JMHO: This is not political in nature, so please don't turn this thread into that. I'm interested in hearing what others think of this situation or where my thinking is wrong.
It occurred to me recently that decisions were made based on what the medical professionals 'thought' would occur before they had accurate information on this virus. For a while now, a week or more at least, we have come to realize that their early projections missed the mark by quite a bit. It's not that they meant to alarm us, but it was their best guess at a time when the information they were working with was wrong. Think initial information coming from China.
Why is no one re-evaluating our position now that we have more accurate stats? If we had this information back when this panic started would we have taken the route that we did? I tend to think not. We would have treated it as a 'bad' flu season (is there a good one?) and gone on about out business. Before flu shots were available, that's what we always did. People got sick, people got well and yes, some didn't survive. Tragic as that may be, we didn't ruin our lives and economy along the way.
Well it seems that the latest information would indicate a type of bad flu season, yet we are clinging to this extreme position as if we were dealing with the Bubonic Plague or Smallpox.
Why are we still locking ourselves in our homes? Why are businesses still being denied the opportunity to re-open their doors. All of the things we are doing to ourselves is based on faulty projections that we now know aren't valid.
Many of us on this site remember the chicken pox parties where you purposely exposed your child to the disease in the hopes of them being young and vital and if they got the disease their young bodies and systems would be strong enough to weather the storm. Chicken pox in an adult (not Shingles) is much more difficult to withstand. Perhaps that's what is happening today. The young and vital are handling the virus whereas the older set are more vulnerable to it's effects as their compromised systems can't fight it off as well.
We can't undo what we have done, but we certainly could re-evaluate our position now and change course couldn't we? Why aren't we?
It occurred to me recently that decisions were made based on what the medical professionals 'thought' would occur before they had accurate information on this virus. For a while now, a week or more at least, we have come to realize that their early projections missed the mark by quite a bit. It's not that they meant to alarm us, but it was their best guess at a time when the information they were working with was wrong. Think initial information coming from China.
Why is no one re-evaluating our position now that we have more accurate stats? If we had this information back when this panic started would we have taken the route that we did? I tend to think not. We would have treated it as a 'bad' flu season (is there a good one?) and gone on about out business. Before flu shots were available, that's what we always did. People got sick, people got well and yes, some didn't survive. Tragic as that may be, we didn't ruin our lives and economy along the way.
Well it seems that the latest information would indicate a type of bad flu season, yet we are clinging to this extreme position as if we were dealing with the Bubonic Plague or Smallpox.
Why are we still locking ourselves in our homes? Why are businesses still being denied the opportunity to re-open their doors. All of the things we are doing to ourselves is based on faulty projections that we now know aren't valid.
Many of us on this site remember the chicken pox parties where you purposely exposed your child to the disease in the hopes of them being young and vital and if they got the disease their young bodies and systems would be strong enough to weather the storm. Chicken pox in an adult (not Shingles) is much more difficult to withstand. Perhaps that's what is happening today. The young and vital are handling the virus whereas the older set are more vulnerable to it's effects as their compromised systems can't fight it off as well.
We can't undo what we have done, but we certainly could re-evaluate our position now and change course couldn't we? Why aren't we?
I think yes, the governor of IL is using this to get federal aid, which is sad, because he pretty much bankrupted the state despite the fact that he is finding every little way he can to raise taxes, and I suspect some other governors are also looking for aid as well, using this as an excuse. Truthfully, I think the huge majority of the cases in IL are in Chicago, and I think Cook Co. in particular, and the rest of the state has had very little in comparison. We live in central IL and the rate of infection is very low here. There were only 11 cases in our county and all but one of them recovered. The person who did not was an elderly person who had underlying health conditions and had contact with someone who had the virus. So we have no new cases, yet, we are not allowed to open our businesses. It does seem a bit wonky that it's being played out this way. I think the majority of people here would wear masks if they were required to, if that meant the businesses could be open. Of course, if they did open this area, I'm sure there would be people coming down from Chicago, to escape being "locked down" and that could pose a problem there as well. 
Comment