A not-so-typical post tonight. I couldn't find anything I really wanted to write about so I thought I could give an update on the state of things concerning the Coronavirus Pandemic and how it is being dealt with. This isn't going to be a traditional post and I don't plan on pulling a bunch of sources to support my arguments. This is just an opinion piece, and shouldn't be taken as anything else.
With that out of the way I think it's clear that a lot of things are happening with this virus, with some of them being relatively good while others being pretty obviously awful. That's true of the general state of the world today but I wanted to put my thoughts down in a bullet point style list.
-The virus is obviously real and people are getting sick and in some cases dying. I generally think the people that say "there is no virus" or "it's a government lie" are full of it. I think there is a strong argument to be made that the virus is not as big of a deal as it is being portrayed but you are deep into tinfoil hat territory if you are saying the virus doesn't exist.
-I hate that the term "Covid-19" took off. It annoys me as much as the Obama administration's attempt to get people to call ISIS "ISIL". But unlike "ISIL" Covid-19 actually took off. I much prefer either Coronavirus or SARS-CoV-2, the former because that is what everyone called it the beginning and changing it feels Orwellian and the latter as it is the proper name for the virus itself. Covid-19 is just a dumb name and I hate it.
-It's very clear that the virus is not as deadly as everyone feared. Though there is current major wave of new infections the death rate isn't changing much and most of the people that are dying are people that were going to die soon anyways.
There are a couple of reasons for this I think. First of all I think it's pretty clear the virus changed. That was to be expected as the vast majority of new viruses become less deadly over time due to mutation and evolutionarily pressure. It's not the same virus from January and February that was causing Chinese people to die in the streets in Wuhan.
I also think that the treatments have finally caught up with the disease. We now know what works and what doesn't with the disease and we have learned from many of our mistakes (ventilators not being that important, don't send infected people to nursing homes and so on and so forth).
-The vaccine coming out might not change things as much as we hoped. I've seen quite a few disturbing reports in the media that people could still be required to social distance and wear masks even after they have received the vaccine. Given that the only reason why a healthy person is likely to want a new and experimental vaccine is to get back to their normal lives I can't think of a worse way to get people to actually take the vaccine.
-I'm not too worried about the dangers of the vaccine and I will most likely take it if/when I am offered it. I agree that there could be risks down the line but at this point I am sick enough of the virus that I am willing to take it just so it goes away faster. Plus, given that I am in a critical industry I feel it's a duty to do whatever I can to make sure I can work.
-It's also very clear that the "expert" class has pissed away the last of their credibility during this virus outbreak. It's to the point where I fear that if an actually dangerous virus, something like the Spanish Flu that killed the healthy along with the old, sick and weak, people will be blindsided by it because they will assume that the government is lying about it. And who could blame them at this point?
I generally think that the powers that be lost any possibility of credibility after they lockdowned the country for a month only to lift it because rioters wanted to burn cities down after a criminal got killed. If the virus is so deadly that everyone has to hide in their houses for a month (or longer in blue states) why are people allowed to loot a television from Wal-Mart? It became impossible to take any public health official or politician seriously when they said that "racism" is more of a threat then the virus.
And it's also clear that some of these politicians don't give a damn about the virus and are instead using it as a cudgel to bash their own constituents. The Democratic Governors of New York, New Jersey, Michigan and California have shown how tyrannical and arbitrary they can be. And it's not like there is a shortage of Republican Governors being jackasses as well (like DeWine in Ohio). It makes no sense to ban people from church while at the same time leaving the strip clubs and marijuana dispensaries open, so it's hard not to see it as anything other then enemy action.
The worst thing though? It's the utter hypocrisy of these people. Congress has all but given up on another stimulus package (and you can't tell me they couldn't have gotten one passed before the election) but they are demanding businesses to stay closed and that people stay home without any help. And that's not even getting into all the people getting caught not wearing masks and violating their own damn virus orders. It's very clear that these rules have nothing to do with keeping people safe and everything to do with the elite class and their utter disgust of anyone who isn't them. "How dare the plebes do things like work for a living, go out to eat, or workout at a gym? They aren't people!"
-The damage from the lockdowns have far exceeded the damage from the virus itself. There are a lot of people that are out of work and a lot of businesses that have shut down. The stock market has recovered and there is some optimism that the economy is coming back, but we aren't going to be able to ignore the lives ruined by the lockdowns.
-People around here in Wisconsin are utterly sick of the virus. In some cases that means just completely ignoring the restrictions to the point of flaunting them. And more then a few people go along with it but consider the whole thing a joke But even the people that are still taking the virus seriously are near their wits end. I have noticed that people are on edge all the time and are a lot easier to anger. That includes me.
If this continues for much longer people are going to start to lose it. I know that suicides and murders are way up and I think that is a trend that will be worse before it gets better. And I think the real reason for all the unrest and violence over the summer was because of the lockdowns and the economic problems they caused. If things aren't better before the end of spring I am expecting riots and violence that made this year look like a joke. And that's assuming we avoid some kind of armed conflict over the election.
-Despite all of this I am doing fairly well throughout this. Though I have had a few scares with me and my family everyone I know who has had it has survived and is doing well. And even though my place of employment had a massive amount of cases nobody has died as far as I know. My financial situation is good and other then a bit of anxiety, I'm in a decent place.
I think working throughout the crisis has been a blessing, and not just because of the obvious reason that I can pay my bills. Having a weekly routine that has not been disrupted at all by the virus has helped a lot. I still go to work every day and have done so, even when our company was briefly shut down due to the virus. I haven't seen my friends and family anywhere near as much as I would normally but other then that and a few virus scares the virus hasn't been too bad for me.
So that's my post for today. In a few months I may revisit the topic as a general "state of things" update for the Coronavirus. It's good to once and awhile take stock of how things are going and how things might be. Sometimes you have to remember not to just focus on the trees and have a look at the forest as well. This was my "forest" post and I think I should probably do more of them, and not just on the virus.
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