A friend of mine who is a retired doctor, as well as a friend who just began working at a hospice program, have told me that the Delta variant of Covid is starting to really spread among kids, who are too young to be vaccinated, in my part of Iowa. The kids hospital in Des Moines, my area, is becoming full with seriously ill kids with Covid. So both of them are now telling me that it's time to start masking and distancing again if we are inside around crowds of people, if we even choose to go to those situations in the first place. And that if we do go to those situations inside, to stay far away from young kids.

What have the rest of you heard and what do you think about this? I live in a red state, where the Repub guv has already taken away all local control or authority to not allow in person school this fall, and also will not issue any statewide mask order. She already fought any local mask orders earlier in the pandemic even before vaccines were available. I have no doubt she is hellbent on forcing all school districts to offer only in person school this fall, instead of allowing hybrid or all online learning. It's a superspreader event waiting to happen...