What lock-downs? No one locked me into my house. I locked myself in because I was 70 years old and didn't want to die. If I would younger and not in a vulnerable population I would have been out and about. As for grocery and Amazon delivery people I'm pretty sure they were lots younger than me and not likely to die from Covid. When this pandemic hit no one knew what was going on. Fauci and the experts did the best they could. Experts aren't perfect but they do better than non-experts. I trust experts and I trust the government because I don't see any reasonable alternative.
There is precious little acknowledgment in this article that Dr. Fauci and others could make mistakes while still operating in good faith in a situation that Dr. Fauci himself recently described in The Atlantic as "an unprecedented challenge."
In fact, this article simply seems to assume bad intentions on the part of "our government" and "public health officials." And that approach is dangerously close to a conspiratorial perspective.
This column states, for example, that "public health officials and our political leaders refused to learn as the pandemic ground on." But that's an utterly astonishing accusation, and one that, I would assert, the rest of the column does not even support.
Did politicians and public health officials make regrettable comments, poor decisions, and hasty recommendations at various times during our first pandemic since the early 20th century? Yes.
But did "The West ... more or less just" copy "China’s draconian policy"? Honestly, how did the editors at Persuasion even agree to publish that statement?
Here are some details on China's internationally infamous zero-COVID measures (reported by Voice of America):
*A few detected Covid cases could lead to forced lockdowns of entire cities for months at a time.
*Authorities used apps and other technologies to monitor the movements of citizens and imposed isolation on them if they were determined to have been anywhere in the vicinity of a Covid infection.
*Quarantines were imposed by forcing people into government facilities or by placing electronic seals on family homes.
Were there some vague similarities between the lockdowns in the west and in China? Probably. But did the west copy China's authoritarian measures? That's not just an absurd statement, it's discrediting.
I do, in fact, agree that our Covid response should be the subject of sober analysis. But this article does not offer any such example.
I am also highly skeptical that lockdowns were a good idea for anything other than brief periods of time when our medical systems may have needed some relief. So, by all means, let's discuss the pros and cons of lockdowns; but,
while we're at it, let's avoid statements like this one: "If lockdowns are the most dramatic example of how what was held out to be science actually was not scientific at all, there were many others."
Really? Lockdowns weren't scientific "at all"? There was zero science involved in any decision related to lockdowns?
Whatever legitimate criticisms of America's response to Covid you can make, there's no way it was in the same league as "China's draconian policy". McLean lost me with that comparison.
I fashioned my own protective measures according to basic common sense, and it was pretty good for me. I never wore masks outside, and ignored the dirty looks from people in my progressive Chicago neighborhood. I wore good N95 masks inside most of the time. Common sense says masks help a bit with reducing risk, with a small cost. I gathered with people in reasonable settings, outdoors, and I certainly spent a lot of time outside. I ignored anything that didn't make sense to me, most of the time. I always wondered about the lab leak, always thought it was possible. I got off social media during COVID, and that saved me from the virus of stupidity that permeates our society. I got vaccinated, knowing it would reduce my chances of serious illness if I got COVID. I'm happy with my own decisions, and at least we were served up some amusing scenes - the out-of-shape cops in Los Angeles running after a jogger on the beach, which is by far one of the most delightful scenes I've ever seen. That jogger was me. Kidding, it wasn't me, but I wish it was.
There are some important questions that remain to be answered but may never be seriously asked and fully answered. The first question is whether we should have targeted reducing rates of infection, morbidity and/or mortality. Based on an answer to that question, what would a successful or more successful response to COVID-19 have been and what results would have been delivered?
A fair critique, but then hindsight can seem obvious. It’s true that trust is paramount in a public health crisis, however had those who knew the most had told us all « we don’t know », which was the real truth, wouldn’t the outrage have been even greater? Would that not have led to even more uninformed theories and suggestions (remember bleach injections?) that would have been even more harmful?
Love your writing. You thread your way thru with little recrimination and anger. Only a couple exaggerations. I really appreciate your call to question our mistakes and be better prepared for next time.
The weakness of your story is the literati bias away from quantitative thought. Don't coddle your audience by avoiding numbers. -- but we can gain the sense of proportion by doing proportions-- division problems. What's big, what's little. The world isn't a drama of heros and villians. It's run by capitalism and institutions. To understand history and predict meaningfully you are better off studying balance sheets and income statements and business plans of institutions. Most of that is secret, and we can't know precisely, but we can estimate close enough to understand the intentions of institutions.
One of the most startling things about the pandemic to me was the huge transfers of wealth. You mention small companies vs big ones. But you don't mention the pharma cartel at all. Or how much money they made. Without that context you don't portray how much of a reality-distortion-field there is to protect that revenue. So the govt spend $3E10 on Covid vaccines. The marketing/influence peddling budget should be 5%, therefore $1.5E9 or One Billion Dollars. How far does that go? If the industry wanted to reward helpful doctors, they could give $1500 in appreciation to every doctor in the USA. If they were to divide the money up among US Federal Legislators, each could get $28 million. Not saying that this happened... but that's the scale to watch out for. It's not a conspiracy theory to say that businesses use defensive marketing to protect revenue. That's MBA training.
In my career I've witnessed many times the financial incentives of institutions cause terrible things to happen to people. In the case of COVID it is startling that NO inexpensive treatments were popularized in the Western world. Not because we didn't know about them. 60 Minutes did a whole segment about Fluvoxamine preventing serious illness early in the pandemic, while it was still OK to talk about outpatient treatment opportunities. Now that isn't the best drug, but it was a standout at the time, and a step in the right direction. There are 20,000 known safe drugs in the drugstores and it would be highly unlikely that none of them help. And we have 30 years of research on most of them and computer models that identified the best early treatment options to prevent hospitalization. A number of them were proven. But none were widely used in the USA. Except the expensive drugs that don't work.
Institutions, no matter whether they bill themselves as university departments, churches, regulatory agencies, families, or corporations... they are alive, a meta level above humans. They use humans the way ant-hills use ants. Humans get caught up in the institutional survival instinct and are often sacrificed. That's not a conspiracy theory. Social animals do that. We aren't as social as bees. But we aren't as individual as bears. Few of us could survive alone for long.
And we live in a capitalistic world. Nearly all important decisions are made to protect the value of a stock in the current Quarter. The rest of the important technical choices are made by administrative law judges who are responding to the demands of lawyers representing well-heeled clients.
THe planet's ecosystems, and humanity, don't have lawyers, and don't have protective share owners on Wall street. So people and the planet get neglected.
The bungled response to COVID and Climate change share the same roots. Regulatory capture, rent seeking behavior of institutions, financial incentives that prevent positive change.
A few more numbers. USA has 5% of the world's people, and spends 75% of the worlds pharma purchases. USA is as healthy as the typical nation that spends 1/4th what we do on health care. Our response to COVID was about #30 in the world, and many poor nations did much better than the rich nations.
Right now folks in my age range are dying 15 % more than before the pandemic-- from reasons OTHER than COVID. Younger males are over 20%. This is true in most developed countries. If we let our health deteriorate at that rate how long before we go extinct? So why is it happening? When I was young AIDS sprung upon the world, and killed far fewer people, but the medical community and the world's scientists really responded, figured it out, came up with tests, and treatments and social programs. What's our response to the huge increase in all-causes mortality? Crickets. No funding. No interest. No press attention.
...anche allora c'erano persone di buon senso che cercavano di fare il loro meglio, ma anche molte che accusavano gl " untori ", gli ebrei o altri, come responsabili dell'epidemia...
Questo articolo dimostra ancora una volta come la storia, in particolare la storia della medicina, non abbia insegnato nulla. Quando ho letto questo articolo, la mia mente è andata a " I Promessi Sposi" di Alessandro Manzoni, quando parla dell'epidemia della Peste.
What lock-downs? No one locked me into my house. I locked myself in because I was 70 years old and didn't want to die. If I would younger and not in a vulnerable population I would have been out and about. As for grocery and Amazon delivery people I'm pretty sure they were lots younger than me and not likely to die from Covid. When this pandemic hit no one knew what was going on. Fauci and the experts did the best they could. Experts aren't perfect but they do better than non-experts. I trust experts and I trust the government because I don't see any reasonable alternative.
If only the supposed experts were worthy of your faith and confidence! https://ivyexile.substack.com/p/mission-creep
Ha ragione. Meglio fidarsi degli esperti in Epidemiologia piuttosto che della signora MacLean esperta di finanza..
There is precious little acknowledgment in this article that Dr. Fauci and others could make mistakes while still operating in good faith in a situation that Dr. Fauci himself recently described in The Atlantic as "an unprecedented challenge."
In fact, this article simply seems to assume bad intentions on the part of "our government" and "public health officials." And that approach is dangerously close to a conspiratorial perspective.
This column states, for example, that "public health officials and our political leaders refused to learn as the pandemic ground on." But that's an utterly astonishing accusation, and one that, I would assert, the rest of the column does not even support.
Did politicians and public health officials make regrettable comments, poor decisions, and hasty recommendations at various times during our first pandemic since the early 20th century? Yes.
But did "The West ... more or less just" copy "China’s draconian policy"? Honestly, how did the editors at Persuasion even agree to publish that statement?
Here are some details on China's internationally infamous zero-COVID measures (reported by Voice of America):
*A few detected Covid cases could lead to forced lockdowns of entire cities for months at a time.
*Authorities used apps and other technologies to monitor the movements of citizens and imposed isolation on them if they were determined to have been anywhere in the vicinity of a Covid infection.
*Quarantines were imposed by forcing people into government facilities or by placing electronic seals on family homes.
Were there some vague similarities between the lockdowns in the west and in China? Probably. But did the west copy China's authoritarian measures? That's not just an absurd statement, it's discrediting.
I do, in fact, agree that our Covid response should be the subject of sober analysis. But this article does not offer any such example.
I am also highly skeptical that lockdowns were a good idea for anything other than brief periods of time when our medical systems may have needed some relief. So, by all means, let's discuss the pros and cons of lockdowns; but,
while we're at it, let's avoid statements like this one: "If lockdowns are the most dramatic example of how what was held out to be science actually was not scientific at all, there were many others."
Really? Lockdowns weren't scientific "at all"? There was zero science involved in any decision related to lockdowns?
Persuasion can do better than this.
Whatever legitimate criticisms of America's response to Covid you can make, there's no way it was in the same league as "China's draconian policy". McLean lost me with that comparison.
I fashioned my own protective measures according to basic common sense, and it was pretty good for me. I never wore masks outside, and ignored the dirty looks from people in my progressive Chicago neighborhood. I wore good N95 masks inside most of the time. Common sense says masks help a bit with reducing risk, with a small cost. I gathered with people in reasonable settings, outdoors, and I certainly spent a lot of time outside. I ignored anything that didn't make sense to me, most of the time. I always wondered about the lab leak, always thought it was possible. I got off social media during COVID, and that saved me from the virus of stupidity that permeates our society. I got vaccinated, knowing it would reduce my chances of serious illness if I got COVID. I'm happy with my own decisions, and at least we were served up some amusing scenes - the out-of-shape cops in Los Angeles running after a jogger on the beach, which is by far one of the most delightful scenes I've ever seen. That jogger was me. Kidding, it wasn't me, but I wish it was.
There are some important questions that remain to be answered but may never be seriously asked and fully answered. The first question is whether we should have targeted reducing rates of infection, morbidity and/or mortality. Based on an answer to that question, what would a successful or more successful response to COVID-19 have been and what results would have been delivered?
A fair critique, but then hindsight can seem obvious. It’s true that trust is paramount in a public health crisis, however had those who knew the most had told us all « we don’t know », which was the real truth, wouldn’t the outrage have been even greater? Would that not have led to even more uninformed theories and suggestions (remember bleach injections?) that would have been even more harmful?
See my comment above. I used my brain to think independently, and some COVID measures I followed, and some I blew off.
Love your writing. You thread your way thru with little recrimination and anger. Only a couple exaggerations. I really appreciate your call to question our mistakes and be better prepared for next time.
The weakness of your story is the literati bias away from quantitative thought. Don't coddle your audience by avoiding numbers. -- but we can gain the sense of proportion by doing proportions-- division problems. What's big, what's little. The world isn't a drama of heros and villians. It's run by capitalism and institutions. To understand history and predict meaningfully you are better off studying balance sheets and income statements and business plans of institutions. Most of that is secret, and we can't know precisely, but we can estimate close enough to understand the intentions of institutions.
One of the most startling things about the pandemic to me was the huge transfers of wealth. You mention small companies vs big ones. But you don't mention the pharma cartel at all. Or how much money they made. Without that context you don't portray how much of a reality-distortion-field there is to protect that revenue. So the govt spend $3E10 on Covid vaccines. The marketing/influence peddling budget should be 5%, therefore $1.5E9 or One Billion Dollars. How far does that go? If the industry wanted to reward helpful doctors, they could give $1500 in appreciation to every doctor in the USA. If they were to divide the money up among US Federal Legislators, each could get $28 million. Not saying that this happened... but that's the scale to watch out for. It's not a conspiracy theory to say that businesses use defensive marketing to protect revenue. That's MBA training.
In my career I've witnessed many times the financial incentives of institutions cause terrible things to happen to people. In the case of COVID it is startling that NO inexpensive treatments were popularized in the Western world. Not because we didn't know about them. 60 Minutes did a whole segment about Fluvoxamine preventing serious illness early in the pandemic, while it was still OK to talk about outpatient treatment opportunities. Now that isn't the best drug, but it was a standout at the time, and a step in the right direction. There are 20,000 known safe drugs in the drugstores and it would be highly unlikely that none of them help. And we have 30 years of research on most of them and computer models that identified the best early treatment options to prevent hospitalization. A number of them were proven. But none were widely used in the USA. Except the expensive drugs that don't work.
Institutions, no matter whether they bill themselves as university departments, churches, regulatory agencies, families, or corporations... they are alive, a meta level above humans. They use humans the way ant-hills use ants. Humans get caught up in the institutional survival instinct and are often sacrificed. That's not a conspiracy theory. Social animals do that. We aren't as social as bees. But we aren't as individual as bears. Few of us could survive alone for long.
And we live in a capitalistic world. Nearly all important decisions are made to protect the value of a stock in the current Quarter. The rest of the important technical choices are made by administrative law judges who are responding to the demands of lawyers representing well-heeled clients.
THe planet's ecosystems, and humanity, don't have lawyers, and don't have protective share owners on Wall street. So people and the planet get neglected.
The bungled response to COVID and Climate change share the same roots. Regulatory capture, rent seeking behavior of institutions, financial incentives that prevent positive change.
A few more numbers. USA has 5% of the world's people, and spends 75% of the worlds pharma purchases. USA is as healthy as the typical nation that spends 1/4th what we do on health care. Our response to COVID was about #30 in the world, and many poor nations did much better than the rich nations.
Right now folks in my age range are dying 15 % more than before the pandemic-- from reasons OTHER than COVID. Younger males are over 20%. This is true in most developed countries. If we let our health deteriorate at that rate how long before we go extinct? So why is it happening? When I was young AIDS sprung upon the world, and killed far fewer people, but the medical community and the world's scientists really responded, figured it out, came up with tests, and treatments and social programs. What's our response to the huge increase in all-causes mortality? Crickets. No funding. No interest. No press attention.
...anche allora c'erano persone di buon senso che cercavano di fare il loro meglio, ma anche molte che accusavano gl " untori ", gli ebrei o altri, come responsabili dell'epidemia...
Questo articolo dimostra ancora una volta come la storia, in particolare la storia della medicina, non abbia insegnato nulla. Quando ho letto questo articolo, la mia mente è andata a " I Promessi Sposi" di Alessandro Manzoni, quando parla dell'epidemia della Peste.