McSweeney's Being McSweeney's

HIDING PLACE CHOSEN BY MY TODDLER, OR LOCATION WHERE SHE IS INVISIBLE TO PEOPLE MAKING DECISIONS ABOUT US COVID POLICY?

by ELIZABETH PRESTON

What's your guess about which way the story will lean:  We're over protecting toddlers or under protecting them?  I knew without looking that it would be the latter.

Just one of many examples:

Toddlers have the lowest risk of any age group--Elderly people have a risk profile thousands of times higher.  So yeah, makes sense for 300 people to mask on a plane, to protect the one person at the least risk.  I wouldn't even mask for an old person on the plane; they know the risk and chose to travel.  As for the parent of a toddler:  Your fear is real, even if the risk isn't,

but you chose the risk--this is your problem.  Sorry, the world doesn't revolve around protecting you from imaginary risks.

5. In an airplane seat on a flight to visit her grandparents, too small to keep a mask on her own face but breathing in the respiratory droplets of hundreds of adults who aren’t wearing masks, thanks to the CDC and/or some judge in Florida.