Today in Oh Yes We Are Most Certainly F*cked, we have data from the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) showing that many Americans are choosing to ignore the guidance against mid-pandemic holiday travel.
Per publicly available travel stats spotted by NBC's Lucy Bayly, the TSA screened more than two million passengers on Friday and Saturday. Broken down by day, there were 1,019,836 screenings on Friday and 984,369 on Saturday. Friday's haul, notably, is only the second time the TSA has reported more than a million screened passengers since the middle of March.
Among those more than two million screened passengers, presumably, is a massive swath of people who have decided to not take seriously the CDC's recently released advice regarding the need for a continued reduction in the expectations of normalcy.
Last week, the agency's new Celebrating Thanksgiving guidance was released, with the biggest takeaway—for those paying attention, at least—being a reminder that the safest way to celebrate the holiday is to simply do so with the people you live with.
Additional advice was included for those who insist on traveling despite the ongoing COVID-19 risk, including wearing a mask and keeping six feet away from anyone who isn't a member of your household, though it's hard to imagine a travel-insistent person following through on any of that.
The total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases surpassed 12 million over the weekend. The total number of confirmed deaths in the U.S. is over 255,000. Sunday, meanwhile, saw the U.S. break its hospitalization record for the 13th day in a row.
