released by the FAA, is not an astronaut. The Tokyo Summer Olympics began (one year later than expected, due to COVID). 

The world reached 194.4 million COVID cases and 4.2 million deaths this week. The Delta variant caused a 65 percent increases in cases in the U.S. this week, reaching a total of 35.2 million cases and 627,000 deaths. At the same time, vaccination rates continue to stall in the U.S. – 188 million (57 percent) of people have at least one vaccine dose and only 163 million (49 percent) of the population are fully vaccinated. A U.S. District Court upheld Indiana University's requirement that all students, faculty and staff be vaccinated by August 15th. Tennessee announced they would resume COVID vaccine outreach to teens and children, which had stopped due to pressure from Republican legislators. Alabama Governor Kay Ivey, in response to a surge of cases in her state, said that it was, "time to start blaming the unvaccinated people... the unvaccinated folks are letting us down." France announced that proof of vaccination would be required at large gatherings beginning this week, resulting in almost 1 million people signing up for vaccinations. Meanwhile, Dr. Anthony Fauci told Sen. Rand Paul at a hearing this week where the Senator (and ophthalmologist) suggested NIH was partially responsible for 4 million COVID deaths, "You do not know what you are talking about."

We spent Sunday hanging with the Mettenburgs in the greater Pittsburgh area, which involved kayaking, miniature golf, trampolining, chicken sitting, grilling, and games. The next morning we headed back to the homeland where we were greeted by Grandpa and Grandma Z (and some wine). Allen and I had to work all week (Allen had to work over the weekend too...), but we managed to make it out to the pond for a few hours each day so the kids could get in some swimming and the adults could get in some adulting. We also were able to schedule a playdate for Nora with Grace which involved lots of crafting, and one for Allen with Kent and Adam which involved a lot of construction equipment and the zip-line.

Which should make our last five days in Iowa even more fun...

(To see all of this week's pictures, click here.)