Rachel Maddow

Monoclonal Antibodies – Day 865

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Rays of Hope – Photo: L. Weikel

Monoclonal Antibodies

This isn’t a post title I ever expected to write. But I’m writing it because I’m convinced that treatment with monoclonal antibodies is a therapeutic intervention that needs to be discussed here, there, and everywhere. We need to be talking about it so that when or if you or a loved one becomes infected with Covid-19, you know enough to: request this treatment.

I knew I’d heard the term and recognized monoclonal antibodies were somehow related to or a part of the treatment received by DT when he was stricken with the virus last year. But I assumed (wrongly) that this was probably wildly expensive treatment that in all probability would only be available to the privileged among us.

(Yes, Virginia, sad to say we live in a profoundly segregated country, with many layers of ‘haves’ and ‘have nots.’ And money – or the lack of it – plays a huge part in the quality of healthcare any of us receive.)

Money’s No Object

And that’s the first amazing aspect of this treatment that needs to be shouted from the rooftops. In this instance, with respect to this particular treatment, money’s no object – at least with respect to the people who fit within a very broad range of parameters. Indeed, one qualification is simply being over age 65. But there are a wide variety of conditions that also qualify a person to receive the treatment for free, even if they’re under age 65.

Even greater is the efficacy rate. Holy cow! An article published within the past couple of days in the New York Times reports on new data that reveals an astounding improvement in patient response when given this treatment within the first ten days of symptoms onset. We’re talking a 70% reduction in the need for hospitalization.

More Information

I had no idea that this therapeutic infusion treatment is so readily available to people before watching Rachel Maddow’s program tonight. I can’t provide a link to the segment now because it’s not yet on the website, but you might want to check it out tomorrow.

If you’re content to read articles, though, check out the links in this post. One (this one) details a program in El Centro, CA, where their healthcare system was on the verge of collapse in December due to so many Covid-19 patients. According to the report this evening on Maddow’s show, administration of monoclonal antibody therapy resulted in only 3% of 1250 symptomatic Covid-19 patients requiring hospitalization after receiving this treatment. That was a game changer for this community.

The trick is knowledge. Knowing it’s available. Knowing enough to ask for it.

Know What’s Out There

The main focus in this country presently is to get everyone vaccinated. We know that not everyone will choose to go that route. We also know that even though great strides are being made in getting ‘shots in arms,’ something like 50,000 people a day are still becoming infected.

I personally know of someone who lives nearby who contracted the virus three days after receiving his second vaccination. He was, luckily for him, immediate treated with monoclonal antibody therapy upon diagnosis and has pulled through remarkably well and quickly.

Knowledge is power. If you or someone you love is unlucky enough to come down with Covid-19, get on top of it. Have the information about this remarkably effective treatment at the ready so you can ask for it. And take heart – it should be free, or close to it. Depending upon your insurance coverage, there may be some charge for actually administering the infusion. But no matter what, it’s better than hospitalization. And it’s a damn sight better than a ventilator – or death.

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Comfort Post – Day 824

Posted on by Lisa Weikel Leave a comment
Cletus in rare pleasant mood – Photo: L. Weikel

Comfort Post

As you all know, I’m riveted by the Constitutional drama spooling out before our very eyes this week. But instead of discussing any of the abominably appalling details of what tried to pass for a defense of DT today, I’m electing instead to offer a comfort post.

I was going to title this Spartacus and the Pussycats, but – nah. My pets have no aspirations to emulate an early 70’s cartoon band, thank goodness. Nor would I condone them going on the road in the midst of a pandemic, even if they did. Somebody’s got to be the adult around here.

Instead, I’ll just give you some puppy and kitty cameos to make you smile.

Tigger Striking a Pose – Photo: L. Weikel

Fiddling While Rome Burns

I have to admit it feels just a little bit like I’m fiddling while Rome (or perhaps more accurately, D.C.) burns. But no. I don’t want to go there.

One place I will go, though, is to give a shout out to a young Penn State grad, Gabby Richards, who is the Communications Director for Representative Mary Gay Scanlon. She and Daniel Gleick, Communications Director for Representative Val Demings, wrote a letter on behalf of Congressional Staffers urging Senators to convict Donald Trump of inciting an insurrection.

What’s most remarkable about the effort of Gabby Richards and Daniel Gleick is the unprecedented nature of Congressional staffers taking a stand and speaking out on such an issue. I’d seen an interview featuring both of these staffers on Rachel Maddow on January 29th, when their letter had over 300 signatures. Tonight, however, Richards was interviewed again by Lawrence O’Donnell. She disclosed that she and Gleick had opened up the letter for additional signatures yesterday, I believe, and within an hour they had 100 additional signatures, and as of this evening they are up to 550 staffers entreating Senators to stand up for our Republic.

Precious Knows – Photo: L. Weikel

Two-fer

I will end this post here. You’ve essentially received a two-fer. Comforting photos of lovable pups and kitties, and a nod to some inspiring young people taking a stand and publicly entreating our representatives to Do. The. Right. Thing.

Spartacus Dreaming – Photo: L. Weikel

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Hope – Day 807

Posted on by Lisa Weikel Leave a comment
Photo: L. Weikel

Hope

I’ve been strapped in and riding an emotional rollercoaster since November 3rd, 2020. The ups and downs! Good grief; at various moments they’ve caused my stomach to lurch up into my throat and in others my heart to drop to my toes. In spite of all the remarkable victories that were achieved for so many who believe in democracy, justice, and the essential goodness of people, the rumors and rumblings I heard emanating from Washington D.C. were starting to take a toll. But then: a ray of hope. Actually, a brilliant, shining, beam of hope.

The first major hill of the most recent rollercoaster ride was climbed in that slow, click-click-click crawl, as we approached Election Day. So to be clear, I’m not even referencing what it’s felt like to live through most of the past four years. No; I’m starting this ‘ride’ just before the election.

We all knew Election Day was fraught with potential opportunities for disaster, sabotage, violence, or other shenanigans. So the days leading up to the election were experienced through the lens of an undercurrent of dread. We were all just trying to hold ourselves and our country together while ‘expecting the unexpected.’ Not an easy task, especially with so much at stake.

 Cresting the Hill

We crested that first major incline of the rollercoaster and started tearing down the other side. DT claimed false victory in the early morning hours of November 4th, but about five days or so later, with almost all of the mail in votes finally counted in states that weren’t allowed to begin counting them until after in-person voting took place, a different result was ‘called.’

Over the next couple of weeks we were whipped side-to-side as onslaught after onslaught was waged on our system. Some states were subjected to outrageous accusations and my emotions, I’ll admit, were especially attenuated, as I took great umbrage at people (both inside and outside my state) wielding lies about Pennsylvania in particular.

Then there was the Georgia run-off election of two Senators in early January. The fact that both the first Black man and the first Jewish man ever were elected to represent Georgia was a great and miraculous day indeed. What a message of inclusion and power-to-the-people those results conveyed.

Whip-Sawed Senses

And then there was January 6th, 2021: a day that will truly live in more infamy than even Pearl Harbor because this attack on our country, on our republic, on our sacred halls of democracy, and our sense of democratic principles was perpetrated by our fellow citizens.

Following the horror of what transpired for all the world to see, I started hearing rumblings of ‘power sharing’ with the Republicans. I heard rumors that Mitch McConnell was up to his old tricks of outrageously abusive manipulations of Senate rules and norms. And worse, it sounded like the Democrats, in spite of their (albeit slim) majorities in both Houses of Congress and the White House, were going to roll over.

To be honest, this is when I started feeling a sense of abject hopelessness. My roller coaster ride was making me feel nauseous.

But then I watched this interview.

It was as if the skies parted and I heard some voices singing. So…in case you missed it, here’s an interview that I encourage you to watch in full, especially if you’ve been feeling the way I was feeling.

I’m also attaching the transcript, in case you don’t want to watch the interview. But I have to tell you: the idealism and fire emanating from Senator Schumer is almost intoxicating. It’s definitely a beam of hope.

Photo: L. Weikel

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Couple More Thoughts on the News -Day 128

Posted on by Lisa Weikel Leave a comment

 

A Couple More Thoughts on the News

I’m not sure if I’ve seen yet all the comments (public and private) my post yesterday spurred. That’s because I only had a few minutes this morning to even check things out on my phone.

Amazingly, I’m only just now getting online with my laptop and it’s almost midnight.

I may have given the wrong impression last night. It crossed my mind as I was writing it, but I chose not to go into more detail at the time. I’m not sure, but it may have been a sad attempt at avoiding controversy, which is kind of dumb – especially since the actual name of my blog is Ruffled Feathers.

My News History

So let me just set the record straight:

First and probably foremost, I believe the last time I watched good ol’, actual ‘old-style’ network news was during 9/11 and a few days in its aftermath. And that was only to glean as much information as I could from a comforting, what I perceived then to be a reliable source in that moment.

Prior to and post 9/11, as my boys were growing up, we watched ‘the news’ pretty much never. This was vastly different than watching tv while I was growing up, with the John Facendas of local news at 6:00 p.m. and either Huntley and Brinkley or, of course, Walter Cronkite at 7:00 p.m., as dependable as clockwork against the backdrop of my parents and their obligatory after-work cocktail with crackers and cheese.

Ugh, I remember wishing my father would come home late and not kick me off the tv. I always had to turn Star Trek off and it was such a bummer. Of course, that was back in the day when all the good stuff I wanted to watch was on the ‘UHF’ channels of 17, 29, and 48. These three much more static-y and hard to tune in just right channels featured much more of the stuff I wanted to watch than the standard channels of 3, 6, and 10. If I’m not mistaken, channel 48 had Roller Derby. And Ultra Man.

But when Daddy got home, the television became his domain. So news it was.

Post-Marriage News Habits

On the other hand, when our guys were growing up, I do not remember watching news. In fact, I don’t remember watching much tv at all. Most of the programs I remember from their growing up years were cartoons like Power Rangers, He-Man, and Ren & Stimpy.  (Yes, Ren & Stimpy. I’ve always shared a gross and some might say vulgar sense of humor with my sons.)

We also watched some of the classic night time tv shows ‘of the day,’ like Cheers and Roseanne and Murphy Brown. I remember watching the very first episode of the Simpsons, too. Hard to believe that’s still cranking out new episodes. The damn series outlived my son. Doesn’t seem right.

Another favorite to watch with my kids was Pee-Wee’s Playhouse on Saturday mornings. By the time my youngest son came along, we actually owned a VCR. So we ended up watching more movies than ever. Lion King and Toy Story were two of the best, with the dialogue-less The Snowman being one that always made me choke up.

All this to say: news via television was not a staple in our home. We did read the local newspaper and magazines.

My Current Sense of Responsibility

So when I say I feel a sense of responsibility to watch the news, I should clarify that I pretty much mean what’s going on politically. And to put a further point on that, I do feel it is my responsibility to watch some of this so that I am a well-informed voter. And to that end, since I am basically engaging in a form of tele-viewing confession, I like watching Rachel Maddow, because she goes into such depth in her stories. She puts current events into historical context in ways no other shows of that nature do. I have learned a ton of history by watching her program.

The slippery slope for me is watching the shows either before or after hers. It can get addictive. And it can become enraging or upsetting or a whole smörgåsbord of adrenalin-or-despair inducing emotions. As in everything, therefore, moderation is the key.

I whole-heartedly endorse a strict abstention from 99% of local news (not counting what you might read in print or may hear on the radio). And I feel NPR is a wonderful resource; I’m just not in my car all that often anymore, now that I no longer have a long daily commute.

While I try to limit my consumption of articles on the internet, I do confess to having subscriptions to the New York Times and a couple other publications. I try to be well-rounded (and open-minded), and even more importantly, careful not to read or pass along garbage.

The bottom line, however, is that I do feel a responsibility to remain aware and informed. NOT inflamed. And NOT propagandized (which is tough in this climate).

But every once in a while, it is a delight to completely and totally ignore what’s going on in Washington D.C., or Harrisburg, or around the world. Especially since there is a lot happening that weighs heavily on all of us. At least those of us who are paying attention.

Which I have a sneaking feeling includes most of you.

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