waitingman (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
waitingman) wrote2020-03-13 09:00 am
waitingman) wrote2020-03-13 09:00 am
Entry tags:
Local &/Or General
Dinner with that rarest of things, last night - a former flame that L-SP likes & encourages me to maintain contact with
The restaurant was pretty good, in a cool, inner-city kind of way - sort of contemporary Lebanese/Turkish & was nice enough... a little over-priced by our standards, but if you can't splurge every now & then... It was really nice to catch up with our globe-trotting, soon-to-be Mother to 3 cats - she says 2, we know it will be 3!! Her sardonic, slightly cynical, but ultimately humanitarian world view matches ours. Recently returned from Japan, it's a relief to know that she didn't need to self-isolate, or anything... having travelled by plane, not by cruise ship... so neither do we!
With all that in mind, L-SP & I were wondering, during the drive to work this morning, why it is that we aren't panicking, or even too worried, about Covid19's gradual, but inexorable spread. Why aren't we rioting in supermarket aisles over rolls of toilet paper, or hand sanitiser & throwing cans of soup at other shoppers?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but even if you get this virus, the chances of dying from it are nothing like what they are for the 'flu every year, or the national road death toll every year, deaths from domestic violence every year... or (even in Australia) shooting deaths every year... or fatal stabbings... Every year
The cynic in me wants to think that, just because the vast majority of virus fatalities have been "older" people, the baby-boomers in power are getting worried. They certainly don't get worked up like this about diseases that kill children... Nobody closes borders & cancels public gatherings during 'flu season. And certainly the US Administration hasn't done anything about all the children who have died in mass shootings this year... & it's only March...
The restaurant was pretty good, in a cool, inner-city kind of way - sort of contemporary Lebanese/Turkish & was nice enough... a little over-priced by our standards, but if you can't splurge every now & then... It was really nice to catch up with our globe-trotting, soon-to-be Mother to 3 cats - she says 2, we know it will be 3!! Her sardonic, slightly cynical, but ultimately humanitarian world view matches ours. Recently returned from Japan, it's a relief to know that she didn't need to self-isolate, or anything... having travelled by plane, not by cruise ship... so neither do we!
With all that in mind, L-SP & I were wondering, during the drive to work this morning, why it is that we aren't panicking, or even too worried, about Covid19's gradual, but inexorable spread. Why aren't we rioting in supermarket aisles over rolls of toilet paper, or hand sanitiser & throwing cans of soup at other shoppers?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but even if you get this virus, the chances of dying from it are nothing like what they are for the 'flu every year, or the national road death toll every year, deaths from domestic violence every year... or (even in Australia) shooting deaths every year... or fatal stabbings... Every year
The cynic in me wants to think that, just because the vast majority of virus fatalities have been "older" people, the baby-boomers in power are getting worried. They certainly don't get worked up like this about diseases that kill children... Nobody closes borders & cancels public gatherings during 'flu season. And certainly the US Administration hasn't done anything about all the children who have died in mass shootings this year... & it's only March...
no subject
Luckily, we've maintained a well-stocked emergency cabinet for slightly over three years now... go ahead, do the math... so no panic buying needed for us.
Besides, I though you kept a year's worth of MREs in your basement bunker? ;-)
no subject
I just replied to someone on LJ who had similar figures. So maybe I'm wrong, but it still seems that a nasty 'flu is more serious than this thing - even with the annually updated 'flu vaccine... Both L-SP & I got the 'flu in 2012, a couple of months before we were going to the USA & for about a week we thought we were going to die. My god, that was nasty... & we'd both had the 'flu vaccine that year
I can understand the closing of borders & the ban on large gatherings to slow the rate of infection. I guess I just wonder what's so special about this one, when there are diseases & other things that kill large numbers every year & nobody flies into a panic at the supermarket (or the Stock Market) over them... Will this be the new normal for every subsequent 'crisis'??
no subject