One year into a global pandemic, it's time to start thinking long-term not short-term.
A little over a year ago I made a prediction: the Covid-19 pandemic would persist until at least the summer of 2022, with a brief rebound during the 2022-2023 holiday season. This was not magic; I did not use a crystal ball, or study the entrails of chickens and goats; it was a reasoned hypothesis based on prior pandemics; especially the ones that have been recorded in the late teens and early twenties of the past ten centuries.
For whatever reason, I will call it "technological hubris" for lack of a better term, we have somehow convinced ourselves (as no doubt other generations have convinced themselves before us) that our science and technology are somehow going to make something that occurs naturally on a fairly consistent cycle, diminish at will. Oh if only nature were that willing a slave to our desires.
The reality is far more sober. On Friday 05 FEB 2021, The Socratic Review Daily Edition, published a report from The Times of India entitled: When will Covid-19 pandemic end? Vaccine calculator shows 7 years at current rate. The reason for this is multifaceted, but the prime concerns (as we explored here at the The Socratic Review last-year) hinge on logistics and human nature, both of which are hard to control and predict in our current environment.
On the logistics side, vaccinating 85% of the globe would be difficult (if not impossible) with a run-of-the mill, normally refrigerated vaccine. The majority of our current vaccines for Covid-19 are quite the opposite of this; they are extremely delicate and perishable, require extraordinary care (and expense) to transport, and require two-doses to be effective. Any one of these factors speak to magnitudes of difficulty logistically, together they spell, if not total failure, at least very qualified success.
The other concern, human nature, is even more difficult to control or predict. Also on Friday 05 FEB 2021, The Socratic Review reported in our Global Pandemic Report a piece by Jordan Wildon in Deutsche Welle entitled: Fact check: Are COVID-19 vaccines causing deaths? followed by another piece, three days later (08 FEB 2021) from Voice of America entitled: South Africa Suspends AstraZeneca Vaccinations. Not reported by The Socratic Review, but equally important none-the-less, was a piece by Mike Stobbe and Hannah Fingerhut from The Associated Press on 10 FEB 2021 entitled: AP-NORC poll: A third of US adults skeptical of COVID shots In all three cases, the confusion and changing conditions surrounding these vaccines and vaccinations have made them undesirable to large swaths of the global population. If people do not want to be vaccinated, or cannot reasonably receive vaccination due to infrastructure, poverty, or inaccessibility, how do we ever hope to break the chain of infection?
It is time for humankind to start considering these harsh realities, and it is time for political leaders to stop selling sunshine and Santa Claus. The lessons this pandemic can teach us are broad and profound, not just for surviving this pandemic, but for surviving all the others soon to follow and whatever other disasters may come our way.
Consider air travel for a moment. I am fifty-five years old (almost fifty-six). Up until my late thirties, air travel was relatively expensive and, as such, was something charring experienced by most people. Now it is not uncommon to see throngs of young adults pour into the tropics on spring break as readily as we would drive to Daytona or Fort Lauderdale, and by "tropics" I don't just mean a walled resort in Mexico or the Dominican Republic, I mean kids swimming, surfing, and socializing (and whatever other "Ss" you care to add) in the antipodes: Southeast Asia one year, and South Africa the next.
I am all for international travel; it broadens horizons and mixes cultural experiences. However, nations of the world need to be better prepared to contain and quarantine these lusty young explorers. By all means surf in Thailand and dig irrigation ditches in the Congo, but be prepared for two weeks worth of quarantine and observation when you get back. This was once standard practice from exotic locales. Now, as the definition of "exotic" seems quaint, so does our open policy of traveling with no consequences or restrictions.
This of course deals with one aspect of the dilemma; keeping illness out. But what about once illness gets in? Despite warnings from both scientists and science fiction writers that another pandemic was just around the corner (as it is every 100 years or so) at no point was anyone remotely prepared for it. It reminds me of a case years ago where an admiral in charge of a command in the tropics had no plans for securing classified documents during a tropical storm. Oops!
During the Cold War we had an entire Civil Defense system in place to protect against the very unlikely prospect of two world powers extinguishing each other (and the rest of the planet) in a nuclear holocaust, but where is our Civil Defense system for the far more likely prospect of a global pandemic or severe weather event? How about a solar storm or electronic warfare attack? If you think the last year was intolerable, imagine how miserable you would be with no water or electricity for a year. We here in Puerto Rico can tell you; it's not fun.
The United States is on its way to $30,000,000,000,000 in debt, and what do we have to show for it? Has the federal government or the states done anything structural with this money that will mitigate future suffering? That is the true purpose of debt, any debt; to fund capital improvements, not to pay expenses. When companies got to that point during my career, I told them they had to either recapitalize or close their doors; I expect nothing less from politicians with the public treasury.
But really the most important lesson to learn is our own. Are we ready for years of pandemic versus months. My personal opinion is no. Whether it is supply chains, income protection, education, food distribution, retail sales, medicine, or civil defense, what I see is an overwhelming "ride out the storm" mentality that to me seems both idealistic and foolish.
I understand businesses have suffered (and will continue to suffer) but we should not expect icemen to remain in business when everyone has a refrigerator. I have used this example for decades because it is one that I personally know about, and you can add others: local stationers, printing companies, TV repair people. These were all once vibrant (and profitable) family businesses that just don't exist in the same numbers anymore because the demand for their services were winnowed out. The same will happen to sit-down restaurants I'm afraid, in short order.
Consider this: even before the pandemic hit, fast-casual was overtaking the food service market. The "bistro" format (where you order off of a board and food is ran to your table or picked up at a window) is an old one. Busy people (or anti social people) like this format for many reasons. How long will the server-client table service format last? When considering the pressure to raise minimum wages, the likelihood of paying for retail space that will cost more to fill, and the obvious economies of doing away with all of that, not too long I'm afraid. Like retail shopping, I think there will always be some"boutique" level luxury experiences for those willing to pay for them, but as the market shrinks, those prices will predictably go up, whether it is the local trattoria down the street or a tony downtown marquee restaurant.
If I were Hollywood I would also be very concerned. Many folks have long been disenchanted with the cinema. The last time I was in one a few years ago, there were twelve of us total in the house, in the evening, at an 8:00 PM showing. Twelve. Years of staying at home is going to retrain an entire generation that media is an at home diversion even more than it already has. How is Hollywood going to coax people back into a cinema? Plate giveaways like the 1940's and 50's? Trading stamps? Cookware?
As months turn into years, we will collectively wonder why some did so well during the long pandemic, while others suffered in confused misery. Use your time wisely and get creative. As Sabina the maid tells us in Thornton Wilder's play, The Skin of Our Teeth , "one more close shave, and where will we be?" That question it seems, is entirely ours to answer.
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