A Flat Curve

Ohio went well past the estimated death total of 500 from my post a month ago. It now stands at over 1600. We are seeing around 500 new cases a day in the state. Our hospitals and other health care infrastructure don't seem to be overwhelmed, and life goes on.

I find I rather like working here at home, and staying away from society in general. I like to read. I like to have a very flexible schedule. I like going for walks alone. I like staying out of the car for days at a time. I could adjust to this for the long term.

A lot of people in Ohio seem to feel differently about that. Some are clamoring for business to reopen. There have been protesters, some in front of Dr. Amy Acton's home carrying rifles.

It is true that the economy has been hurt by everyone staying home. We won't know the full extent of the effects on the economy for some time after businesses are all allowed to open, which is planned to happen slowly. The American system of unemployment, and government in general, has been shown to be dysfunctional and slow. Where other governments have taken on paying a share of lost income across much of their workforces, America has battles going on over relief programs for small business and unemployment benefits, because the current systems are incompatible with each other. It's a real mess, and will hurt, possibly destroy, a lot of small businesses.

But based on guidelines from the CDC and others, we're not ready to lift the lockdown. We still have 500 new cases reported each day. The rate of new cases went up, slowed a bit, went up really high for a week or so, came back down a little, and then became flat. Same numbers every day for a couple of weeks. Not trend up or down, really, just flat. So the virus is still spreading in the community, and opening up will probably cause big flareups in new cases, along with the associated deaths. I don't understand why Dr. Acton is on board with the current plans. It seems too early. But maybe the government has concluded the people of Ohio just aren't smart enough to follow the directions well enough for long enough to actually clear the infections from the community, so we may as well just accept our fate, and watch people continue to get sick and die.

I read an article that says most of the push to open up is from Trump fans. People who don't seem to notice how rarely he gets a fact right, or how little he has done, or even tried to do as president. Now they are lying about how bad the pandemic has been, saying the numbers are overstated, and it's really not that bad at all. There really aren't that many of them, but enough to make noise, and give excuses to some officials who are afraid of the political consequences of the economic problems.

So, once again, I'm just going to wash my hands.