Violet Affleck is utilizing her voice to advocate for public well being.
The 18-year-old daughter of actors Jennifer Garner and Ben Affleck delivered an impassioned plea through the public feedback portion of a Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors assembly Tuesday, which was captured on video and shared on X, previously Twitter.
Throughout her speech, Affleck — who was carrying a face masks — opened up a few medical situation that has impacted her life.
“I contracted a post-viral condition in 2019,” Affleck, who spoke rapidly to suit her message throughout the allotted minutelong time-frame, revealed. “I’m OK now, but I saw firsthand that medicine does not always have answers to the consequences of even minor viruses. The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown that into sharper relief.”
“One in 10 infections leads to long COVID, which is a devastating neurological and cardiovascular illness that can take away people’s ability to work, see, move and even think,” Affleck stated. “To confront the long COVID crisis, I demand mask availability, air filtration and far-UVC lights in government facilities, including jails and detention centers, and mask mandates in county medical facilities.”
She additionally advocated for extra free testing and therapy alternatives, whereas including “most importantly the county must oppose mask bans for any reason.” “They do not keep us safer, they make vulnerable members of our community less safe and make everyone less able to participate in Los Angeles together,” she concluded. “Thank you.”
Though it’s unclear what situation Affleck contracted, post-COVID signs can embody fatigue, signs that worsen after bodily or psychological effort, fever and respiratory signs, together with problem respiratory or shortness of breath and cough, in line with the Mayo Clinic.
Mayo Clinic Proceedings added that post-COVID circumstances are widespread and have “caused widespread unemployment and billions in lost wages.”
Information exhibits that COVID circumstances are steadily rising this summer season, as a result of variants which may be extra contagious and higher at bypassing vaccine safety than earlier ones.
Affleck’s speech comes on the heels of Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass’ (D) announcement in June that she was contemplating banning masks at protests, in line with The New Republic. Bass’ announcement got here as a response to a pro-Palestinian protest close to a Los Angeles synagogue that made worldwide headlines, per The Guardian.
Each retailers be aware that different political leaders, corresponding to New York Gov. Kathy Hochul and New York Metropolis Mayor Eric Adams, each Democrats, have supported the concept of banning masks at protests and on public transit as a result of they really feel the masks provide anonymity to individuals who want to have interaction in antisemitic habits.
Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious illness specialist at Vanderbilt College Medical Heart, informed USA As we speak that “bans on the use of masks strongly inhibit one of the options that public health has to reduce the impact of pandemics in our population.”
