Dear Young People,

If you don’t kill us with your refusal to adhere to social distancing, we’ll all be hen-pecked to death by your annoying insistence on meeting up with friends. So quit it, and stay home.

The messaging that COVID-19 is less lethal to your age group–which is true, thank God– is being translated by some in your age group as “we won’t get it,” which is really really really untrue. Instead, because you have already been everywhere (school and sports and Starbucks) and with everybody (ditto) you’re carrying a risk of having contracted COVID-19 that is not zero. People your age are also more likely to walk around shedding virus while having no symptoms at all.

Some of you have become armchair epidemiologists and are manufacturing relative risk estimates based on positive COVID-19 reports in your area. Whatever you are guessing, you’re wrong. We aren’t testing enough people to know what the community penetrance is. Even if you arrived at the hospital right now and with the classic presentation (body aches, fever, cough, and fatigue), they wouldn’t test you for COVID-19 unless you were sick enough to be admitted. And though very few of you will get that sick, some of you will. Instead, you’re more likely to infect 2-4 people (that’s the R naught) every time you insist on going over to Emma’s.

Also, I don’t care what Emma’s family is allowing. Social distancing means you stay home. And if you have to go out–and let’s be honest, you don’t– you stay 6 feet away from other people. We’re also not buying your “I’ll go to the grocery for you” or “just gonna run up to Panera for a sandwich.” Children, please.

On Wednesday, I gave a COVID-19 overview to high school seniors who told me they hadn’t gotten much more information than, “wash your hands.” On Wednesday, which was just 72 hours ago, they didn’t entirely believe me when I told them schools would be canceled by the next day. I showed them graphs that prove how contagious COVID-19 is, and said out loud what no one is telling you: some of your grandparents will die if we do not slow its spread. You know what those kids aren’t doing now? They aren’t asking to go over to Emma’s.

Things might get grim, but right now you have an opportunity to help save lives by doing something you already love to do: stay home and play with your phone. Make some TikToks. Learn how to skateboard or practice your three-pointer. And armed with science (R naught! Homeschooling done for the day!), you can be an ambassador for public health just by telling your friends you’re not meeting up with them at Shake Shack.

Tell them to quit it, and stay home.

Remember summertime when you didn’t know who these guys were? They are the definition of VIRAL. Related: the Hype House needs to be shut down. #socialdistancing