The COVID Enigma

"We are far from learning everything we need to know about this virus. Like, the latest suspicious culprit might be air conditioning. And inside air. Communal rest rooms."

I don't know about you all, but my head is spinning. This COVID thing is so hard to understand, and the "facts" are so hard to trust. Is it a canard, or is it an apocalyptic plague. Is it a little of both, or is it neither. In 2017, Dr. Michael Osterholm wrote a book (Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Germs) about past pandemics and if we are prepared for the next one. The script for this one, could not have been more clearly drawn. Osterholm has impeccable credentials and a sterling reputation. When he speaks, most people listen. 

My annual visit to my skin doctor this week was not quite as illuminating as listening to Dr. Osterholm. However, like Osterholm, my skin doc is a U of M medical school graduate, and is still tied in with the medical school community. His beliefs from what he as learned about COVID are these - it is real, there is no stopping it now, and China is to blame. What he meant by saying there is no stopping it now, is it is going to be with us for a while. Sometimes in waves, sometimes in lulls. But it is here.

Back to Dr. Osterholm for a minute. Even though his book came out in 2017, he has been sounding the clarion call for action since 2005 - maybe even earlier. "We are not prepared for what will surely come", he would say. He has studied the Spanish Flu pandemic closely. He has studied AIDS, H1N1, MERS, SARS, you name it. To have a new variant of the COVID virus unleashed on the planet was all but inevitable. His complaint, was the unwillingness of governments (especially ours), to prepare for it.

But now it is here, and I have never seen any event where there is more confusion, data shaping, and half truths. We have knee jerked, and knee jerked again in response to it. Some folks have blown this thing off as much to do about nothing. Others are saying it is as real as a heart attack, and if you get it, you could be big time sick. Maybe hospitalized. Maybe hospitalized in an ICU. Maybe worse.

It does seem however, that every day we learn something new about COVID - 19. We also know how much we did not know when this thing first hit. And to validate what Dr. Osterholm has been warning us about - we were nowhere near prepared for it. And again, according to Osterholm, we are only in the second inning of a nine inning game.

Someone told me that COVID was the turd in our punch bowl which never seems to go away. Amen to that one. It affects and/or spoils just about everything we do on a daily basis. However, one way or another, this thing will finally end. Will it still be with us in a less than virulent state in the future? Time will tell. Until that happens, our behavior will resemble something like Group-think. Large space bubbles, mandatory masks in certain venues, super cleaning just about everything, and daily temperature checks. 

We are far from learning every important item we need to know about this virus. Like, the latest suspicious culprit might be air conditioning. And/or inside air. Communal rest rooms. Huggers and  hand shakers will continue to mourn their past greeting practices. The rest of us? Many of us will continue to be perplexed and frustrated by the enigma of COVID - 19. It is after all, the turd in our punch bowl.