Known Knowns
Here’s an update on the coronavirus. We know if you’re healthy, especially young and healthy – coronavirus is generally not a risk to you. If you’re older – like me – or have underlying health issues – or both – coronavirus puts you in danger. We think 80% of people who get coronavirus will be ok. The other 20% will face serious illness with possible long-term damage, and particularly lung damage. And of course some small percentage of them, elderly mostly – will die.
You read the memes and messages – flu kills more people – we don’t freak out about it. Measles is more easily transmitted – and we are only mildly concerned.
And there is the one scientific fact that we absolutely know. If we don’t test people for coronavirus, we won’t know how many people are sick. Many will have cold and flu symptoms, and simply treat themselves. They won’t “go in the count”. But they will have the opportunity to spread their disease, for up to two weeks before they experience whatever symptoms they are going to have.
Not testing doesn’t mean we’re doing better than other countries, like Italy or Iran or China. It simply means we don’t know what we don’t know.
Counter-Measures
But we have vaccines for both flu and measles. Much of the concern about those diseases is that by not getting vaccinated, those most in danger are placed at the greatest risk – people immune compromised or otherwise unable to be protected. It’s not so much that you or your kid will get sick, it’s that you or they become a walking infection machine before being aware they are sick. Then they infect those who can’t survive the disease.
And there’s no vaccine for coronavirus: all that can be done is treat symptoms in those who become critically ill. In a letter from an Italian doctor I read recently, he spoke of the shortage of mechanical vents, breathing machines, in Italian hospitals. Operating rooms are turned into intensive care units as the last vents left available. In some cities there is no other medical care going on other than treating coronavirus. The at-risk twenty percent are overwhelming.
Here in America we are being given lessons on washing hands. We are told stay six feet from each other (try that in any public school classroom in America) and sneeze in your elbow, not your hands.
Doesn’t that sound reassuring? Modern science at it’s best, saving society with soap, water, and alcohol based sanitizer. That’s it: sing a song while you wash your hands? Our vaunted medical establishment, the folks that stopped Ebola, that’s all they’ve got?
Yep.
Mitigation not Containment
So let’s get all this straight. COVID 19 is the particular coronavirus we are worried about. The opportunity to “contain” the virus has passed, with “community transmission” (sounds like a cable company) occurring in several parts of the United States. Now, all that can be done is mitigation – another term for cutting losses.
Like the Ebola outbreak in 2014, we’ve started with nothing more than isolation and “mitigation”. The difference is during Ebola; mitigation was quickly followed by a vaccine of sorts, and even more specific treatment options. And there was no “community transmission”. But we are being told by the “best and the brightest” of American medicine, that a vaccine is a year away, at minimum.
“But the spring will end this,” they say. “Like the flu, it will go away in the summer sun.” We don’t have any reason to know that. It didn’t happen with the Spanish Flu in the horrible epidemics from 1918 to 1920. And by the way, it isn’t the temperature that reduces the incidence of disease. It’s the fact that folks spend more time outside, beyond the four walls of the hothouse disease spreading environments of their homes and offices. School’s out too.
Looking Forward
It’s disappointing. We expected more from our science, and our government. But we are here now, facing a massive infection of American society. This isn’t the apocalypse, and this particular disease won’t end our society, though it already is having a dramatic impact on our economy. Oil prices are down: China’s not using as much, and a tiff between Russia and Saudi Arabia means that the supply will go up. That’s fine; gas prices will probably drop again soon.
That will match the stock market, after a few days of near free-fall. The Market is looking forward to limited productions, supply-line disruptions, and possible citywide quarantines. Working from home doesn’t work, if you’re a restaurant, or a factory, or a distributor. While the Administration and the Federal Reserve will try to “pump” the economy by adding funds, money might not solve the market value problems.
It’s America. We will find a way to muddle through. We will have elections and conventions, and probably the World Series as well. But denial is not the answer. We need to recognize the problem, realize that some will in fact get sick, really sick, and some will die. We need our hospitals to get prepared for the onslaught. And then, we’ll have to deal with it, not ignore it.
