Tag Archives: Thanksgiving

Entertainment

San Diego Comic-Con’s Thanksgiving event faces backlash

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A cosplayer at San Diego Comic-Con in 2019
Photo: CHRIS DELMAS/AFP via Getty Images)

At the beginning of this month, the organizers behind San Diego Comic-Con announced that they would once again be skipping the traditional in-person event in favor of another installment of the free Comic-Con@Home thing they did last year. However, either because nobody liked Comic-Con@Home in 2020 or because vaccine distribution has been going better than originally forecasted, the organization announced just a few days ago that it will also be holding a “Comic-Con Special Edition” at the San Diego Convention Center this fall that sounds a whole lot like a regular, pre-pandemic Comic-Con on a slightly smaller scale—even though we are still decidedly mid-pandemic and may still be mid-pandemic by the fall. So that was one issue with the “Special Edition,” but another issue was the specific weekend they chose to hold it on: November 26-28, a.k.a. Thanksgiving weekend, a.k.a. the first Thanksgiving weekend that a lot of people might actually be able to spend with their families since 2019.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, a behind-the-scenes backlash has been building since this new event was announced (in addition to a front-of-the-scenes backlash, as detailed by our friends at io9) with “multiple studio, publishing, and publicity sources” quietly wondering why the hell Comic-Con thinks anyone would want to do this on freakin’ Thanksgiving weekend—though not in those exact words. An unnamed representative “for a studio that has hosted Hall H panels in the past” questioned “what actor or producer is going to give up their first post-vaccine Thanksgiving holiday with family to travel to San Deigo to publicize a project?” and another noted that people have already gotten Wonder Woman and The Mandalorian during the pandemic but “what we haven’t had is a hug from our parents and grandparents.”

A PR rep “with clients who have appeared in Hall H panels” (i.e. probably some superhero people) also said that actors are “refusing” to attend, but they “would likely come around if ordered to by a studio.” So if someone shows up to this thing and seems really unhappy about it, you might be able to do the math and figure out who to blame. Meanwhile, there’s the obvious issue of whether or not it will actually be safe to hold something like this in November—both in terms of putting people in a convention center and possibly flying them out to San Diego. Comic-Con seems willing to move this thing to another date, but that only illustrates how arbitrary this whole plan is. Case in point, THR says none of the big studios were even consulted about this Thanksgiving weekend thing ahead of time, and now they’re scrambling to decide if it’s even something they want to do.

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Entertainment

Comic-Con Addresses Controversial Thanksgiving In Person Event

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The San Diego Convention Center, home to Comic-Con.
Photo: Frazer Harrison (Getty Images)

Over the weekend, Comic-Con International—the folks behind San Diego Comic-Con—made a more-than-surprising announcement that they’d be holding an in-person convention from November 26-28 of this year. Now, if you don’t have a calendar in front of you, that’s Thanksgiving weekend, one of the busiest travel weekends of the year.

The news—originally released at 9:00 p.m. EST on Saturday night, a totally normal time to release such news—was met with largely negative responses. Attending Comic-Con is already a huge hassle. But attending it on a busy holiday weekend, after almost two years of a pandemic, when many people should hypothetically actually be able to spend time with their families and friends? “Not great, Bob!” Well today, Comic-Con offered an updated response to the “Comic-Con Special Edition” reveal, and while it explained a bit more of why they chose that specific weekend, they also made it clear there’s no guarantee it’ll happen. You know. Because of the global pandemic.

“As longtime fans ourselves, we have attended many conventions over that holiday weekend, opting to spend Thanksgiving day with family and the rest of the weekend with friends and our families of choice. While this is not unusual in the convention trade, we understand this choice is not optimal for everyone,” the statement—which you can, and should, read on the official website— says.

The statement also reveals Comic-Con chose Thanksgiving weekend because many conventions (fan-related or otherwise) have rescheduled in hopes things would be better at the end of year. So the calendar is crowded and “Of the dates presented with the fewest restrictions, Friday through Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend seemed to be the best balance of available space and our envisioned event,” the statement said.

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Second, Comic-Con Special Edition is not intended to be the full event SDCC typically is in July. As such, and because of the difficulty of travel at this time, “We understand that due to potential travel-based restrictions and challenges, Comic-Con Special Edition may be an event attended mostly by fans more easily able to travel to San Diego.” So they aren’t expecting people to travel from far and wide from it. Though they are, of course, welcome. Finally: “Currently we do not know whether having this event in November is even feasible” but “it was our desire to have something in place for our fans who have longed for an in-person event.” Basically, this could all be for naught, they just wanted to get ahead of the game in case it’s possible. Which is understandable.

The statement did at least include the idea of starting “slowly and cautiously” in this new era. Noticeably absent in this new posting however is the language from the initial statement about this event being needed for economic reasons. Which is also understandable. But is it “Our primary hope was to be able to gather in-person as a community” or “generate much needed revenue?” It’s likely a combination of the two but it still makes for slightly mixed messages. Also, while Comic-Con@Home was free last year, there’s nothing stopping the organizers from setting up a virtual ticket system for a pay-per-view type of thing.

Look, some of us would love to attend an in-person comic convention and no one does it better than the team behind San Diego Comic-Con (which is still happening virtually in July). And yes, if it’s safe to hold this convention, people will go. That’s a weekend many people have off from work or could attend with family or friends. That’s only one part of such an event though—think about the people who run security, work at hotels, restaurants, and the people who will need to exhibit at such an event to help their own businesses. Some of them may have already had to work the weekend regardless but you know a convention requires all hands on deck. At least fans (and some reporters, like us at io9) have a choice.

It’s a very complex situation and though this latest statement from Comic-Con isn’t great, at least the conversation has already shifted a bit. We’ll keep you updated.

For more, make sure you’re following us on our Instagram @io9dotcom.



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Health

Ex-FDA chief Scott Gottlieb COVID infection rates will FALL into the summer as cases fall to 56K

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The former commissioner of the FDA has said he believes the downward trend in coronavirus infection rates will continue until the summer.

Dr. Scott Gottlieb said that despite new variants of the virus springing up which still creates a risk of infection, he believes that rates will continue to fall.

Daily average deaths and hospitalizations have fallen to their lowest levels since before the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays. 

There were 1,286 daily deaths recorded in the last 24 hours with figures now at their lowest since October 23, at the start of this winter’s wave of infections.

Former FDA commissioner Dr. Scott Gottlieb said that the US will likely ‘continue to see infection rates decline into the spring and the summer.’

The number of daily cases, hospitalizations and deaths are all now falling

On Sunday, the number of people currently in hospital with the virus was 56,159 marking 40 straight days of falling hospitalization numbers. 

‘This has taken a tragic toll on the United States, but we should be optimistic, in my view. I think we’re going to continue to see infection rates decline into the spring and the summer. Right now, they’re falling quite dramatically. I think these trends are likely to continue,’ Gottlieb, who sits on the board of Pfizer, told CBS News.    

‘With rising vaccination rates and the fact we’ve injected about a third of the country, that is enough protected immunity. If you look at the counties in New York and New Jersey that had greater than 45% prevalence, meaning more than 45% of the population was infected going into the winter, they really didn’t have much of a winter surge.

‘Once you get to about 40% of the population with some sort of protected immunity — you don’t have herd immunity because it will continue to transfer, but it will transfer at a much slower rate,’ Gottlieb explained.    

RN Robert Villa (right) gives a Moderna Covid-19 vaccine to Armando Montes at the newly opened City of Los Angeles vaccination site at Pierce College

There has now been 40 straight days of falling hospitalizations

Gottlieb said that he believes Pfizer and other companies that are manufacturing vaccines will be able to ‘prepare much better for the fall’ and develop boosters for the new variants of the virus that are circulating. 

‘I think we’ll have the spring and the summer to work this out. I don’t think we’ll ever reach total herd immunity. Hopefully we will vaccinate the older population to protect them from dying from this, but this will continue to spread.’   

Gottlieb also said he believed this fall might be the right time for school children to also receive the vaccination.

‘I think it is possible this vaccine gets moved into the high school population in the fall. We have seen the spread more in the high schools than the elementary schools. There is less risk in the grade-school-aged children. I don’t believe this vaccine will get moved to 12-and-under into the fall.

‘It may be a question of trying to reformulate the vaccines at a lower dose for the younger kids because they develop a more robust immune response to the vaccine,’ Gottlieb theorized. 

Motorists and passengers wait in line for their Covid-19 vaccinations administered by members of the National Guard at a joint state and federal COVID-19 vaccination site on the campus of California State University of Los Angeles in Los Angeles on Wednesday 

More than 28 million COVID-19 cases have rocked the US since the virus arrived in the country almost exactly one year ago.

The virus’ effect was so severe it has taken a full year off the average life expectancy in the United States, the biggest decline since World War Two. 

So far, less than 15 per cent of the US population has received at least one vaccine dose, with nearly 43 million getting at least one shot and nearly 18 million getting a second shot, US statistics show.

Some locales are easing restrictions, such as on indoor dining, and moving to reopen schools even as millions await their shots, sparking debate over the safety of teachers, students and others.

The total number of people who have died in the U.S. fro the virus is fast approaching 500,000 

Financial pressures also continue to weigh even as economists express optimism for the year ahead. 

Congress is weighing Biden’s $1.9trillion coronavirus relief package, with the House of Representatives expected to vote on it this week and the Senate seeking to pass it before March 14. 

The White House said on Sunday it was planning a memorial event in which Biden would deliver remarks.

A White House spokesman said the president along with first lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and second gentleman Doug Emhoff would hold a moment of silence on Monday and there would be a candle-lighting ceremony at sundown.

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Health

Biden Team Fears No COVID-19 Herd Immunity Until Thanksgiving

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Top members of President Joe Biden’s COVID response team are warning internally that the U.S. may not reach herd immunity until Thanksgiving or even the start of winter—months later than originally calculated—according to two senior administration officials.

In an interview with CBS News this week, Biden hinted at some of these concerns, saying it would be “very difficult” to reach herd immunity—a population-wide resistance to the virus—“much before the end of the summer” with the current daily rate of approximately 1.3 million vaccine doses. Other top officials working on the federal government’s COVID-19 response say the are uneasy about vaccine supply long term and the impact on herd immunity, and have begun to explore ways to expand U.S. manufacturing capacity, potentially through new partnerships with outside pharmaceutical firms.

Beyond supply issues, though, top health officials say they are increasingly worried about the United Kingdom and South African COVID-19 variants, the likelihood that more variants will emerge in the coming months, and the possibility that those variants will evade the vaccines. There is some evidence to suggest that both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines protect against the B117 United Kingdom variant, though a recent study shows a new mutation could make the vaccines less effective. Data gathered by the Novavax and Johnson and Johnson clinical trials in South Africa suggest their vaccines are less effective against the variant spreading rapidly in the country. And South Africa recently said it was halting the rollout of the AstraZeneca vaccine because evidence from clinical trials suggested the vaccine did not work well against the variant.

Together, the recent data has alarmed health officials in the Biden administration who are now raising questions about what more can be done to not only shorten the herd immunity timeline—not just to return Americans to some sort of normalcy but also to ensure the country does not experience another surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations and deaths. Officials have spent the last several days discussing ways to ramp up genome sequencing to track variants and how to push out the message that Americans need to more closely follow public health guidelines to reduce transmission as B117 variant cases begin to increase.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, who has previously calculated that about 75 percent of the U.S. population would need to get vaccinated to reach herd immunity, said in an interview that he is still “cautiously optimistic” that the country can achieve that goal by the beginning of the fall.

“I still think that is possible,” Fauci said. “As I’ve said before, once we get into mass vaccination when the general public starts getting it by the end of the spring—April, May, June …and we get past any vaccine hesitancy, then we should be able to reach that 70 or 75 percent mark. We’re going in the right direction.” Fauci caveated that prediction by underscoring the fact that he has ongoing concerns about the new COVID-19 variants.

In a press conference Monday, Fauci said that modeling indicates the B117 variant “could become dominant by the end of March.” “That’s the sobering news,” he said. “The two things that we can do is, A, make sure we adhere to the public health measures … and, B, get as many people vaccinated as quickly as we possibly can.” Vaccine rates have begun to improve across the country in recent days. And the Biden administration continues to announce increases in the number of doses states are receiving each week.

Still, Centers for Disease Control Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky said Monday that the proliferation of variants “remains of great concern and is a threat that could reverse the recent positive trends we’re seeing.” As of this week, 699 variant cases have been confirmed across 34 states, with 690 of these cases being the B117 variant, the variant first reported in the United Kingdom, Walensky said.

“The good news is that even with B117 as a dominant variant … cases plummeted when people stop having contact, when people wore masks … That is the key. We need to give a viral enemy less chance to speak.”

— former CDC director Tom Frieden

“The virus is going to continue to mutate no matter what we do. The types of mutations we’ll see will change as more people are immunized. And natural immunity will continue to put evolutionary pressure on the virus. So, we’ll see different types of mutations that may help it escape vaccine protection or become more transmissible,” said Rajeev Venkayya, president of Takeda Pharmaceuticals’ vaccine business. “I think the number one thing that’s going to affect supply [and access], right now is having more vaccines, demonstrating proof of efficacy and safety. And there, I think the story is very, very promising.”

With the threats of the new variants becoming more clear, the message among Biden officials and health experts alike is clear: Return back to basics. Follow the public health guidelines the CDC has recommended for the past year—masks, social distancing, and limited indoor contact.

“The more transmissible those strains of viruses, the higher threshold you need for herd immunity. The B117 variant … is very concerning,” said Tom Frieden, former director of the CDC. “The good news is that even with B117 as a dominant variant in the UK and elsewhere … cases plummeted when people stop having contact, when people wore masks, when you have people not sharing indoor air with people not in your household. That is the key. We need to give a viral enemy less chance to speak.”

Yet many cities across the country are moving in the opposite direction, and are beginning to loosen restrictions. In New York and New Jersey, for example, officials have begun to allow for increases in indoor dining and other indoor events such as weddings. Iowa’s governor just lifted the state’s mask mandate.

Walensky pushed back against those new guidelines Monday, telling reporters that she discouraged any move to loosen masking guidance. “We’re still at over 100,000 cases a day,” she said. “I think we have yet to control this pandemic. We still have this emerging threat of variants. And I would just simply discourage any of those activities. We really need to keep all of the mitigation measures at play here if we’re really going to get control of this pandemic.”

Atul Gawande, a former member of President Biden’s transition COVID-19 advisory board, said in an interview that vaccination is not the only way to combat the new variants.

“We’re going to need more than the vaccines when it comes to the strains. We have a very high rate of viral circulation. So, we’re going to continue to generate new strains. The fact that we’ve already seen strains that have some diminished effectiveness for the vaccines suggests where we could be up against,” Gawande said. “We’re going to have a year where it’s going to take a long time not just to get to people. We’re going to have significant pockets of the population that will not yet have received the vaccine, either because they don’t want it or they want to or they want to wait. We’re going to have significant circulation. The variants are increasingly defeating the monoclonal antibodies.”



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