Restaurant owners, gym owners, healthcare workers, teachers, and parents stood with San Diego County community leaders fed up with severe government-imposed COVID restrictions and confronted the San Diego County Board of Supervisors during a board meeting on Tuesday, August 17, just as the board is preparing to issue new response proposals to combat what it has deemed a “local health emergency.”
Should the board approve recommendations put forth by local public health officials, San Diego County would be added to the ever-expanding list of U.S. cities and counties instituting mandatory vaccine passports to enter restaurants and retail stores, and reinstating masking in schools and public indoor spaces.
On Tuesday, local media outlet KUSI news reported on the backlash from the courageous Californians, noting a community rally was held prior to the meeting, with the advocacy groups ReOpen San Diego, Let Them Breathe, and San Diego Rise Up providing the public with resources such as petitions and proclamations that businesses can display declaring they are against discrimination.
“We, the undersigned businesses of San Diego County, publicly declare we will never discriminate against anyone and deny them the right to eat based on a vaccine passport,” read one Proclamation Against Discrimination for San Diego Restaurants by the group ReOpen San Diego.
Proclamation For San Diego Restaurants 8 10 21The nearly five-hour-long meeting largely consisted of public comments, where some 150 people addressed the board, following a public-health update by board health officer Dr. Wilma Wooten, who presented on county vaccination rates and case-testing efforts.
One constituent, Shaun Frederickson, called out Wooten specifically during his turn to address the board: “The numbers you stated are propaganda…. Last month … do you know how many deaths happened in the month of July? Wilma [Dr. Wooten]? Nathan [Board Chairman Nathan Fletcher]? Thirty six. How much propaganda are we going to use for the deaths of 36 people? How many rights are we going to take, and Nathan, how many lies are you going to continue to propagate?”
“There is already a recall effort started for one dictator, there will be another if necessary,” continued Frederickson, pointing to Board Chairman Fletcher, referencing the recall election of embattled Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom, set to take place on September 14.
“Your authority is being pummeled…. We are here to inform you the people have spoken, COVID is over.”
San Diego County, with a population of 3.4 million, just below that of Los Angeles County, has reported 3,839 total COVID-related deaths, as of August 20 — a total fatality rate of 0.1 percent.
During her presentation, Dr. Wooten described the “more contagious and transmissible” Delta variant, admitting that “vaccinated individuals can get Delta through a breakthrough infection and can be contagious,” but that “vaccinated people represent a very small number of transmissions across the country.”
Dr. Wooten went on to state that “since March 1, there have been a total of 13 COVID-19-related deaths among those that were fully vaccinated compared with 103 among those who were not fully vaccinated.”
Statistics from 2019-2020, covering roughly the same time span of six months, show that San Diego County reported a total of 105 flu deaths.
Concerned citizens, such as Frederickson, whose speech at a previous board meeting went viral online, took to the podium on Tuesday to speak out against vaccination and masking requirements, warning that “We are here, as your constituents, to tell you, this [COVID pandemic] is over. San Diego is no longer under your rule of thumb.”
Another speaker, eleven-year-old San Diego resident Olivia detailed her experience, telling the board that “this past year has been very difficult for me.” She described the closure of her school and church and the difficulty of adjusting to online learning. “Ridiculous rules [were] in place,” she said. “We could only walk in one direction down the hallway…. I could barely hear my teacher through her mask. I couldn’t hug my friends or see their faces. It made me very sad to keep six feet away from them.”
Taking her turn at the podium to address the board, young Emily Archuleta began, “Whatever your political affiliation, we [Americans] all hold one thing near and dear to our hearts, the freedom of choice. How is the choice to have a vaccine different? Mandating a vaccine to work is against our constitutional rights as Americans.”
San Diego resident Brittany Mayer led off a powerful speech by reminding the board that “America is not a hospital. California is not a hospital. San Diego is not a hospital. This is a constitutional republic that guarantees protection of individual freedom.” She continued, “We remove consent from treating us like we are patients in a hospital ward. We are done. The consent of the governed is removed. We will not comply. We do not consent. Nathan Fletcher you are on notice. We will constitutionally remove all petty tyrants beginning now!”
Directing her comments at Fletcher and Wooten, constituent Sharon McKeeman, a mother of four, a military wife, and the founder of the nonprofit Let Them Breathe said, “You have talked about cases rising, but what you didn’t talk about was suicide risings. You didn’t talk about mental health disorders that are deadly that we are seeing our families battle every day.”
Notably, back in December 2020, Dr. Chris Gordon, chief medical officer at the Family Health Centers of San Diego, reported “seeing higher incidents of anxiety, depression” and a 30-percent increase in patients seeking help during the COVID crisis.
Over the course of the past year, millions of Americans have endured prolonged stretches of social isolation, with many relapsing into drug and substance abuse and forced to cohabit with their abusers, succumbing to suicide and preventable suffering.
In response to the rising emotional and mental crises, Gordon said, “We have to understand our lives have been turned completely upside down and it’s ok to not feel good about that. It’s ok to feel sad, to feel anxious.”
According to CBS8 News, “San Diego County saw over a 200% increase in fentanyl overdose deaths just last year and now a San Diego recovery center says more than half of its new clients in 2021 are still struggling with opioid addiction.”
“Health officials predict that about 700 people will die from a fentanyl overdose in 2021 in San Diego County. Since July, the George Bailey Detention Center in San Diego has reported at least eight fentanyl overdose cases, with one person dying. Shoreline Recovery Center says right now, about 55% of their clients have opioid use disorders.”
While the impact of the efforts of these brave San Diego residents remains to be seen, if Americans are to fight the larger battles ahead, we must first fight the small, local battles.
In San Diego County, the people are fighting. They are organized, prepared, and standing together for the purpose of taking back their community from county officials abusing the power of their duly elected positions. Under such circumstances, Americans would do well to remember the prescient words of the 19th-century psychologist Carl Jung:
It is not famine, not earthquakes, not microbes, not cancer, but man himself who is man’s greatest danger to man, for the simple reason that there is no adequate protection against psychic epidemics, which are infinitely more devastating than the worst of natural catastrophes.
