Thanksgiving Or the Beginning Of A Dark Holiday Season

Dr. Anthony Fauci said, ‘since there is a surge in coronavirus cases and if it likely persists, then Thanksgiving may transform as the beginning of dark holiday season. There is a chance that it even gets worse by December and may continue in January and February.

Thanksgiving Or the Beginning Of A Dark Holiday Season

Fauci said last week in an interview with USA TODAY, ‘If in case the surge takes a turn and it continues to grow if there is greater than 100,000 infections per day and over 1300 deaths in a day, then the situation will be no different even for Christmas and New Year than Thanksgiving.’

As per the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, ‘right now, the country is the invulnerable situation, and it is the time when the country is welcoming the holiday situation. The reason is infections are too high, and it is hard to control the surge when the number is increasing day by day.’ Based on his statement, the situation will not be different even in the coming winter months.

Fauci added, ‘I will most likely scrape my Christmas plans in the current year as I did for Thanksgiving. My daughters live in different parts of the country, and instead of receiving them, and just sent my love over Zoom. I enjoyed a simple dinner with my wife.’

He said, ‘Thinking of my family, I feel I had a great Thanksgiving as well as Christmas last year. At least in 2012, I am looking for a great Christmas and Thanksgiving. But, now I want to make the best of the situation, and I want to keep my family safe and show them my affection by maintaining a distance.’

As per data, over three million air travellers passed via security checkpoints from last Friday to Sunday just before Thanksgiving. Sunday was considered as the single-busiest day at most of the airport checkpoints from March.

Ali Moldad, working as the professor of health metrics sciences, Ali Moldad, at the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluations said, ‘just about a fourth of COVID-19 cases that have been reported in the country is due to unavailability of testing to everyone. In most issues, mild forms of the cases may go unnoticed.

On Thursday, there were over 181,490 new COVID-19 cases based on data by Johns Hopkins University. The same is considered to be the 23rd consecutive day were in over 100,000 new cases reported. But, there is an estimation by the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluations, and it says there is twice the number of cases as reported. The same estimation also projected over 450,000 daily cases by the 25^th of December of the same trends continues.

Mokdad said, ‘At this point, we should be safe and prevent getting COVID-19 since it is the time when we are about to get a vaccine. Hence, it is necessary to be extra careful in the upcoming days, which helps avoid suffering and pain.’

As the total number of COVID-19 cases in a day, hospitalizations, and deaths surge nationwide, most of the states are imposing new coronavirus guidelines and restrictions. Many states have now put limits on social gatherings, adding states to travel quarantine lists, mandating face masks, and even encouraging residents to stay at home and to follow social distancing norms. Some of the states have made new rules and restricted business hours of operation, and put limitations on restaurant capacity.

The professor and vice-chair of the department of epidemiology, Jodie Guest, working at the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University said, ‘thinking of the current surge in cases and situation, it feels like the country may not see any benefits of new guidelines and restrictions by the beginning of holidays.’

She said, ’Up to 4-6 weeks, we will see implications of everything we are following right now. I feel the prevention measures will definitely keep us alive for Holidays. But I don’t feel they are enough to give license to enjoy Hanukkah and Christmas parties like the way we did in previous years.’

Guest added, ‘It is tough to miss family and holidays. Hence there is a need to make some huge corrections and consider mandatory masking, avoiding large gatherings, and social distancing. Even small gatherings can be risky.’

Even though there are fewer data available on the risk associated with small gatherings, but as per experts, they can be the primary drivers of the current pandemic, especially when they involve multiple households.