Omicron has taken over local headlines and public health conversations. But is it really worth the hype? Now, I do think that this is a very important issue, I simply do not believe that it is something to obsess about or to constantly bring up when I am just trying to eat my Cheetos in peace. 

First, I need to point out that being vaccinated and masked up does not make you more virtuous. The people that don’t want to get vaccinated are not evil people, they just see the world differently than you do. It is important to make this point as we continue, because there are too many people trying to assert their self-righteousness. 

I get it, the people that are not vaccinated could get people with underlying health conditions sick. However, if they already have the vaccine — why does it matter?  The COVID-19 vaccine prevents hospitalization, so why are we continuing to focus on masking up on campus when around others, especially if these are young people with no serious medical conditions? 

Sedgwick County has a population of over 500,000 people. The county has seen a little over 900 deaths since the beginning of the pandemic, according to the COVID Sedgwick County dashboard. Most of the people that are being diagnosed with COVID-19, in the past month, are among 18-34 year olds. If you look at the recovery rate for Sedgwick County, nearly all 18-34 year old’s recover with little to no problems. 

Half of the population in Sedgwick County has been vaccinated, which also means that there is little risk of going out and interacting with others and then being hospitalized. There is widespread media attention for the overcrowding of hospitals, which again would make sense because of how many people are freaked out about the virus due to media coverage of the pandemic.

How many of those people being brought into the hospitals with COVID-19 are actually in dire need of support, and how many have recovered with little to no attention from medical staff? Crowding does not equal death of COVID-19 patients. Again I’m not arguing that this is not an important issue, I think that we should follow statistics and science, and not media organizations or scientists that are being influenced by politicians. Let’s focus on efficiently operating, and that number is usually not zero. As much as I want utopia as you do, we have to work with what we have. 

CORRECTION: A previous version of this story had the state-wide numbers instead of the county-wide numbers. This version has been updated to reflect the changes.