Random thoughts about Covid

I want to thank you, my readers, for being such great people. You are intelligent. You give thoughtful consideration to sources you consider credible. You make your own decisions and live by them.

Way too many people have devolved to tribalism. You either agree with the opinion leaders in every detail or your are tossed out of the tribe and stoned. Most of those who have devolved are not only not capable of engaging in introspection but actively attack those who do exercise the capability.

Case in point: Cuomo* hits on some attractive women who might be available. He is being thrown under the bus. George Floyd pointed a handgun at the belly of a pregnant woman and he is now Saint George Floyd. Huh? How does that work?

Where I march to a slightly different drummer

Masks

Masks are not binary (Totally effective or only a placebo) but they don't need to be to to dampen the growth-rate.

Growth-rate is the old compound interest problem. The difference between 5% growth rate and 10% growth-rate is not 5%. In seventy years 5% will have increased to 30 times the original investment while 10% will be 26  times what 5% generated. Not twice as much. 26 times as much.

From a population-dynamics standpoint the effect of implementing a countermeasure that reduces transmissibility (in a given venue) by 30% is huge.

Note that I am pulling 30% out of my nethermost orifice. When we cough or sneeze we do not expel individual virus. We aerosol droplets of mucus, saliva and sloughed-off cells. Oh, and a few virus. If a mask catches 30% of the droplets (and I assume that is a low-end estimate) then masks have the potential to reduce the transmissibility due to that path of infection by 30%.

It may be almost insignificant to the individual but be large from a systems-dynamics standpoint.

Do I think masks should be worn everywhere? Heck no. Impossible to enforce, for one thing. Educate people when it is needed and let them be adults. If the current best-science implies that most transmissibility happens when there are more than 10 people in 1000 square feet of indoor space, then tell people that and let them make their own decisions.

Vaccinations

Both Mrs ERJ and I had the two shots. Will we get the third? Maybe, but not until at least a year goes by and the "booster" has been dialed into the newer strains.

The bus pulled out of the station on the ones the current vaccine targets. Even if you are moderately disposed to trust "vaccines", why would you invest in buggy-whips?

I expect every adult to make their own decisions. If you decide there is too much risk then I respect that. Maybe I am wrong and I die. Should that happen, I am glad that you did not.

All the other stuff

It is incredibly clear that the people who think they are the smartest ones in the room are mostly clueless.

Side-story: I used to think I was allergic to strawberries.

Dad grew strawberries. We picked and sold them to turn a few honest dollars.

My eyes watered and my nose stopped up with snot while I picked them.

For years I avoided strawberries. All of the evidence pointed to the "fact" that I was allergic to them.

It wasn't the strawberries. It was the grass in the rows of strawberries that pollinated at the same time the strawberries were ripening.

The strawberries were big and red and everywhere. I had them squished on my knees and hands. I rubbed my face and it was covered with strawberry goo. I was "picking strawberries" and I had an allergic reaction. Of course it HAD TO BE the strawberries.

But it wasn't. It was pollen from those inconspicuous, green seed-heads bobbing atop the clumps of grass. The same seed-heads that fleetingly brushed against my face while I picked the strawberries.

Duck-duck-goose

The "smartest people in the room" cannot explain Covid's duck-duck-goose behavior. Why does it lightly skip over so many and hammer the few? 

The "smartest people in the room" cannot explain the racial disparities regarding transmission rates and severity. Hint: Go to any search engine and type "Brawl" and see what kind of videos show up.

If brawls and raves and house-parties are the dominant mode of transmission, then issuing tickets to 57 year-old suburbanites for letting their mask slip down from their nose isn't going to fix the problem.

The virus does not care if it is not politically correct to point out that certain demographics are statistically more likely to engage in street brawls and demonstrations, more likely to engage in brawling and huge, slam-dancing street parties.

Hammering (mostly) compliant non-spreaders is like kicking the dog after Granny rattled the windows with a fart. It might make the person who kicked the dog feel good but the stench does not dissipate and Granny keeps farting indoors.

It is an example of the story of the drunk who lost his wallet one night on Maple Street but was looking for it on Elm Street because the lighting was better.

*Not a Cuomo fan but using the example to point out a double-standard.