Coronavirus Hysteria

It’s amazing how obsessed people are with this whole Coronavirus situation. Schools, theatres, sporting events, religious services being canceled or severely curtailed because of what is basically a flu virus. It is being treated like an Ebola outbreak when nothing could be farther from the truth. For one thing, Ebola had a ninety percent death rate. The death rate for this is about four percent, with the overwhelming majority being the elderly with underlying health issues. 

In South Korea, there has not been single death attributable to Coronavirus in anyone under thirty, and the median age for those who have died is eighty-one. In China, it appears that new cases are already on the decline. In the US, preemptive measures taken by the government have prevented any widespread communal infection. It is almost Spring when viruses like this become dormant, so new cases will begin to dwindle worldwide in the ordinary course of natural occurrence.

The reason this is so laughable to me is that many of the same people complaining that we hear drying the lack of a vaccine or treatment or testing have not even bothered to get a flu shot. That is undoubtedly the reason that over 18,000 people have died from the flu this year. But we accept this, and for most of the winter, we have gone blithely about our business as if nothing was wrong. 

Don’t get me wrong. We should take common-sense precautions like thoroughly washing our hands, staying home if we are sick, keeping our work stations, kitchen tables, and counters, etc. clean. But why haven’t we been doing that already? Maybe this whole thing will serve as a wakeup call, and the next flu season will bring about increased awareness and vigilance in preventing the spread of the virus.