Tuesday, June 8, 2021

Jon Rahm: a $1.674 Million Decision

 A recent article in Golf Magazine discusses Jon Rahm's withdrawal from the Memorial Tournament due to a positive COVID-19 test. I watched Rahm's walk off the course on Sunday, not long before he would have almost certainly won $1.674 million as a first-place finisher.

For some reason, about 50% of golfers on the PGA Tour are vaccinated. Rahm declined to discuss his vaccination status, but if he'd been fully vaccinated, daily testing after known exposure to COVID-19 would not have been required.

Over 600,000 Americans have died from COVID. Many more hav been infected; most have recovered. It's too early to estimate the number and severity of long-term side effects. The economic impact is expected to be staggering -- a recent search yielded an estimate of $16 trillion. Some of these costs will touch ordinary people, including people I know and love.

The politicization of the COVID-19 vaccination issue does a grave disservice to many who are now adament about not getting the vaccine. The arguments are many and mostly easy to refute. The vaccine was developed quickly but the preliminary research was completed over a period of over a decade, and testing was not sshort-cutted. It will not make anyone sterile, a falsehood repeatedly debunked and reported. And yet, the lies persist.

This international catastrophe touches us all.

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