No Time to Spare

 

This is from the New York Times today, a graph showing the now three distinct waves of COVID-19 across the United States. You do not have to be an epidemiologist or a scientist to see the obvious. On November 13th there were a reported 181,194 new cases of COVID-19 in the USA and the 7-day averages are climbing fast. There were also 68,516 people hospitalized in the United States and multiple states are actually beyond the breaking point: no beds, little PPE, staff maximally stressed with little respite in sight. Many of the cases are in a broad swath of so-called “red states” in the middle of the country but that is illusory. All states are dealing with a massive problem. They are dealing with it largely alone; Donald Trump lost the election because he and his administration presided over the worst failure of public health in a century. 


And these are the deaths (also from today’s New York Times). The USA total today is 245,495 dead. Also three waves but fewer in the second and third waves (so far) than the first. While some of the decrease in deaths is because of new therapeutics, most have to do with improved basic medical techniques including proning, not rushing to mechanical ventilation, and the use of dexamethasone and related steroids in ICUs. The Times and other sources also note that there is underreporting of deaths for a variety of reasons. This includes ICU beds unavailable for non-COVID-19 patients who need them, with heart attacks, strokes, and so forth. The coronavirus caseload is 1 million and counting in California where I am writing this. And influenza has yet to make an appearance, thankfully.


We are divided politically. Today in Washington, a “Million Man MAGA” march brought several thousand die-hard Trump supporters to protest the Democrats “stealing” the Presidential election. There is no evidence at all for this but Trump and his cabal, through tireless repetition of disinformation, have stirred this up and spread disillusionment with our election process. This is dangerous and toxic for democracy. A look at some of the Trump supporters tells the story: hate and anger. Repairing this will take generations. We don’t have generations to tackle COVID-19. We are a bit more than 66 days from the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris. They will need the help of every American to right the ship of state that Trump has nearly capsized. 

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