 So I want to talk about this article from the New York Times that really illustrates the consequences of the Republican Party and the right-wing media spheres politicization of the pandemic and not just that their politicization of the COVID-19 vaccines it shows that this is hurting Right-wingers more so than anyone else at this point in time in the country and the data here It's not necessarily the most surprising thing in the world But it confirms what we already suspected and seeing the data is still pretty jarring It shows that there's one conclusion out of all of this and I think you already know what it's going to be Get the vaccine, but nonetheless, I want to show you the findings from this article David Leonhardt of the New York Times writes during the early months of COVID-19 vaccinations Several major demographic groups lagged in receiving shots including black Americans Latino Americans and Republican voters more recently the racial gaps While still existing have narrowed the partisan gap However continues to be enormous a Pew Research Center poll last month found that 86% of Democratic voters had received at least one shot Compared with 60% of Republican voters The political divide over vaccinations is so large that almost every reliably blue state now has a higher vaccination rate than almost every Reliably red state because the vaccines are so effective at preventing serious illness COVID deaths are also showing a partisan pattern COVID is still a national crisis But the worst forms of it are increasingly concentrated in red America as is often the case State by state numbers can often understate the true pattern because every state has both liberal and conservative areas When you look at the county level the gap can look even starker And as you can see here red counties do in fact do worse both in terms of vaccination rates And also in terms of the number of deaths that they're seeing due to COVID-19 and these charts here They demonstrate that they show that there is a clear difference Now this wasn't necessarily always the case in the beginning of the pandemic There were a lot of blue areas that were disproportionately affected and rural areas weren't really seeing that much of a surge, right? And it's because in these bigger cities more urban areas areas that are densely populated that tend to vote democratic They just have more people and even though masks help to mitigate the spread of the virus They just weren't as effective As the vaccines are But now that we have vaccines That kind of changed everything, right? The masks indeed did put a cap on the spread of the virus But the vaccines are just they're second to none And the author of this article points that out vaccination has changed the situation The vaccines are powerful enough to overwhelm other differences between blue and red areas Some left-leaning communities like many suburbs of new york san francisco and washington As well as much of new england have such high vaccination rates that even the unvaccinated are partly protected by the low number of cases Conservative communities on the other hand have been walloped by the highly contagious delta variant since delta began circulating widely in the united states COVID has exacted a horrific death toll on red america in counties where donald trump received at least 70 of the vote The virus has killed about 47 out of every 100 000 people since the end of june according to charles gaba a health care analyst In counties where trump won less than 32 of the vote the number is about 10 out of 100 000 And the gap will probably keep growing and this chart right here. It just says it all I mean, you don't really even have to say much more. Just look at this chart Show this chart to someone share it with your friends counties with large trump vote shares are seeing higher COVID death rates due to widespread vaccine hesitancy among right-wingers And this didn't happen on accident the vaccine hesitancy is being pushed By republicans not all republicans, but it's especially being pushed by the right-wing media sphere fox news tucker carlson oan newsmax And the result is that right-wingers are contracting COVID-19 at higher rates And they're dying at higher rates their disinformation is killing Their political group. It's it's sad The conclusion obviously is get vaccinated. What are you doing? This shouldn't be a political issue. There should be no partisan divide when it comes to a life-saving highly effective safe vaccine There shouldn't be This red blue divide here. It should just be the vaccines available There's evidence stating how effective it is and how safe it is. I'm gonna take it It doesn't matter if I'm a republican a democrat or apolitical And I know people in my family who are apolitical who get the flu vaccine every single year And guess what? They're anti-vax because dumb fucks in my family convinced them That the vaccine is actually dangerous so anti-vaxxers Their sentiment is like they're not just themselves anti-vax They proselytize right they try to spread their fear mongering to other people It's contagious just like the virus is contagious They don't want to just be content Endangering themselves. They want to endanger others, but they don't view it this way They believe that by spreading anti-vaccine misinformation They're saving people's lives because some folks believe that either the vaccine isn't safe or that it's dangerous even And these people are a threat To society. They're a threat to public health They're effectively bioterrorists in my opinion and I have no love for any anti-vaxxer My patients has run out because this misinformation this anti-vaxx sentiment is literally killing people And it doesn't matter if republicans are the ones dying more so than democrats or leftists I don't care. I just don't want people to die It's that simple like as a leftist when I push for medicare for all I don't push for medicare for all Except republicans. I push for medicare for all period I think that if there is a way we can save lives, we should do it and combating anti-vaccine misinformation I feel like that's my responsibility as a leftist the vaccines work and they're safe facts Don't care about your feelings. The data is very very clear and so when you look at the death rates and the Anti-vaxx rates the rates of people who are unvaccinated There's a very clear causal relationship right there people who are not getting vaccinated are disproportionately in hospitals They're disproportionately the ones dying That's indisputable at this point So if you still are choosing to not take the covid-19 vaccines You're playing with your own life Just so you can be edgy and own the libs and associate with your own political in group Don't politicize this It's your life Take the vaccine stop being fucking stubborn Take it now rather than regretting it later