COVID-19 a citizens rant.

Novel Corona Virus 2019.

March 24, 2020- the world is shutting down one city after another and the toll on the people is just beginning to unravel. I am confounded by the expectations of the masses that

1. The virus will die or will stop spreading
2. A vaccine will be discovered or
3. A cure will make the virus non-lethal.

What if any or all of these expectations fail to materialize? Should we be brave cabin fever for the rest of our lives? would that be acceptable?

I believe that the virus is here and out in the wild so we have to live with it. Let us start thinking about it.

Virus will neither die nor stop spreading

Viral airborne communicable diseases like Tuberculosis, Influenza etc have not been eliminated  and continue to coexist with us even though a large body of organizations have been fighting them for decades.  Those viruses are not as contagious as COVID-19.

We will have a vaccine for COVID-19

A vaccine makes it difficult for the virus to infect a person. Flu Vaccine is effective 67% of the time that is  a vaccine will slow down the spread and effectively help.  Although Ebola vaccine is touted to be 100%  effective, this is a rare thing. This should be the easiest solution but considering that a vaccine has not been found to be acceptable in the last 4 months, its entirely possible this option will need 4 more months to come to fruition. With every passing month, the vaccine pushes out by a month-according to some mathematical models and the research results for flying cars, cold fusion, hoverboards etc. Concepts and product are two different things.

A Cure

The most prayed for option is a cure. We forget that 96% of the detected patients recover- our bodies given enough support can manage to beat the virus. This option has two small issues:

1. Detection

2. Treatment Capacity

From the research so far, I see that the costs of detection are large- not sure why.  Isn't this the case with all disease detection? Why are medical costs so convoluted? Why are governments/publics not actively working to bring down the cost of health-detection-treatment-recovery? Too large an issue to address at this time. But you guessed it. This is not a short-term solution.

How do we live alongside COVID-19

Is it time to rethink sanitation and hygiene?  Clearly, the way we did business is not going to be enough. We will need a lot more sanitizers, wipes, soaps, disinfectants and more to live in the post COVID-19 world.

Is it not time to start the brainstorming?