OPINION: Are Maine and New Hampshire Reporting Way Too Much on COVID?

For the record, this is a genuine question, not a leading one. Because while driving around earlier today and hearing yet another headline on the radio about COVID hospitalizations and knowing I'd see another news report either on TV or social media probably multiple times throughout the day about COVID deaths, I literally asked myself a question.

Are we just talking too much about all things COVID?

I mean, we've been in this pandemic for about two years now. I can see it being a nonstop leading headline at first when we really had no idea what the heck COVID was, where it came from, what it was doing to people and could do to people, how to prevent, how to treat it, how severe it was getting -- there were so many unanswered questions at first. But that was two years ago.

Now, it's easy to say, "Well, look where we are right now. Clearly, nobody is learning their lesson because we're still dealing with this, so yes, we need to hear about this all the time so we know the severity." But is that necessarily the case? Is it truly a case of us not learning our lesson, or is it a matter of we realize this just isn't going to go away and it's going to continue mutating, and we're just doing our best to live with it?

Again, genuine question, not a leading one.

Yesterday, WMUR posted two tweets about the daily notification of COVID deaths according to New Hampshire state epidemiologist, Dr. Benjamin Chan.

Another genuine question, and I honestly don't even think I have an answer myself to this -- is this info we need to constantly keep hearing? Two years deep into this pandemic, we know people are dying, and they've pretty much been dying on the daily for the better part of the last two years. We know new cases of COVID are popping up like kernels of popcorn under heat, generally due to how contagious the omicron variant is. We know all this because we've been hearing about it nonstop, multiple times per day.

There are two ways to view it, really. 1) Yes, we need to hear about this as a daily reminder that we're doing an incredibly crappy job at trying to better this thing, and instead it's absolutely wiping the floor with us, or 2) ENOUGH ALREADY, WE GET IT!

And then, of course, there's the insanely tired debate with the vaccine. "The jab" as some people (who despise the idea of it) like to call it. You can't go one day -- maybe even one hour -- without hearing or reading the word "vaccine." Ever since the first vaccine rolled out at the start of 2021, it's been so insanely highly and ferociously debated on whether or not to get it, whether it's safe, and the like. Add those to the nonstop updates we hear about on the regular and can't seemingly escape.

Especially now that, a few days before the start of the New Year, the CDC basically said that if you're not boostered, you need to basically take the same precautions as those who aren't vaccinated. So, basically, overnight, people who were fully vaccinated but not boostered, rejoined the unvaccinated pool of people. And at that point, what's even the use of getting the vaccine in the first place if after time, the CDC is randomly going to say it doesn't even matter unless you get 23983289 boosters every half year. It's just a bad look.

It's just at the point where it's like -- when is enough, enough? Does it do any good to report on all of the people that are dying on the daily? Does it do any good to constantly remind us that every single day that passes, we're setting new records of COVID hospitalizations? Does it actually do anything to have all of this shoved down our throats multiple times every single day without a break?

Again, just a genuine question that I personally have zero clue how to answer.

Regardless of where you fall and stand in all this, there is one thing we can all do together no matter our stances -- be safe and stay safe (okay, two things.)