O/T:- Force Majeur

[jackal2]

How right wing people think. Stage by stage.

I'm not sure this should be a right v left thing, but anyway my thoughts are as follows...

1. Coronavirus isn’t serious, same as flu, lots more people die of other things.

For the vast majority of people who don't have underlying health conditions, Coronavirus isn't serious and only brings mild symptoms. Some sufferers apparently remain capable of "working from home" while they have the virus, which often isn't the case for anyone who has suffered flu (i.e. genuine flu as opposed to footballers' flu! ). And yes, lots more people are dying of other things.

2. Coronavirus is serious, but if we let enough people get it then herd immunity will develop. We'll allow stuff like Cheltenham races to go ahead.

Coronavirus is serious for some older people, especially those with underlying health conditions, and for a tiny number of younger healthy people who develop extreme symptoms for whatever reason. Until a vaccine is available, developing herd immunity remains a practical/inevitable way to tackle the virus. The debate is over how best to allow that immunity to develop whilst minimising the number of deaths.

3. Coronavirus is very serious, but if we make people stop at home then it’ll be all over in 12 weeks/by Easter.

When their scientific advisers recommended a change from delay/containment to lockdown, the Government followed their advice, but for social and economic reasons the lockdown can only be a temporary or sporadic measure, and it won't be a solution. It simply seeks to flatten the trajectory of cases over the short-term.

4. Coronavirus is very very serious and it’s all someone else’s fault when loads of people die.

In the midst of the outbreak people look upon the rising number of deaths and the amount government activity and media attention as 'confirmation' of the seriousness of the virus and 'justification' of extreme measures, but this can be deceptive. Only when we look back on Coronavirus in years to come will we be able to assess just how serious or not it was relative to other pandemics and causes of death, and whether our reaction as a nation was excessive, measured, insufficient, or even futile.

Some say that if China had reacted more quickly to the first signs of the COVID-19 outbreak rather than covering it up, they might have nipped it in the bud, but I'm not sure. They might have been able to delay the spread, giving other parts of the world a little more time to prepare, but a virus of this nature is difficult to contain completely.

Pandemics are a naturally occurring phenomenon which afflict humankind every so often and kill large numbers of people. Perhaps Mother Nature is trying to cull the worldwide population explosion that is the real driving force behind climate change, but if so, she's going to have to come up with something far more deadly than this to save our species.