When Covid-19 made its first run for it in early March, emanating from the West Coast (or so we thought at the time), I made the private declaration that we should just focus on treatment and not get caught up in the great worries about transmission. My rational at the time was that, while it had its mortal victims, it did not present much differently than new strains of flue. I quickly amended that as the actual effects became apparent and I did embrace the now very much dead, ‘flatten the curve’ approach. While the pandemic has taken on massive political implications, I’ll leave that for a moment to say, I’ve returned to my original instinct.
In my last essay, I described, ‘A Whimpering Pandemic…’, the idea that this will be a long term fizzle. This message is more, what should we do about it. As [Our Lord and Savior] Fauci and others are now frequently insinuating, this is going to be around for some time and any widespread effectiveness of a vaccine is as yet, speculative. That is if large numbers even consent to take it. Test rates now number the tens of millions, and consequently, the real adjusted death rate is inching toward a resemblance of a bad flu season. This is in significant part, because of better treatments.
Covid-19 has been a monster in that the range of affliction includes a great many showing no or minor symptoms, a much smaller number experiencing debilitating symptoms and a much smaller number than that dying. It is that range that has paralyzed us and stumped researchers. It’s a medical quandary that our doctors have had to get a grasp on and fortunately, they are doing so. Covid-19 is a corona-virus, the same thing as a class of ‘colds’ with roughly the same or less degree of infectiousness as a cold. To what degree have we been successful in limiting cold transmission? Not so much and yet with the Covid-19, the whole of our visible public policy, trampling of constitutional freedoms and, a not insignificant amount of social war is predicated strictly on the efficacy of avoiding transmission. I submit to you that medical progress on Covid-19 therapies should now be prioritized, the same position I took back in early March. We have to do as much as we can for the severe chronic infections and those in danger of death, knowing that not all will survive and that all die of something. We must get beyond our current obsession with castigating millions of relatively heathy people that will suffer little to nothing. The doctors are doing what they can do, but our public policy is warped.