Disasters in Slow Motion (pt. 17) - Jul 12, 2020

July 12 (14:35 GMT) - Actual Numbers vs. July 9 (11:00 GMT)
Worldwide Cases: 12,896,697 (+ 700,517)
Worldwide Deaths: 568,586 (+15,815)
Worldwide Mortality Rate: 4.40% (-0.13%)
Worldwide Mortality Rate (without US): 4.52% (-0.10%)
US Cases: 3,357,974 (+198,460)
US Deaths: 137,429 (+2,556)
US Mortality Rate: 4.09% (-0.17%)
US Total Recovered: 1,490,724 (+97,468)
Florida/Collier Cases: 254,511 (+30,738) / 5,968 (+535)
Florida/Collier Deaths: 4,197 (+307) / 94 (+9)
Florida/Collier Mortality Rate: 1.64% (-0.09%) / 1.57% (+0.01%)

I’m keeping this short, just writing as my brain gets back into numbers mode and, clearly, most of the numbers above are pretty terrifying on a number of levels. The broad mortality rate continues to slowly go down, likely bringing us closer to the real number.

But, there is another death number that isn’t going to fall under what is normally being tracked, and I find it quite horrific. The number of people going hungry, and those starving to death, are going to go up due to Covid-19 caused increases in food scarcity. 130 million more people are going to be going without proper nourishment. An estimate I heard on the BBC news placed the death toll around an ADDITIONAL 12,000 people per day. If that is correct, Covid-19 will indirectly cause the deaths of over 4,000,000 people through its disruptions in our already fragile food distribution chain.

If the lives of 137,000+ Americans, or the lives of 568,000+ people worldwide, isn’t enough to get you to pay attention and put on a mask, maybe another 4 million dead might. This also puts something into perspective for me, and in a rather discomforting way.

In our country, we have recently had a number of conversations about “white privilege”. That privilege is very real. It doesn’t mean that white people will always succeed, or that they don’t need to work hard - it is more like having a 5 second start in a foot race. The runner in the lead still needs to work to win, they just have a clear advantage at the beginning.

What this has reinforced though, is “Western Privilege” at a level I don’t commonly think about. The “developed world” is mobilizing to stop a global pandemic that has claimed over one half million lives worldwide; a pandemic that can strike anywhere, and anyone. Meanwhile, and ADDITIONAL 4 million people are expected to die this year from starvation - probably the easiest “plague” for humanity to confront and end - but that isn’t so much a “Western” problem. Hunger, and related issues, claim the lives of over 9 million people a year - NORMALLY.

How do we as a species let this happen? Simple. Out of sight, out of mind. The greatest scientific minds in humanity’s history are working to end a global pandemic because it impacts them, because it is personal.

I suppose then, that I shouldn’t be surprised by the number of people refusing to wear masks. Not giving a damn about other people has broadly been a part of Western culture for a while, now we are just seeing that on a local level as well.

Covid-19 is going to change societies across the globe - end of story. There is likely no “going back to normal” so much as there is working to find a new, acceptable, normal. So, maybe as we do that, maybe as we as a species change and adapt to our new situation...maybe we relearn the concept of empathy.

It is only by working together that we survived to come out of the caves and into the light. This may be our last opportunity to avoid a return to living in darkness.