It's Friday afternoon, about 3 PM. Your friend group of 6 people is making plans for the night. Meet up at 5, play some games for an hour, get some grub, see a movie, maybe get a late-night snack, and call it a night.
That's what everyone wishes they could be doing. Instead, we've been told, by the government, to stay inside our homes (or go out for essential things, but stay six feet away from other people) for at least the next month. No sporting events, no school (in-person), no new movies, no gatherings of any kind, nothing that you would normally do in a day that doesn't include essential work or just basic survival stuff.
Why is this happening, you ask? It's all because of a virus that could've been prevented from spreading at this magnitude had the country it originated from dealt with it and not covered shit up until it was deep into the roots of the United States. A virus that, now, is apparently all President Donald Trump's fault, because he didn't act fast enough to stop this from spreading. Except he did. He cut off all international travel to China (the country it originated from) as soon as their President informed him of what was happening. Two months AFTER it was an issue. TWO. FUCKING. MONTHS. The Chinese government started blaming the US military for causing it, claiming they brought it over to China, or some bullshit. President Trump, in turn, started calling it the Chinese Virus, because, ya know, that's where it's from, and certainly isn't racist like the media says it is. That's right - instead of asking questions pertaining to treatment and the outlook of this disease, they're worried about what he's fucking calling it.
Anyway, yes, it started in China. More specifically, at some animal market in Wuhan, supposedly transferred from a bat to humans. In the early days of testing, the WHO (World Health Organization) claimed that there was no hard evidence this virus was transferable from human to human. Boy were they off on that. It's like the flu, can be worse, but is a new strand of it, called COVID-19, and being new is highly contagious since no one is immune to it. It's most dangerous to the elderly and anyone with underlying health conditions. Now. Here's where we dive into how this thing is completely derailing what was a phenomenal and booming economy, and how our reaction to it is asinine and completely wrong.
On Thursday, March 12th, 2020, the NBA announced it was suspending its season until further notice after a player for the Utah Jazz had confirmed positive for COVID-19. There was about two weeks left of regular season gameplay. Everything got postponed. Then literally every other major league sport in the US followed suit and got suspended until further notice. The next day, Friday, movie studios began announcing the delays/postponements of movies slated for release in the coming weeks/months.
On Monday, March 15th, President Donald Trump issued a 15-day nationwide quarantine for everyone to "slow the spread of coronavirus". This later gave way to every non-essential business shutting down until they are given the clear to re-open.
As a result, you can start to imagine what happened. The stock market crashed harder than it did in 2008 when the housing market collapsed. Unemployment is over 3 million people, and somehow that's a surprise to people, even though it's because everything that wasn't vital to survival and the fight against COVID-19 was closed down. Congress struggled to pass a bill that would give everyone at least $1000 to get by for the next month, and apparently that couldn't pass without a bunch of bullshit thrown in by Nancy goddamn Pelosi, who is a pile of shit if I might add.
The media loves scaring people over something that isn't a huge deal, and they're probably the biggest culprit in this mess. At the start, every time another state had its first confirmed case, it was breaking news. Then it was the first death. Apparently 2,191 deaths matter more than the 30-40,000 that occur from the common flu every fucking year. Oh and that has treatment and a vaccine. Or ya know, from cancer, car accidents, murders, old age, or literally anything else that kills people every year.
I guess 2,000 deaths is cause to shut everything down and have the government start telling you what to do instead of just being smart about washing your hands and not sneezing into someone's face.
Now, I get being precautious and trying to contain something that no one is immune to. But when the majority of people will be fine, why take this course of action. Why shut everything down that isn't "essential" and put people out of work? The way I see it, quarantine those most at-risk and the elderly, and let other people who can handle it deal with it and allow the economy to keep moving. Maybe stop freaking the fuck out about a flu-like virus, stop always listening to the media, and move along.
Like President Trump has said, the cure cannot be worse than the virus itself. And the way I see it, the country is going to eventually have to resume business with this virus still around. We can't live like this for a year until a vaccine is approved, we just can't. People need to be able to continue working, plan events, and live their lives.
Get a treatment. Mobilize testing kits (which is being done). Done. Problem solved until we have a vaccine.
Stop freaking out, if you get it, you'll likely get over it. Someone dies from it, it's terrible, but it happens. We're born, we live, we die. I'm not wishing death on people who get it, it's just part of life. If we can lessen the amount of deaths, that's awesome, I'm all for it. BUT it can't in turn wreck American lives and put us into another great depression all because of how we handled it.
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