clearly this is a dangerous virus, not sure any sane person would argue differently - i truly feel for those who have been affected, as well their families and loved ones
but clearly there are repercussions being felt outside of the direct health effects - in NOLA, there are hundreds of thousands in the service industry (and other sectors) without jobs, and many businesses are on the verge of shuttering - my wife works for a national company and she was one of the lucky ones who was able to take a 20% salary cut, as most have been furloughed without pay - those types of examples go on and on across the nation and the world
i know dr's and healthcare workers on the front lines are fighting their dicks off and the scenes that they are experiencing are not pretty - my brother in law is a neurosurgeon at one of the area's biggest hospitals and one of my friend's in my inner circle is a high ranking dr in the emergency department at another - the latter was one of my dinner companions last Friday night as we went out to help support one of our friends who is chef/owner at a local semi-casual fine dining establishment (Restaurant Patois, if you're ever in New Orleans look it up - ask Wineguy about it he visited a few years ago when he was in town) - when I golfed on Saturday the same dr filled a spot in my foursome - getting out was important to me to support those at these places I often frequent and to take a deep breath as I had just found out that my 3 and 6 year old kids were going to be off of school for the foreseeable future and the environment at my house was about to change dramatically - was that selfish of me? maybe so, but how about the people who bought up all of the relevant supplies and locked themselves in their bunkers without concern for others who might not have been able to access said supplies? - I'll leave the judgement to others as everybody's situations are different and as humans we tend to only see/judge things through our own personal lenses (I admit I am just as guilty of this as the next guy from time to time)
when i posted last week i was in a moment of finally having had enough of the hype machine attached to CV - again, clearly the situation was a serious one, but a situation can be serious and overblown at the same time - and CV is serious enough to not have to deal with unnecessary hysteria on top of the virus as that's when things start to get out of hand
was a few drinks deep as I posted so my apologies if I came off in a confrontational manner as that is certainly not healthy in times like this - I had no intentions of picking fights but I was ready for society in general to start trying to put this thing in its proper perspective instead of running around with its collective heads cut off
I hope we start to see some leveling off soon - the number of cases will obviously start to rise as testing ramps up but the number of critical cases and deaths seem to me to be far more important indicators of where we stand, as many infected are asymptomatic and in many other positive cases people suffer from mild symptoms only, so hopefully those severe cases decrease while overall case numbers rise - this thing was obviously floating around NOLA during Mardi Gras (which lasts about 3 weeks ending on Fat Tuesday, which this year was 2/25) as that is one of the only logical explanations for the clustering in this area - my assertion is that many many thousands of people here have already been infected and simply did not know it, while some were sick and tested negative for flu but had no reason to believe at the time that CV was to blame
again, terrible virus and I pray for the recovery of those who are in serious/critical condition as the effects in these cases sound truly awful - the strain on local healthcare workers and systems is also obviously immense - but the doomsday scenarios of millions dying, etc were likely never really in play, but still the collateral damage has hit home in an extreme way both on a local level and in my own household
finally, I hate how all of this is being politicized, and for the record I am completely apolitical - i fucking hate politics and have absolutely no dog in that particular fight (a fight that is dividing our nation now more than ever) - so when I read things about this subject I take everything with a grain of salt and try to consider the source and the potential reasoning behind the stories being written and published - the following seems to be very comprehensive, logical and well thought out, but it was written by a guy who is apparently involved with the republican party in Silicon Valley so take it for what it's worth if you care to read:
https://medium.com/six-four-six-nine/evidence-over-hysteria-covid-19-1b767def5894
continued kudos for those who are working to fight this thing on the front lines, and i hope that there aren't many here who have been affected at a high level - i am in the process of trying to get a new business off the ground so this has definitely been detrimental in that regard, and my wife's 20% pay cut will really hurt our family, but hopefully these are temporary changes and there are many who are in much worse shape, so trying to keep all of that in mind - hope everyone remains vigilant but can find a way to stay calm in the process, and more importantly hope everyone finds it in themselves to treat each other with kindness and respect throughout the rest of this ordeal
best wishes -
LA Burns
