After Pandemic Pause, 3K Return For Race

So many maskless people breathing heavily, cheering, yelling, gathered together in close proximity in crowds. I know it is outside, but when you're in such close proximity to each other and expelling droplets potentially spreading covid delta variant virus particles to everyone who is running or is on the sidelines, you are potentially infecting hundreds, who will then go on to infect hundreds more. The delta variant is far more infectious than the original variant.
I know everybody is tired of wearing masks and social distancing. I know we were told that based on the alpha variant based research that it would be really safe if you were fully vaccinated, and that you didn't have to wear a mask if you were fully vaccinated, and/or outdoors with good ventilation, but the delta variant changed everything.
The more we transmit the virus, the more we increase the chances of new variants that are stronger, more infectious, more deadly, and are immune to our current vaccines. The longer it has been since your final dose of the vaccine, the less immunity you have. Your immunity wanes over time.
Our foolish human behavior, and our lack of prioritizing ending this pandemic and the transmission of the virus, will be creating far worse outbreaks of this pandemic due to crowded and maskless public events like these, the return of in person education, and return to sporting and entertainment and social venues, and will result in superspreader events and mass shutdowns and mass casualties like Italy experienced at the beginning of the pandemic or even worse, like the Black Death plague in Europe.
Pretend things are back to business as usual, and you risk the fate of humanity.

@heather
Stay home and live in your bubble. The rest of want to live life!

It would be honorable if The Independent wrote such lengthy, comprehensive and in-depth articles on subjects more important to its readers.

Always a great event, on a holiday that signifies the end of summer, and a quiet, restful day for Labor. For those that were forced to work, it is a sign of the continued exploitation of the working class, and their families. Who most of the participants barely gave a thought to. Hidden in this celebration is a simmering powder keg of potential deadly violence. All the police that worked the race, those hundreds in uniform of traffic posts, were forced labor. They were all ordered to work, under threat of discipline, or risk of putting a black mark on their career paths within the department, and under the current administration. Every uniform officer, Every Detective, Every Supervisor, who had scheduled days off, were ordered to work, under threat of discipline. Why? because of a manpower shortage in the NHPD that is unprecedented. the end result of an administration that succumbed to the political threats of a group of activists who take as a cause the killing of innocent people of color by police officers. Innocent can cover people pointing guns at police doing their job, selling drugs while carrying illegal guns, resisting arrest violently while being dangerously under the influence of drugs, and it goes on and on. I get it. In legal terms it is called the "eggshell theory"; the cops inherit the physical condition of those they chose to enforce the law. Only problem is they don't get to chose, the law's of the public chose. So now you have an exhausted, overworked, police force, not just for this event but for over a year now, with a hundred on the street every day, armed with the firearms the taxpayers are liable for , and the public is at risk of. This event was not a riot. It was a road race. But the Police are exploited again, as when the unthinkable happens here, an some innocent person is hurt or killed by an exhausted, cop, no one will be there, who sets, and makes the policies putting the cops in these positions, will assume responsibility.

Great event. Thanks to all who helped make it possible.

Second attempt. First time not published and I don't know why.
Heather C: Mayor Elicker ran the 20K. I'm sure he'd be interested in your comment.

bassmaster: Certain jobs entail working nights, holidays, etc. These obviously include public safety, hospital workers, and military and naval folks. If you want lots of time off, be a teacher. Lots of holidays, but not overtime, strictly salary regardless of the hours invested.

I ran the half marathon yesterday; it was a great day to run a race! In comparison to prior years, the streets were empty. Usually when you run down down Wooster Square and then into Fair Haven, the streets are filled with people cheering you on. This year there was one parent and child on Chapel in WS and 2 little pods of people on Grand Avenue, and almost no one on the side streets until we were close to ERP. I'm super grateful to the people who came out to cheer on the runners, and I hope next year we can get back to a more normal race.

To the commenters that were concerned about the amount of people gathering -- that was pretty much limited to the green, where free masks were being handed out. The other spots on the run were not crowded, and I saw a bunch of kids wearing masks as they cheered on the runners. I'm very glad we were able to run this race this year.

Here's to the next one!

I agree with @aprillevine

Though @heatherc is also misinformed.

Aprillevine- In living life maskless in denial of the realities of the pandemic you can be potentially spreading death to others by being infected if you are asymptotic or having such mild symptoms that you don't bother to get tested. The more we pass the virus around, the more it mutates. My living in a bubble won't stop the virus from being spread or mutating, only by everyone following the precautions to prevent virus transmission can we stop the virus from spreading and mutating.
The MU variant went from being detected in a few countries to spreading to 49 states in a few short months. It may be immune to the vaccines https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/09/03/mu-coronavirus-variant-explained/
And
https://www.republicworld.com/amp/world-news/us-news/new-mu-covid-variant-that-can-evade-vaccine-immunity-found-in-49-us-states.html
There are other variants of interest or of concern being monitored by the WHO and CDC and NIH https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/variants/variant-info.html
and the more we pass this virus and it's variants around, the more likely we are to create a variant that is immune to the vaccines, more deadly, more contagious, etc.
So if we keep pretending that's it's back to business as usual because we "want to live life" we are risking superspreader events that will cause catastrophic pandemic conditions with the emergence of a more dangerous variant. We need to do everything in our power to stop the transmission of this virus.
And Elicker should know better, he's enforcing masks mandates on businesses, but allowing outdoor crowds at events like these without enforcing masks mandates, and Lamont is a coward for leaving it up to the municipalities instead of masks mandates statewide, the virus doesn't care about town lines. We have no way of knowing how common breakthrough infections are, because only those people sick enough to get tested is providing the data. There could be lots of undocumented breakthrough variant spread.

Heather C.: If you read the actual UN press release, MU is no more vaccine resistant than the beta/South African variant we have been living with for a over a year. The virus will mutate, which is what they do. People will die, which is what we all do. But our species will survive, too. With each wave, the pool of susceptibles shrinks, making the catastrophic pandemic nearly impossible. We are left with endemic disease but tolerable levels of disease.

The chances of someone asymptomatically spreading Covid outdoors is infinitesimally small.

As both a health care provider and long time runner, I was so happy and grateful to be back on the green for the labour day run. It's always been one of my favorite days on the New Haven calendar.

Much thanks to the many volunteers and city workers who allows us to race again!

@ Heather C... It's very easy to doom scroll through NHI articles and point out maskless people in photos. Masks are of course important in enclosed spaces and/or close contact which is why the race organizers required them when walking around on the Green before and after the event. I was there. I ran the half marathon and the vast majority of folks on the Green were masked. Also I don't think it's reasonable to expect the organizers to police every spectator around the course in every photo. But what you are completely missing in these photos is IMO far more relevant to the COVID crisis. The most dire COVID outcomes and the resulting hospital overcrowding and resource shortages can almost always be directly attributed to unhealthy patients with underlying conditions. In fact including and beyond COVID the overwhelming burden of expense and stress on our healthcare system is the direct result of metabolically preventable conditions. Poor nutrition, obesity, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease, etc. all compromising immune systems and leading to dire and costly health outcomes. When you look at these photos of all these healthy happy running people do you see any evidence of these conditions? I don't. I see healthy happy people who are a shining example of how best to stay ahead of disease and dire outcomes. I was proud to be among them and very happy to participate in this well organized and safe event. And yes I will still put my mask on when I go to the grocery store or any space where I am near others indoors. But to look at this article and predict the apocalypse is to completely miss the glaring facts of the incredibly poor general state of our national health. If more of us were like the healthy people in these photos we would not be in this situation in the first place. End of rant.