Stay home...

 

 

"Never confound statistics with facts, numbers with science, experiments with results." 

Paulo Ferreira 

Since the pandemic became well... generalized, the main tone of authorities has been to stay home, protect yourself and others. That has been the rule of thumb they want to be accepted and, to be honest, I accept too. However amidst all these graphs and numbers, theories and tiers, something is failing, something is being missed.

We all saw the curve of the first wave and how confinement was successful on bringing new cases down, reducing COVID19 deaths to a level of normal life that preceded it i. e. (accidents at work, car crashes, general daily life pre confinement)

We then got hit by the second wave and somehow its behaviour is nowhere near the one of the first... new infections are staying resolutely high, death numbers ominously steady, regardless of how many tiers the general population is being thrown at. All these facts (not numbers, facts) are, however, stubbornly new and untested in this modern age. There is no proper answer, no experimental method, nothing to compare results. So... why are we facing more adversity on a second wave when all the scientific models (based on no experience at all) predicted that it would be more benign than the first one?

The thing is... we stayed at home... for months... and by doing so we stopped sharing with our other humans the good, the bad and the ugly we used to pass on on a daily basis. The personal immune barrier we unknowingly used to curate every day, on the train, coffee shop, air plane, gym, market, pub has now been dramatically lowered. That does not mean that our reaction to COVID19 would differ had we been "attacked" during the first wave, but it means that we will get infected and test positive and pass it on more easily than before. Vulnerable people are now more at risk than in the beginning of the year and their reaction to COVID19 exposure can be more catastrophic than 10 months ago. We did not hug, kiss, sweat, shared our bodies at all and that is going to have disastrous consequences to us all, for our lives ahead, regardless of age or sex. That is why care homes are so vulnerable, as their own ecosystem,  their "bug vocabulary" is way below of the standard outside life of a daily commuter. That is the reason why Amazonian tribes were wiped out and, for some not yet reached, we are taking extra care to throw "civilization" at them. I am afraid that we are, by staying at home, becoming more and more like them.

All those bugs we used to share, from Australia to Svalbard,  are no longer amongst us; even with an efficient COVID19 vaccine, the resumption of a "normal" life is fraught with new dangers we know nothing about yet. We may be scared of COVID19 but post-COVID19 is not going to be a walk in the park even if that's what we have been doing for the past 10 months.

The main problem is that governments, politicians and all succumbed to the bog standard formula of a new disease... it spreads, we need to take measures, we need to find a... vaccine! and that has been the main strategy of all governments on this planet. The pharmaceutical companies had all their Christmas come oh so early this year as suddenly they have a product that is going to be used 20,000,000,000 times at at least $20 a pop. That is why all efforts were driven to this "solution" and not to research why a small minority was dying of an over the top immune reaction to the virus. Again $$$ came into the equation as so far less than 2,000,000 people died and a brand new palliative to reverse the effects of 10,000,000 afflicted would have to cost $40,000 a pop to cash in the same revenue of a vaccine... so no surprise to see where the research is directed at. 

Please remember that the AIDS epidemic is under control, life goes on... with no hint of a vaccine so far. 

Please remember that herd immunity only happens if we are in a herd! This immunity was constantly being updated on a daily basis. Unfortunately for us all, the last update was on 23 March 2020 and I have to remind you that, as Microsoft and Apple do, if you don't get regular updates, your Operating System becomes "buggy", literally in our case. For us humans there is no such thing as "unnecessary social contact", it is part of our wellbeing, physically and mentally and has allowed us, through trillions of contacts in the last 50 years, to reach 7.8 billion and counting. 

We are in trouble now... and when we get out of this one we have no idea what we will be facing after; my guess is an endless cycle of epidemics, confinements, vaccines... no hugs, kisses, just alcoholic gel and PPE.

Ah Happy Christmas to you all by the way!