Latest: The stock market crashed again today, setting off a circuit breaker. The 'feel good' index, so often touted by the criminal in office, went below the level at which he was inaugurated! Like Ben & Jerry's, justice comes in different flavors. West Virginia reported its first case of Covid-19 yesterday. There are now confirmed cases (7803 according to CDC) in all 50 states. One hundred seven infected persons, at least, have died. (2%)
More: History can teach us; we ignore it at our peril, as the proverb reminds us. The deadly 1918 flu pandemic, misnamed the "Spanish" flu, actually began in Kansas among soldiers crowed into an army camp. That pandemic had three waves of infection lasting 3-4 weeks among young, generally healthy soldiers, and 6-8 weeks in the general population. The virus mutates in adaptation to its host during each wave. Today, China has already experienced the first wave of infections with the number of cases subsiding, and its scientists have detected two strains of the virus. The US is still in the midst of the first wave that may subside once warmer weather is prevalent.
War ravaged Italy was hit hard by the 1918 pandemic. Once again Italy is suffering more than its European neighbors. Italy is densely inhabited with an aging population. Coronavirus affects those with compromised immune systems the most. Italians are also world famous for their fondness for intimacy. World health authorities are suggesting social distancing as a way to contain the virus' spread. Travel bans are also an effective method of containment. Australia, despite having troops in Europe at the war's end, largely escaped the 1918 pandemic, due to shutting down its borders to travel in or out of the country.
The private medical industry was not very helpful during 1918, and we are experiencing that failure again. Large swaths of the population were made ill by high doses of aspirin, the wonder drug of the day, which increased the death rate according to research done in 2007. Throwing money at a for profit system will do wonders for companies' stock price, but produce nothing useful until at least two waves of infection have worked their way through the population. The industry has not even provided enough test kits to allow comprehensive testing. The fact that actor Tom Hanks (diabetes) and his wife were tested early for Covid-19 is because they were in Australia, which has socialized medicine and enough test kits. Hanks was released from hospital recently, but his wife Rita is still sick. US Person wants to thank a reader for this information.
{17.03.20}The map shows the locus of coronavirus infections in the US. Typically, the nation's largest ports of entry are showing the most cases. Unlike the EU, the US has not yet closed its borders to non-essential, international travel. Doctors estimate that for every reported case, there are 5-10 infections that go unreported. Only West Virginia seems to be spared, but that is probably due to little or no testing, and unreported infections by the airborne virus. Worldwide more than 6600 people have died, with 73 fatalities in the US so far (2%). Il Douche finally admitted the gravity of the situation in a press conference today. As a reward for his reluctant truth-telling, his biggest fan, the stock market cratered. (Down 12% in the worst day of trading since the "Black Monday" crash of October 1987). What Covid-19 tells us about the country is the sorry state of its national public health system. Die-hard Malthusian zealots are hell-bent on preventing social medicine in the US, but profit driven companies have absolutely no incentive to stock free vaccines, medical supplies and equipment, or surplus hospital capacity.
Asking states and municipalities to pick up those left-behind is like asking the fox to count the chickens in the henhouse. A Kentucky health official responsible for seven rural counties admitted to reporters, “We have no capacity when something like this happens,” referring to the coronavirus epidemic. Budget cuts to the public health system have not been fully restored since the Great Recession of 2008. State and local health departments have lost a quarter of their work forces. Yet Il Douche had the ignorant temerity to tell governors to look for the own ventilators, hospital beds and other equipment that will be needed as the virus continues its parabolic course of infection. An epitome of a free market mythologist, he has agreed with Democrats for emergency public funding to combat the spread of the corona virus, but as one Washington public health advocacy group recently concluded, “chronic under funding has presented a consistent obstacle” to the nation’s public health systems.
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| Fed Chair Jerome Powell by M. Ricolli, credit: WolfStreet Corp. |