By now, we are all familiar with the false Sophie’s choice that trump and his surrogates have been peddling on national TV — we can either save the economy or we can save our people but we cannot do both. trump now wants businesses, schools and churches to be open by Easter. (Why Easter? It appeals to the Evangelical base, who look at him as a Messiah). And they want to unilaterally make the choice — the economy (actually the wealth of a few billionaires) over the well-being and lives of the people.
These folks have no clue what is going to happen when we lift stay-at-home restrictions, how the virus will spread across all communities, how the economy will function with millions of deaths — spread across all age groups, but more concentrated towards seniors and health workers. They think that some small percentage (1% - 3.4%) of the population will die, the rest will become immune and life and the economy will hum right along.
Not one sane person, let alone health expert, agrees with this crazy and inhumane plan. Here are a few noteworthy reactions and thoughtful recommendations.
First we hear from Dr. Fauci — he predicts several more weeks of isolation -
Dr. Ashish Jha (and others in the article) — on smart and humane ways to handle the pandemic.
Bill Gates has been sounding the alarm for a long time. And he still is. Gates has long focused on the health field within his work at the nonprofit Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Bill Gates did not mince his words in a TED interview at www.vox.com/…
“There really is no middle ground, and it’s very tough to say to people, ‘Hey, keep going to restaurants, go buy new houses, ignore that pile of bodies over in the corner. We want you to keep spending because there’s maybe a politician who thinks GDP growth is all that counts. It’s very irresponsible for somebody to suggest that we can have the best of both worlds.
The economic effect of this is really dramatic. Nothing like this has ever happened to the economy in our lifetimes. But bringing the economy back ... that’s more of a reversible thing than bringing people back to life. So we’re going to take the pain in the economic dimension — huge pain — in order to minimize the pain in the diseases-and-death dimension.”
Jeremy Konyndyk, Pandemic prep & humanitarian aid, Center for Global Development, ex USAID and OFDA has been writing consistently about the strategy we should adopt -
Scott Gottlieb, ex FDA Commissioner has a thread outlining a similar approach -
Tom Inglesby, Director at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security has a thread with a similar approach -
Tom Frieden, ex CDC Director -
The choice is not between health and economics but about optimizing the public health response to save lives while minimizing economic harm. Economic harm isn’t just about profits: It’s about workers being able to afford essential goods, lifesaving products staying on the market and safeguarding everyone’s well-being. Social restrictions have effects beyond economic and social harms, such as harming patients who go without treatment for conditions unrelated to coronavirus.
More than the economy will be hurt if we get this wrong. Reopening the floodgates could overwhelm health-care facilities, killing doctors, nurses, patients and others — and prolonging the need to shutter our economy.
What is common among these various threads is that —
- We should not reopen business and schools in the next week or two
- We need several weeks of aggressive isolation, suppression and social distancing to slow down the growth rate, nationwide
- Phase 1 should be followed by a phase 2 with aggressive testing, contact tracing and more surgical isolation and quarantining.
- Meanwhile, we have to keep hospitals and health workers from getting overwhelmed, ramp up production of medical equipment and supplies, open up more hospital beds and ICUs
- And keep working on development and testing of drugs and vaccines
- This will be long marathon, but it be done, if done right; opening up businesses prematurely will make the situation much worse, including the economy.
Epilogue
Let’s do all we can to protect our loved ones — young and old. Let’s follow all the guidelines on staying home, social distancing, washing hands, getting tested if you notice any symptoms, etc. We will get through with this, in spite of the inept criminal approach of trump and the GOP.
Let’s also keep in mind that most states (at least the blue ones) will act responsibly; Most companies (except a few conservative ones like Hobby Lobby) will not force their employees to come to work in the middle of a raging pandemic. And if they do, most workers should refuse to go to work — there’s nothing worse than watching our loved ones die.
Question for us is how we need to fight back. We cannot let this one buffoon and his zombie supporters destroy America; this is our country.
The cure for the disease is to expunge the real virus from the White House, now or in November
P.S.
For those who want to explore more science-based information about Coronavirus, check out diary “Coronavirus - Myths, Realities and Uncertainties” for some more info.
In our comments section, let’s try not spend too much energy on venting about trump, let’s discuss strategies — personal and social, insights, expert opinion, our own experiences and thoughts on the subject and our predictions about the next few weeks and the next few months.