Also on today’s menu:
That Omicron Variant
Hunting Rifle Discharges Round
Governor Chris Sununu and Attorney General John Formella announced on Monday that the state will prohibit enforcement of a federal mandate intended to prevent unvaccinated nurses from spreading the coronavirus to the patients under their care. The state’s action followed a ruling by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri granting a preliminary injunction against the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ vaccine mandate for workers at healthcare facilities that receive Medicare or Medicaid funding.
New Hampshire was among the states (others being Missouri, Nebraska, Arkansas, Kansas, Iowa, Wyoming, Alaska, South Dakota, and North Dakota) seeking to invalidate the order requiring nurses to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19. Sununu said, “This is a big win for New Hampshire’s health care system. Nursing homes were at risk of closure if the Biden mandate remained in place. This helps maintain the staff New Hampshire needs to care for our loved ones.”
Prior to vaccines being available, nursing homes experienced the highest death rates nationwide because, once the disease entered those facilities, it quickly spread throughout the enclosed space. The death counts dropped as measures, including vaccines and frequent testing, increased. Many nurses, however, have quit their jobs rather than submit to the vaccine — a situation that places patients at risk from inadequate staffing.
Nurses are not bound by the Hippocratic oath that doctors take: “First, do no harm.” They instead take the Florence Nightingale oath: “I solemnly pledge myself before God and in the presence of this assembly, to pass my life in purity and to practice my profession faithfully. I will abstain from whatever is deleterious and mischievous, and will not take or knowingly administer any harmful drug. I will do all in my power to maintain and elevate the standard of my profession, and will hold in confidence all personal matters committed to my keeping and all family affairs coming to my knowledge in the practice of my calling. With loyalty will I endeavor to aid the physician in his work, and devote myself to the welfare of those committed to my care.”
New Hampshire has taken the position that “devoting myself to the welfare of those committed to my care” simply means being present, rather than doing everything possible to prevent more COVID deaths and “doing no harm.”
Everyone’s personal healthcare decisions are private decisions, and fears of possible side effects are valid reasons to reject a vaccine — as are religious beliefs — but those who make that choice should be willing to step aside when those decisions could affect others’ lives.
That Omicron Variant
The new variant of the coronavirus, first discovered in Africa, is, in President Joe Biden’s words, “a cause for concern, not a cause for panic.” He said, “We have the best vaccine in the world, the best medicines, the best scientists. And we’re learning more every single day.”
Biden emphasized that the best protection against the variants out there, including the new Omicron variant, is getting fully vaccinated and getting a booster shot.
“We do not yet believe that additional measures will be needed,” he said, “but so that we are prepared if needed, my team is already working with officials at Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson to develop contingency plans for vaccines or boosters if needed.”
Hunting Rifle Discharges Round
An elderly hunter was injured when his companion’s hunting rifle accidentally discharged on Nov. 27.
According to New Hampshire Fish and Game, 83-year-old Kenneth Simpson of Lyndeborough failed to remove all of the rounds in his .300 Remington Model 722 bolt-action hunting rifle following a day of hunting. One bullet remained in the chamber and, when he placed the weapon in the vehicle, the gun discharged, with the round going through the leg of 82-year-old Gary Ciardelli of Wilton, who was in the driver’s seat, and it continued through the driver’s side door.
The Wilton Ambulance Service treated Ciardelli’s injury, which was serious but not life-threatening, and took him to Southern New Hampshire Medical Center which later discharged him.
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