Photo via @lindyqb5/Twitter, @SamBrockNBC/Twitter
February 4, 2021, 3:06 pm
A video clip from a supermarket in Naples, Florida is dropping jaws as the camera pans over crowds of shoppers with hardly a mask in sight in spite of widespread mask mandates, including one currently active in Naples. Only one of the employees shown in the clip is wearing a mask and many of the individuals in the store appear to be elderly and therefore at significantly higher risk for dangerous COVID-19 complications.
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NBC News correspondent Sam Brock took the video while he was working on a different story and was floored by the lack of pandemic precautions.
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The store in question is the Oakes Farms Seed to Table Market owned by one Alfie Oakes, an anti-masker and COVID-denier who doesn’t believe in the U.S. death count, which has now topped 450,000. He also seems to not understand the difference between heart attacks and a disease caused by an infectious virus.
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“That’s total hogwash,” Oakes said of the death count. “Why don’t we shut the world down because of the heart attacks? Why don’t we lock down cities because of heart attacks?”
Because heart attacks, thankfully, are not contagious.
Considering Oakes’ views on the pandemic, it’s less surprising but still horrifying to find out that he paid for multiple busses to take Trump supporters to the Capitol on January 6—and that he used his grocery store’s Facebook page to perpetuate the conspiracy theory that BLM protestors dressed up as MAGA rioters that day.
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The full story shows the sign that Brock was directed to when he asked about the store’s mask policy, which uses the “medical exemptions” excuse to let anyone who doesn’t feel like it enter the store without a mask.
“Those in our lovely government have ordered all persons entering indoor facilities to wear a mask,” it reads. “If you have a medical condition that prevents you from wearing a mask, you are exempt from this order. Due to HIPAA and the 4th Amendment we cannot legally ask you about your medical condition. Therefore, if we see you without a mask, we will assume you have a medical condition and we will welcome you inside to support our business.”
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The sign also features two individuals with Uncle Sam hats above another three people, possibly government figures, in spiked German WWI helmets bizarrely labeled “socialists.”
People are not actually allowed to cite unspecified “medical conditions” to dodge mask mandates, obviously, but Florida governor Ron DeSantis has stripped the state’s ability to fine people and establishments who break the rules.
Meanwhile, the world watches in horror.
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*First Published: February 4, 2021, 3:06 pm
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