I've always believed we only had one shot as a country to shut everything down and slow the spread of the coronavirus. I believed it back in April and May when states were shutting down. I believed it in the fall when COVID-19 numbers started spiking. And I believe it today. So I wasn't shocked at the article on the KMBC website with the headline "As pandemic worsens, most US states resist restrictions".

I'm not saying we shouldn't shut things down again. That might be the right thing to do to stop the spread. However, human nature being what is. It isn't going to happen regardless of what anyone says. We're proof of that in Missouri. People are going to do what they're going to do regardless of what the health officials or politicians ask us to do.

The KMBC article points out politicians on both sides of the aisle are citing economic damage, a focus on rolling out the vaccine, and yes, even lack of patience among constituents for not imposing more restrictions.

It's really the lack of patience among constituents for more restrictions that has always informed my belief that we got one shutdown and that was it. I don't care if the pandemic was effectively managed, I still don't think a lot of people ten months into this thing would be patient enough to deal with more shutdowns.

The KMBC article quotes Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, head of epidemiology at the University of California, San Francisco. She says:

This is probably our most challenging time in the pandemic because the general population is least likely to just hear the same old messages and comply in the same way, but the need for them to do that is at its greatest.

Wear a mask, avoid crowds, observe social distancing and wash your paws. Yeah, it's the same old message. Take care of yourself, because there isn't going to be another shut down. And if there was many wouldn't listen anyway. It's too bad we squandered the one we had.

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