Post 54 - May 4, 2020
Day 54…
New Zealand reported no new cases of the virus yesterday.
The first case was reported on February 28.
Their Prime Minister, Jacinda Arden, instituted a strict lockdown before there was a single death reported.
Borders were quickly closed to all non-Residents on March 19.
The lockdown went into place on March 25.
The total death toll from the virus in New Zealand as of yesterday is 11.
New Zealand has the advantage of being a cluster of islands.
The total population is only 4.8 million, a little bit more than half the population of New York City.
They are now in a great position to start to re-open.
In terms of a response to the virus, it seems that New Zealand has been the model of how to do it properly.
While the residents of New Zealand may soon be able to return to something close to normal life, they will need to remain isolated to maintain that.
Nobody allowed in.
They need to keep their borders closed.
The rate of virus in Australia seems to be dropping as well.
If Australia can get to where New Zealand is, then the regular back and forth between those two companies can start up again but they will still need to keep their collective borders closed to all outsiders.
As countries around them start to get THEIR numbers down and in control, then those countries can slowly be added into this bubble.
With these low rates, when there are new cases, they can be identified and the people that those newly affected people have come in contact with can be identified and quarantined.
That’s what “contact tracing” means.
That’s why testing is important.
Here at home, forty states have already started re-opening.
New case rates in most of those states continue to rise.
In some of those states, fewer than 1% of the population have been tested.
They are reopening blindly.
It is a huge gamble.
They’re playing lotto.
There is little or no coordination happening between most states.
There is nothing in place at all stopping someone from a place with a very high rate, going somewhere where the case rate is low and bringing the virus with them.
We don’t have anywhere near the control over this that we need to have to be reopening.
Even the White House is now saying that the death rate by August will likely hit 100,000 people.
That is up more than 20% from even a couple of days ago.
And that’s just by AUGUST.
New York has joined with seven other states - Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Delaware, Massachusetts, and New Jersey to coordinate our response.
We are trying to create our own bubble.
We will not reopen our businesses until all seven of us can reopen our businesses.
Our seven states are completely interdependent.
People who live in these states often commute to one of the others.
There is a solid band of concentrated population that runs through this area.
Yesterday, our collective states announced that they would be uniting to purchase and buy personal protection equipment for our hospitals.
Rather than compete against each other, which is what has been happening, our group of eastern states will join together, negotiate together and SHARE the proceeds as needed.
This keeps us from competing against each other.
That is what we should be doing as a country.
Instead we are inexplicably doing the exact opposite.
Every state is just doing whatever it wants to do regardless of what its neighbors are doing.
The President is ENCOURAGING this even though his own advisors are saying it’s a bad idea.
Every single model being released by the federal government says that it is too soon, but states are moving ahead anyway and the President is cheering them on.
When somebody like the Governor of Michigan holds their ground and keeps the closures in place, the citizens show up at the capitol armed to the teeth like an army in fury.
On some level, how can you blame them?
The President is encouraging them to reopen and the Governor won’t do it.
THEN, the President actually praises the Michigan armed protestors.
“Very good people.”
There are now protests erupting all over the country.
Despite the new case numbers and the rising death rate, people want out.
And the President, rather than trying to calm them all down, is egging them on and giving them a clear mandate to revolt.
We are not seeing the sharp decline in cases that was hoped for in New York.
Yes, we are trending down, but our numbers are still very high.
226 people died in New York yesterday.
226 people died while our city parks filled up with people not wearing masks and not honoring social distancing.
It was a nice day and people missed hanging out with each other.
Some places around the city yesterday were PACKED with people.
We don’t know what is going to happen.
Nobody, not any politician and not any healthcare professional and certainly not I know what’s going to happen.
The best that anybody can do is make an EDUCATED guess.
New people are getting this virus every single day.
Every 45 seconds today, an American will die from COVID-19.
We can look around the world and see what’s working and what isn’t.
Our Federal Government can then unite us and coordinate a response policy that is based on scientific study and not just on “a feeling”.
Russia, yesterday, reported 10,000 new cases in a single day.
A new record.
Let’s let them keep that record.
We don’t have to win.
What the guidelines for reopening dictate is that there should be a 14 day drop in cases before we start to reopen.
For two solid weeks, new case rates should trend down.
That is not happening in a single place in the US where businesses are reopening.
Cases across the US are not only not trending down, they are actually rising.
I want to get back as much as anybody.
We ALL want to get back.
This is getting really old.
Michael is making our 55th brunch.
I am going to wash my 55th batch of brunch dishes.
We are going to have our 55th discussion about what we are going to have for dinner.
Michael will then make our 55th dinner and I will then wash our 55th batch of dinner dishes.
We will then go to sleep for the 55th time since this started.
Tomorrow, we will do it all again.
And probably the day after.
And the day after that.
If we keep doing that, chances are that we will eventually be able to get back on a plane, fly to London and meet up with my cousins and have a great meal at Bill’s together before seeing a show in the West End.
For now, though, I am just going to look forward to whatever it is that Michael’s making for brunch.
He was always a good cook, but all this practice is making him REALLY good.
We don’t need to have everything right now.
For the good of all, we can wait.
Easy for me to say, alas.
This isn't as easy for many, many people who are truly suffering during this time.
Like a lot of my friends, though, Michael and I really do have everything we need right now.
We have more than enough.