Plague State

 As Trump fulminates over his electoral humiliation and packs the National Security apparatus with hacks, the country is barreling towards a humanitarian catastrophe. The surge in Covid patients is on the brink of overwhelming the country's hospital systems, if it hasn't already. Localized hospital systems are already turning people away. Unlike the spring outbreak - which was focused on certain urban areas - this is hitting everywhere at once. Rural hospitals that are already small and understaffed are pushed over the brink. As we've seen too often over the past 9 months, poorly run nursing homes are going to see lethal outbreaks as efforts to control the pandemic outside their walls spill over into their vulnerable populations.

Trump will continue to do nothing. When actual histories are written about this pandemic - and not the masturbatory lies spread by Trumpists propogandists - the colossal ineptitude of our lack of a response will rank Trump among our 2-3 worst presidents, regardless of all the other heinous shit he's done. Republican politicians, largely sewn to Trump's ass like the human centipede, will follow his lead and 100,000 Americans will die before the year is out. As cases explode and hospital beds fill up, the death rate will lag by a couple of weeks.

What will make this especially tragic is that we are on the cusp of beating this thing. A very effective vaccine is perhaps only a few months away. We also know how this virus spreads, via mid-sized to large indoor gatherings. It spreads in places where people shed their masks like restaurants, bars and gyms. In spreads in the close quarters of a family home, after a family member has been to (or worked at) one of those restaurants or gyms. 

Our fundamental short-sightedness and selfishness as as species is going to get thousands more people killed for no reason. A goddamned cruise ship left port and immediately has a Covid crisis. Europe is getting pummeled, too, and this fall/early winter surge has been predicted all along. Since we know what we need to do, it simply relies on competent government - looking at you, New Zealand, South Korea and Vietnam - and high levels of social trust to implement plans that we know are effective. What we've learned is that large, unmasked groups spread this disease, so we need to stop meeting in large groups.

We learned as a faculty last night that we are going to get high speed-high accuracy saliva tests when we return in January. We could start seeing vaccines by March.  We are so close. And right as we get to the ending, we are going to kill a bunch of people.