I have read any number of times that this virus is becoming more deadly and more contagious. It's not clear to me that it's doing either of those. To me, the most defining and worrisome thing about it is that it's so unpredictable in how it affects different people. It ranges from being completely symptomless, to dying, to staying ill for months, to possibly getting it a second time.
This is going to be with us for a very long time. If a vaccine is developed soon, by which I mean within the next two years, that is truly safe, effective, and confers permanent immunity, then eventually, when enough people are vaccinated, we will be out of the woods. And that will still take a very long time, possibly years, even if everyone willingly gets vaccinated.
I have been saying this about how we're in it for the long haul: Pretend it's 1939 and you and I are planning a trip to Europe next year. We are so much looking forward to it. We're planning to visit Paris, Rome, Venice, the French Riviera, just as many places as we can get to. Sure, the political situation there seems a bit worrisome, but just last year British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain signed an agreement with Germany that assures us of peace in our time. Then September rolls around and WWII breaks out. Oh, crap. Well, it looks like we're not going to Europe next year, but maybe the war won't last very long and we can go in 1940. But it's not a short war, and doesn't finally end until May of 1945 in Europe. The soonest we will take that long-postponed trip will be 1946, more like a year or two later. And when we finally get there, it's a completely different place than it would have been in 1939.
And that's what it's going to be like with this virus. It's going to make changes that at the present are unimaginable. I hope that they will mostly be positive ones, such as some kind of universal health care in this country, possibly the beginnings of a universal basic income. The process of education may well be profoundly changed. Perhaps people will become more compassionate to each other. Maybe the current inequalities of wealth in this country will no longer be tolerable.
We can only live through this, do our very personal best, and see what eventually happens.
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