The "silver lining" of the Covid-19 pandemic

[sukumvit boy]

Just listened to todays interview with Dr. Anthony Fauci. US vaccines will begin distribution by mid December. It's a primary shot followed by a boost in 4-6 weeks,up to 95% effective , safe,no significant side effects found.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?478369...demic-response

[Stavros]

The silver lining for Covid is that we saw what can happen if the citizens of countries feel some sense of obligation to one another and healthier people make sacrifices for those who are less healthy. That this resulted in major reductions in mortality in countries like Australia, Germany, South Korea, and New Zealand can be gleaned from their mortality rates.
The United States had no major disadvantage in terms of climate, demographics, population density, nor financial resources when dealing with the virus. But we have a major cultural problem that begins with people pretending that any sacrifice they're asked to make presents an existential threat to their freedom or will hamper their lifestyle more than being on a ventilator or having major cardiac damage for the rest of their lives.
The problem with developing a system of affordable care is that it depends on the same values that dealing effectively with a pandemic does. You have to see someone with cancer and think "that person is very unfortunate, it could happen to anyone and they should be taken care of" and not "that person is not me; Why am I being asked to help someone else when I'm fine".
The silver lining from the pandemic is that if people cooperate and are informed everyone's quality of life can be improved. We saw real time evidence of that. The sad reality for us Americans is that there is too much resentment out there and I don't see a system of affordable care in our near future. I was pleased by the efforts of both private and public institutions to develop vaccines and it is useful that new technologies have been proven to yield an effective vaccine in humans.

While I appreciate your eloquent explanation, it begs the queston -if Americans felt a tremendous sense of solidarity in December 1941, and in the days after 9/11 when some decided to change jobs and careers are apply to work in the military or the intelligence services, why is there no public campaign to discuss the social benefits, ndeed, requirements, of medicine and personal protection when so much illness is provoked by social interactions?

Moreover, a comprehensive health service is more than just a doctor, nurse or dentist treating a medical problem, it is in effect a permanent university of teaching and research but, most of all, expresses solidarity among people by virtue of being a recognisable benefit that does not, or ought not to discriminate against anyone on any basis. It is a form of medical democracy -'of society, by society, for society'.

The idea that there is no such thing as society, which Margaret Thatcher once said, is not so much an expression of indiviidual liberty as a form of solipsism. If a person goes to a pop concert, is it not the thrill of the music and the congregation of an enthusiastic audience the social element that they may lack if they live alone, or is a social event under any circumstance?

If it were not for people working together for a common purpose, there would be no vaccine against any disease, and if every American said 'I won't fight in Vietnam' who knows how history would have evolved since 1960? Surely one of the primary values of a Liberal Democracy is that it both binds an individual to the State, while the State gives that individual the space and freedom in which to be themselves -as long as they do not cause harm to others. It may seek a perfect balance which in reality is hard to achieve all the time, but it also requires the State to meet is obligations to the citizen, and for the citizen to respect the laws of the State which, ultimately, are (or ought to be) the citizen's laws.

It simply makes no sense for one person to refuse to wear a mask because another person's health is not his or her responsibility, when a virus is airborne, and we are in that air, be in in a confined space, or passing someone in the street, responsible behaviour of all kinds applies -'I'm walking here!' is no excuse for one person shoving another aside on the pavement.

As for the compelling evidence of the simple fact that we are social creatures who require socially-constructed remedies for illness, I offer another superb piece of research by Andrew Cliff and Peter Haggett who have done so much over the last 30 odd years to explore the interactive relationship between 'time, travel and disease'-

"The collapse of geographical space over the last 200 years has had profound effects on the circulation of human populations and on the transfer of infectious diseases. Three examples are used to illustrate the process: (a) the impact of the switch from sail to steamships in importing measles into Fiji over a 40-year period; (b) changes in measles epidemic behaviour in Iceland over a 150-year period; and (c) changes in the spread of cholera within the United States over a 35-year period. In each case, the link between time, travel and disease has been an intimate one."
https://academic.oup.com/bmb/article/69/1/87/2747681

[sukumvit boy]

Biden has hinted that he wants to find a place for Bernie Saunders in his Cabinet and Bernie has said that he would accept if given a portfolio that "could make a difference". Hopefully that would be in the healthcare plan sector or perhaps Saunders "socialist" ideas may still seem too radical.

[sukumvit boy]

Sorry I meant Bernie Sanders ,of course, too many Thanksgiving rum eggnogs !

[broncofan]

While I appreciate your eloquent explanation, it begs the queston -if Americans felt a tremendous sense of solidarity in December 1941, and in the days after 9/11 when some decided to change jobs and careers are apply to work in the military or the intelligence services, why is there no public campaign to discuss the social benefits, ndeed, requirements, of medicine and personal protection when so much illness is provoked by social interactions?

I agree with most of your post (especially your description of what society is and its benefits) and appreciate the challenge to some of my pessimism in this paragraph. We've been able to convince the public that they should come together for common cause when they have a visual that stokes their patriotism, but even in the case of 9/11 how clear was the public about what they were fighting against? Many enlisted to fight Al Qaeda and others were later convinced that toppling Saddam Hussein and trying to calm waves of sectarian violence were all part of the same never-ending battle.

There was a hope early on that Trump might be able to marshal the resources of the U.S. government to build supplies and encourage public compliance by analogizing the virus to a physical enemy and the battle against it to war on the battlefield. But the virus doesn't kill people in loud explosions or leave images as memorable as buildings crashing down. The virus is not as easy to demonize as other human beings though Trump tried to appeal to xenophobia by calling it the Chinese Virus, it was only as an act of surrender to shift blame.

The cause of bringing Americans together to fight a pandemic is one that could not rely on dramatic images of crashing buildings, or xenophobia, or false premises. The heroism of a healthcare worker and of staff at a senior care facility is a quiet heroism and their sacrifice noble but there were no explosions, just individual traumas involving blood clots and quickened respiration and ventilation of our most vulnerable population. Their deaths were atrociously inhumane and many of those who survived will have long-term problems, but they were largely ignored, as were the lessons they had to teach.

Could it have been different? Yes. And while Trump is definitely a big part of the problem, his appeal can no longer be written off as aberrant. To the extent there's a collective we here, he and his supporters are part of it. Can you really build a society around the kind of disrespect for the truth that he and Giuliani and his cabal have shown this last year? It's poison and it's in our system.

[Stavros]

So you are still a pessimist on this, Broncofan!

Yes, the imagery of 9/11 was real and potent enough, but when I think of this staggering figure, 13 million Americans infected, deaths creeping toward 300,000, I wonder if enough Americans have been affected directy to ask the right questions. What I find borderline insane, or potentially an accessory to murder, is the view of the Governor of Florida that local officials cannot mandate the wearing of masks, or limit physical and social distancing. It is as if in answer to the question about what the cause is of 13 million infections his response might be, 'I don't know', only we are all nearly a year into this crisis, and given the evidence of the success that has been available from Taiwan, South Korea and New Zealand to name but three, you have to wonder what Mr DeSantis uses for brains.

If these people were threatened with legal action, if there is a law that covers it, I would say throw the book at them, including the President. I mean to say, 13 million...