New Oregon mascot: Sitting Ducks

Well, here we are, the darkest moment so far in the Covid ordeal for Oregon. Yesterday's show-and-tell in Salem was truly alarming.

“I want to be honest—the situation in Oregon's hospitals is growing increasingly dire,” Patrick Allen, Director of the Oregon Health Authority (OHA), said during a Thursday press conference. “Our healthcare system is on the verge of collapse in parts of the state. In the coming weeks, every Oregon hospital could be overtopped.”

Allen said that in hospitals across the state, patient beds are parked in hallways, outpatient rooms are being converted to ICU bedrooms, and over 200 patients are being held in emergency departments as they wait for critical care beds to become available....

At this time, hospitals still have enough resources to treat all of their COVID patients by putting off all elected surgeries and other non-essential medical treatments, but OHA projects that COVID cases will overrun hospitals by early to mid-September. According to modeling from the Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) and OHA, if 80 percent of Oregonians follow the current indoor mask mandate, Oregon is poised to exceed hospital capacity by 250 beds in September. If no one follows the mask mandate, that number goes up to 500.

So what are Killer Kate and her bureaucrats doing? Urging everybody to get vaccinated. Well, that's swell, guys, but even people who start a vaccine regimen today won't be immune (and even then, only sort of) for five weeks. 

Oh, and you are required to wear a mask when you're indoors around other people. But you can be around lots of other people, many of whom won't be obeying that rule, or wearing a mask properly. Bars are open. Restaurants are open. Concert halls are open. All at full capacity. Go into a bar in Roseburg and see how many people have masks on.

Soon schools will be open, full of unvaccinated children.

Referring to the delta variant’s power and transmissibility, [state epidemiologist Dean] Sidelinger said: “If you’re unvaccinated you’ve never been more vulnerable to being sickened by the virus, passing it on to your loved ones, getting seriously ill or even dying.” 

Well, you sure aren't acting like it, Doc. 

I was impressed by what the Oregon bureaucrats did last year when Covid first hit. But these days, they seem to have lost their minds. "Children need to be in school." Yes, and children also need to not be dying in hospital hallways. 

The counties that are now melting down with Covid need to be shut down immediately. Maybe the whole state, really. Killer Kate and her minions are dropping the ball so very badly. If she's tired of taking the heat for doing the right thing, maybe she needs to switch to another job right away.