The fog over these last weeks has been unlike anything in my life. The whole month of March has slowed to a painful crawl, more like a decade than a month, days dragging by, uncertainty at every turn, fear of getting sick or losing my business. No community gatherings, no restaurants, no baseball or school or church. Day after dreary day — more infections, more deaths, Italy! OMG!, now Spain, Wall Street crashing, layoffs, closing this, closing that.
Where is this going?
COVID19 is God-awful, having ravaged the world, killing thousands, and soon millions.
It is, quite simply, the most significant threat to the world since WW II.
Things are bad.
All that said, as March comes to a close — and Thank God March will come to a close -- at the end of the day, the question narrows to a single crucial issue: How do we get through this with the least amount of human suffering? And, a good chance of launching a successful rebound, one that is sustainable for the health of our social body and for an economy that creates jobs and livelihoods which can power a much-needed rebound, get us back in the saddle?
Every American needs to realize: the virus is not going away. We can hope for summer attenuation in terms of transmission. We can hope that it mutates over time into something less lethal. We can hope for better treatment options. We can even hope for a quicker vaccine.
But, hope is not a strategy. We have to pro-actively pick a route forward to get through this: one that is smart, balanced, informed by data and critical analysis — one that realizes: the virus is not going away.
I want to say this one more time: avoiding the virus by sheltering in place does not alter the reality that the virus is NOT. GOING. AWAY. And that somewhere between 40%-80% of us are going to need to get this disease. It just is that simple. That’s what a pandemic is. We have no immunity.
We cannot close businesses indefinitely. Nor our professional, collegiate and secondary sports programs. Nor our gyms, malls, parks, etc. Nor our religious centers. Nor, nor, nor. Not indefinitely. Because the virus is NOT. GOING. AWAY. It will rear its ugly head again, if not in May, then in October or November or December.
Governor Tim Walz of Minnesota has, in my opinion, laid out the strongest case for a way forward. His strategy, informed by science and medical professionals, measured, balanced and well-calibrated to weigh the risks of a secondary infectious break-out next fall, including the need to get enough people exposed to create a home-grown defense against worst outcomes, was articulated yesterday, March 25th via Facebook -- Governor Walz is himself in self-imposed quarantine.
Walz is asking citizens in Minnesota to shelter-in-place from Friday, March 27th at midnight to April 10th. At that point, Walz promises to rescind shelter-in-place, but maintain the same level of “social distancing” that has been on the table since mid-March and which is working in Minnesota: limits on gatherings, rigorous hand-washing, keep personal space of 6’, protect the most vulnerable, but reopening some businesses and starting the process of returning to normal.
“This order gives Minnesota’s health care system the strongest possible chance to adequately prepare for the predicted impact of this virus,” Walz said.
“Flattening the curve” of those infected buys the State of Minnesota the following: increased ICU capacity, more ventilators as produced by industry, more bed space through hospitals acting to reduce loads and adding isolated field hospitals, and crucially, better PPE for health professionals.
Over time, hopefully end of April, ample COVID tests and anti-body tests will also be put in place. Essentially, Walz is looking to create enough time to build out a coordinated medical defensive arsenal, including a new strategy around testing, tracing and isolating active cases, for numbers they project will result once Minnesota reopens, which Walz says will happen beginning of May.
On May 1st, restaurants and bars will be allowed to re-open. On May 4th, schools re-open. He has picked a date in the future, having looked at all the production schedules and projections of medical necessities, and chosen a moment in time when Minnesota, and hopefully their neighboring states: turn and face the virus.
At some point, and please understand this: most everyone and most every community will need to turn and face the virus. Sure, we can indefinitely try to protect the most vulnerable, the elderly in nursing homes, for example, and Minnesota will do that. But that alone will not get us back on our feet as a society.
What this strategy looks like is building a bridge to the next phase; one where we will be fully prepared to engage with our medical system: numbers of infections will spike in May and June, but as always, 85% of infected people will recover without hospitalization and go forward with a level of presumed herd immunity. Approximately 15%, maybe less, will need treatment from care facilities. Around 1% of infections will result in death, maybe less as the medical system improves its regimen and gains insight over time. Germany is currently under .5% mortality.
But, and I hope people understand the crucial point here: we need to have a certain level of exposure--recovery--immunity within our communities to ward off the second wave of corona infections expected to launch sometime in October/November/December. Without adequate levels of infectious immunity built up from previous exposure and recovery, the next wave of COVID-19 could be much worse, much more lethal and much more devastating to the basis of our society.
The virus is not going away. But we are not powerless in our ability to calculate a best-case strategy going forward that keeps the wolf from the door, while allowing the masses to move through the disease cycle without overwhelming our medical system and keeping mortality in a very low range.
It’s the best, smartest and well-informed strategy to getting out of this mess with most of what we need to carry forward, our dignity and humanity in place, our health, sense of identity as a country and some semblance of an economy. We save as many people as we can. We protect our medical system. We get people back into the public square once we are sure the medical system has capacity. And, we test, trace and identify pockets of infection as they occur to short-circuit flare-ups over the near term. Meanwhile, and most importantly, we move a higher percentage of the population through the eye-wall of the storm so that the second wave of the virus, coming this fall, is not as lethal, nor as disruptive as what we just went through.
Every community, every nation must understand that when ready, it must turn and face the virus and come out the other end. Hunkering down buys time, and we use it, we validate the public sacrifice that is being made, to choose a time and a place to turn and face the virus. Knowing there will be pain, suffering, even death, but that, given the choices we face, it is the best route forward, the most prudent, to get beyond and through this.
Bravo, Governor Walz, for giving Minnesotans a goal to work toward together as a community during this unprecedentedly challenging time. That’s what leadership looks like. Today I go forward, finally, with more purpose and understanding of how we can through this working together. And I can start planning my life and my business activities accordingly. There is a ray of sunshine I can walk toward believing the future will be better.
God Bless, out there.