Thoughts on managing the pandemic

Black Lives Matter!

In a major development, the WHO appears to have accepted that the SARS-COV-2 novel coronavirus is airborne.

This will have major implications - in particular, in my opinion, it will end the idiotic debate over whether we should be wearing facemasks (which have been known for some time to be beneficial, albeit slightly less so than physical distancing). That's fine by my immediate, in-the-household family, as we've been doing that for some time anyway - because of other health vulnerabilities, the sort of thing that isn't often thought about and has been completely forgotten about by most people now.

My home state (Victoria, in  Australia) has, in my opinion, been managing the pandemic reasonably well. The use of private security guards appears to have been a problem, but that is because of a lack of training - would that training have been provided to others in that role? Police haven't been wearing masks for most of the pandemic, and their duties mean they are in situations where they should have been all along.

The lockdown may also be bringing out the authoritarian worst of our police. (On that, see here and here, which I've been meaning to post for some time, and my previous posts on that topic.) Wearing guns for a public health emergency is so counter-productive it is stupid - this is a time when calming and reassuring people is needed, and weapons are neither. For that matter, for most minorities, neither are police, who tend towards a regressive view of order that is decades behind the norms of the current times. (Their globally endemic racism and propensity for egregious  violence is further indication of that.)

Their use is, in my opinion, a measure of the limited diversity of decision makers - every single one of whom, as well as every single police member and ALL other figures with public authority, should be COMPELLED, as a pre-condition before hiring and at regular intervals thereafter, to take tests to determine their levels of unconscious bias. There are some excellent tools for this around, but they tend to be focused on race and/or gender, and they also need to be developed for LGBTIQ+, disabled, and other minority groups. The fact that they haven't suggests, to me, the possibility of unconscious bias on the part of those developing the tests.

(If those broader tests have been developed, please send me a link via the contact form and I'll post it here - after I check it, and if I find it to my satisfaction.)

Managing the pandemic is a governance matter. As with all such matters, it is involves a mix of sometimes competing rights (such as the right to health and life, vs. - in this case - the right to adequate income in order to have an adequate [not a rich or superior or higher class] quality of life and the right to mental health, which requires connectedness). The responses show a great deal about the mindset of those doing the governing, and range from determined to do well for community but tainted by unconscious bias (in my home state), to ignore things and keep "business as usual" (e.g, Sweden and other nations stupidly trying to develop "herd immunity" - which actively discriminates against minorities and other vulnerable people), to lockdowns without support for those harmed (India and Africa [I have friends there who I am particularly concerned about] - and those nations often don't have the resources to provide support), to the racist and political power at all costs approach of #45, in the USA - which, partly because of the active negation of that nation's potential, I consider to be the worst in the world.

There are some people looking to the future - both the recovery from this pandemic, and the prevention of future pandemics (managing climate/environmental impacts and population growth will be key in that), which is good. For most people, however, the issue is simple, short term survival in the best condition possible, especially mentally.

WLNGRHDMT

Black Lives Matter!