The Churches are Closed; The Pot Stores are Open. Hallelujah?

Yesterday was a beautiful day in generally empty West Hollywood, California. I had a couple of necessary errands to do, permissible and possible in accord with the quarantine, and I decided to walk the approximately 1.3 miles each way. One errand was to pick up a few groceries at Gelson's. Having done so, I began my walk back to my apartment, a bit over laden as it turned out, such that my journey required a couple of breaks along the way. I found a ledge by a storefront upon which I could perch. As I did I noticed a line of about five or six people in front of me. And pretty quickly after I sat down on the ledge, several people stood in that line until the line had reached me and another several people stood behind me, supposing I was also waiting.

I got up and walked a bit further on, having realized that the wait was for the local pot store.  The traffic on the sidewalk superseded, as you can see, the traffic on the empty road.

Ah incongruity! Or not, depending on what one considers and "essential" service to which the consumer may go and upon whom he or she may depend. The Churches in Los Angeles are closed, shuttered, kaput, at least for the future that could be anywhere from April 12 (the Easter that Mr. Trump made a goal to roars of knowing laughter) to September depending on which expert is correct about the run of the Coronavirus. Happily, there are online and other streaming type methods by which the faithful can be in spiritual communion. For the Catholic, the Eucharist, which is called the "Source and Summit" of our faith, is. . . unavailable.  Good reasons abound.

But in the balancing of interests, is the sale of pot (or alcohol, which I admit to having purchased during this siege), properly, logically, called an "essential service"?To be fair, it is the Archdiocese that closed our Church because of its response to the concerns about public health. And it is the secular government that has decided the pot stores are essential notwithstanding the public health emergency.

But these moments of cognitive dissonance make it hard to trust any authority. It makes it hard to know what is true in all of the pronouncements being lobbed at us figuratively like rockets from Gaza into Israel.

Speaking of the secular end of things. When I was walking into the Gelson's parking lot to purchase my three bags full in order to stand on the happily not very long line to enter the store, I noticed a homeless woman meandering toward the same line. As she walked, she coughed, heartily. She did  join the line, and she was not observing the six feet rule. She departed quickly, and did not cough in the brief time she was there.

I have noted in an internet search, at least according to the Los Angeles Times, that California cannot agree on a strategy regarding the many homeless who are still on the streets in this time of pandemic.

Today I read that while some experts are recommending that those who are healthy ought not wear protective masks; others are saying with equal authority that they should.

Maybe it's time for me to get back on that line. You won't believe it, but I have never tried the stuff. Except, of course, the second hand kind, which wafts when I walk and even when I am in my little condo, from one or more apartments below.

The Killing Cure

I was sitting outside on my terrace before the clouds came back again, with my tablet. I had a lot of conversations today with friends with varying thoughts about the shuttering of the society, the closing of commerce and the mandate of "social distancing" because of the Coronavirus, which perhaps not apropos of anything is more often now called in the media, Covid-19--which surely has a more catastrophic elan consistent with the terrorization that has been round the clock (what else?) media coverage.

Those who believe this particular virus warrants the shutdown of every aspect of American life (and global) life are legion. It is practically worth the life everyone says they want to save to suggest that maybe, just maybe, there is something untoward, to put it mildly, about the ruinous existence ending measures being impressed and imposed with nary a concern about the long term consequences let alone those freedoms that once defined the nation. The health of others is definitely an interest to be balanced against freedom. But what, no one seems able to explain, is different about this virus than about any number of illnesses and natural and unnatural conditions to which we human beings--who always die no matter what safeguards are proposed or implemented? Speak about numbers, in any commonsensical terms, and "experts" are invoked, who quite frankly, themselves don't agree on anything with all that expertise.

I entered a search term while I was sitting on my terrace, "The Cure is Worse than the Disease." Among the articles that came up was this one.

OPINION

Finley: The coronavirus cure is worse than the disease

Nolan Finley, The Detroit NewsPublished 4:30 p.m. ET March 22, 2020 | 

I guess I'm with him. What kind of life will we go back to, after one month, two months, or that nine months some of those "experts" are predicting? One that has put more people on the streets? One that gave up freedom of assembly and pretty much all freedom of movement with nary an objection or consultation of the citizenry?

Although my pastor made a valiant effort to keep our parish open, while abiding by the distancing rules, and the suspension of public Mass, the number of reported "cases" of the virus in my area, as of yesterday, reported with breathless urgency, required that he give up the ghost and lock the Church doors. No Mass. No Communion. No praying inside the Church, each individual assuming the risk of living in a world where one could die. Where one will surely die. I would have thought that it would be harder to separate the faithful from their practice. It turns out it is even easier than in the days of Henry VIII.

Will we be Venezuela fully and finally? But there's nothing wrong with that. Right?

Sleepless in Los Angeles during the 2020 Pandemic

It's just after two in the morning. I tried to put myself to sleep with a sentimental favorite Amazon Prime playlist, with some 20 plus songs each of which evokes some moment in time of my life. Didn't work.

I suppose it is true of anyone who has lived that he or she might say, "I've seen a lot in my time on the earth". I mean, after all, isn't that a bit of the sense you get when you hear Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire"?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFTLKWw542g

If I remember that song, well, I have lived through pretty much all of what is in it. I was a young child when Sputnik prodded America to make the moon its goal. I was just about as young when we were doing nuclear war drills by burying our heads under our hands under skeletal desks and wooden lockers precariously affixed to walls. I was several years a pre-teen when John Kennedy was assassinated, then his murderer, Lee Harvey Oswald. I was still a pre-teen when New York had its 1965 blackout. I was just a teenager when Martin Luther King was assassinated, and Bobby Kennedy followed. All through the sixties was the fall out of the Vietnam War, and the opened window that threw the baby out with the Catholic faith the tenets of which once true, became ever so . . .flexible.
On and on it has gone through the decades, Watergate, the destruction of the World Trade Center, Iraq, Afghanistan, the recent four years of bitter partisanship, sex, emolument clause, 25th Amendment, Mueller, Impeachment. . . .

And now, this, whatever it is that has made this and every other city look like one or more episodes of the Twilight Zone. As I lay in bed I noticed something you don't get in a big city, certainly not a block off the Sunset Strip on a Saturday--dead silence. I usually get a little bit of headlights visible as a car passes even through my shades. But tonight in my tossing and turning, I notice none. That sound of silence you might only hear in a country bed and breakfast, there it is, here in Weho, California.
Extraordinary. It would be wonderful if it were not all so. . . .creepy.

I slipped on a sweatshirt because it is in the fifties tonight, and stepped just outside my condo apartment building door. I was there for something like ten minutes. Not a car came down my block. Only two people, young, moving pretty quickly as if they wanted to get home fast. "It's too quiet" I imagined them saying to one another. Some rustling in the palm trees from a slight breeze. And yes, the odd fire engine or police car siren.  As I write, having come back inside, I hear another siren breaking the otherwise dead silence.

It isn't the meditative kind of silence, alas. One tries to treat it that way, in my case, with reading, and prayer. Or break it with a few episodes of Inspector Morse. Something about the Oxford scenery is comforting, particularly if you had the pleasure of having visited there once.

My cats don't notice anything. Good for them. There is something to be said for limits to sentience.
Not sure if this is what war on one's own soil feels like--but whatever it is and whoever is causing it--for I do not believe that this is merely the result of 27,000 cases of a virus and 348 deaths (US) as troubling as is the omnipresence of death by an endless number of means and at astounding rates. (My internet stats say 151,600 deaths a day world wide, 6,316 an hour, 105 a minute, 2 a second).
Laugh though you might at my saying it, there is something darker here, and it is humanly caused by people we may know in power, and those we do not know. And since Transcendent principles are either not agreed upon or dismissed, there is nothing to keep the worst from happening.

Religious people refer to a chastisement. I guess I am one of those religious people, but I can tell you I'd rather not be in the middle of a chastisement as it seems I might well be. I very much want to meet God (hoping that he has not too much critique--good luck to me) but not as He comes upon a fiery cloud that breaks a silence like this one.

Ok, it's nearly three in the morning. I am waxing dramatic.

I am going to try to sleep, which probably means I won't sleep until I just wear myself out with thoughts of past, present, and the questionable future.

I have managed to stay away from reviewing Facebook for Lent--which methinks is pretty good considering I am looking for distractions from anxious thoughts--but I have posted these entries as I will post this one.

Lent doesn't seem like it's going to end in any kind of Easter celebration this year, at least in a Church. That's pretty disheartening. On the other hand, the actual Resurrection already took place 2000 plus years ago and He provides the Light of Hope, if only I don't allow myself to be blinded by yet another crisis in human history to which we are witness.

Coronavirus Cavalcade of Thoughts

My late father, who died at the age of 90, and thus had seen human beings at their worst, often said to me and to my baby boom friends, "What this society needs is a good depression."  I was just awakening from a not usual for me afternoon nap today when this parental pronouncement came unbidden to my foggy brain. Dad also added that he wouldn't likely be here when this happened for him, a second time. I just expected, well, hoped, that I wouldn't be here when it happened either. But  Bill Maher, that paragon of progressive virtue is apparently happy now that the frenzied governmental action in closing nearly everything a society needs to thrive has upended the lives of its people. The non-celebrity people I know, and one of which I am, are looking at having their life savings eradicated by the cure that is worse than the disease.

I still don't get it, but I know I am lousy at math, and I just don't get nearly and probably martial law where fewer people are being fatally affected than with a yearly flu. Any reason that people die is sad, warrants our compassion. But there is this odd aspect of things in the over the top handling of this denominated pandemic that seems to have the implicit idea that if the whole world is put on lock down, no one will die anymore. Which brings the line from Moonstruck to my mind, spoken by the character played by Olympia Dukakis:  "I just want you to know no matter what you do, you're gonna die, just like everybody else."  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBWxqcvH7Dk

So, when do we open up again for business as a free society? If more people die, will everything stay on hold until other people's lives, literally and figuratively, are ended? Or are we waiting for no one to die? That, of course, is impossible. And now, when we have our yearly flu, that at one stat in 2017 killed 80,000 people in the United States, will we have an annual "Safer at Home" mandate closing down everything again?

I find myself filled frankly with a multitude of conspiracy theories about what is happening. And here's the thing, I no longer think that any of them are remotely crazy. I am terrified at how easy it is to give up freedoms, well, not give up, find oneself shamed into accepting what is not necessarily logical for fear of being labelled an outlier, a person who does not fall into line with the unproven but firmly expressed positions of those who decline any debate. 

I had a really dark thought pop up these last weeks. It is not worth living this way. I wonder whether the powers that be realize the oppression of minds, body and souls for which they are arguably responsible. 

One other thought, not sure if it is positive or not. . . .about the newest concept "social distancing". I have always been one of those people not big on hugging, and other physical greeting. Over the years if someone approached me, I responded in awkward kind. But now we are mandated to keep six feet or so between us.  I wouldn't mind keeping some version of that reactivated constraint on social interaction. I wouldn't mind staying with a courteous bow and smile once we go back to whatever in this world passes for normal. 

Suspend Public Masses, The Devil Does a Dance of Delight

The thing about this so called "advanced" society is that its fear is just as primal and destructive as it was for the poor sods of say, the 14th Century. In some ways, it seems that we progressive moderns are weaker and more foolish than our progenitors, the ones we look at askance as having lacked our enlightened perspectives on science and morality.

I am not a coronavirus "denier". Sickness and death, (as I noted in a prior entry) are very real. I applaud the idea that visits are limited by family and friends at nursing homes where the average age is probably around 80 or 85. I am very much involved with a woman at one such home who is 96. If you are sick, you shouldn't go out. Common sense.

But this frenzy which reminds me more of "Lord of the Flies" (we haven't gotten quite that bad yet, but there is time) than Charles Borromeo taking food to plague victims despite the risk to himself (and I realize that the old common sense, civility and charity probably require something in between), is becoming beyond the pale.

Oh, and soul destroying. . . .

What do our Catholic Clerics do? They begin to suspend Masses around the world. One priest in Italy who went ahead with a Mass is being sanctioned by authorities.

We cannot, you say, have people gathering in a public place during this crisis. But which, I ask you (and I gather that it is a 50 50 proposition) is the more damning of body and soul? For me, it is telling the People of God that they cannot do the one thing that is Central to their Faith, the one thing that will keep them grounded. It is always the case that if a person is sick, they are relieved of the obligation to Sunday Mass. To make some kind of pronouncement, "You don't have to go to Sunday Mass for Three Weeks" is not only redundant but another way of making inroads into the destruction of the already tenuous practice of Catholicism by its followers.

To my reading on the internet, there has NEVER been such a suspension of public Masses in the history of the Church. And whether there has been, or not, I can see nothing that the Devil is enjoying more than that people of faith are not at Mass and present for the Eucharistic miracle.

I was amused (in a paradoxically sad way) that all sorts of public fora are being closed for fear of numbers and contagion, but that at my local Ralph's there were hundreds or more of us gathering provisions of frozen pizza and as one of my friends noted, Ramen. Why aren't they closing these places, well, so far. Because people need the food and provisions therein.

We need the provision for our spiritual selves, perhaps even more than anything else.

There is nothing I can do except hope that my parish doesn't close for business. So far, it hasn't.

And the only thing I can think of, if the closings (and when will they end; when will we all be safe from disease and death?) persist is that there be an increase, if that is possible, of the private Masses, the sine populo.  Maybe every priest in the world can say the Mass at the same time, whatever the time of day in whatever part of the world. And stop the Devil in his dance before it's too late.

I have not been looking at Facebook because of a small Lenten discipline (best I can do alas), but I have decided to post this entry. Pray for the sick. Pray for the dying. Pray for faith. Pray that we do not give the devil his due.

Coronaviral Media

There is, as Dylan once said, "something happening here", but I am thinking what it is is decidedly clear. 

There is certainly a thing called the Coronavirus. And that thing, that disease, is certainly killing people. Not so parenthetically, there is a lot to be investigated (though they will never allow it) about how it all percolated in China. 

But to me, the real virus is the media, official and social, that has whipped up the frenzy that has people raiding Costcos, Targets and the 99 Cents Stores, and caused the very much hoped for (by our progressive wing) destabilization of the stock market and the retirement portfolios of lots of senior Americans. Children have been terrorized, not to mention the average hypochondriac. You would think that but for this outbreak, death wouldn't be a fact of life in the world, something that no one escapes sooner, or later. 

Here are a few things from the web, from places like the CDC and the World Health Organization.

Let us begin with the Swine Flu of 2009-2010: 

In the spring of 2009, a novel influenza A (H1N1) virus emerged. It was detected first in the United States and spread quickly across the United States and the world. This new H1N1 virus contained a unique combination of influenza genes not previously identified in animals or people. This virus was designated as influenza A (H1N1)pdm09 virus. Ten years later work continues to better understand influenza, prevent disease, and prepare for the next pandemic.

Summary of Progress since 2009

Ten Years of Gains: A Look Back at Progress Since the 2009 H1N1 Pandemic

The 2009 H1N1 Pandemic: A New Flu Virus Emerges

The (H1N1)pdm09 virus was very different from H1N1 viruses that were circulating at the time of the pandemic. Few young people had any existing immunity (as detected by antibody response) to the (H1N1)pdm09 virus, but nearly one-third of people over 60 years old had antibodies against this virus, likely from exposure to an older H1N1 virus earlier in their lives. Since the (H1N1)pdm09 virus was very different from circulating H1N1 viruses, vaccination with seasonal flu vaccines offered little cross-protection against (H1N1)pdm09 virus infection. While a monovalent (H1N1)pdm09 vaccine was produced, it was not available in large quantities until late November—after the peak of illness during the second wave had come and gone in the United States. From April 12, 2009 to April 10, 2010, CDC estimated there were 60.8 million cases (range: 43.3-89.3 million), 274,304 hospitalizations (range: 195,086-402,719), and 12,469 deaths (range: 8868-18,306) in the United States due to the (H1N1)pdm09 virus.

Disease Burden of the H1N1pdm09 Flu Virus, 2009-2018

Since the 2009 H1N1 pandemic, the (H1N1)pdm09 flu virus has circulated seasonally in the U.S. causing significant illnesses, hospitalizations, and deaths.

More

Additionally, CDC estimated that 151,700-575,400 people worldwide died from (H1N1)pdm09 virus infection during the first year the virus circulated.** Globally, 80 percent of (H1N1)pdm09 virus-related deaths were estimated to have occurred in people younger than 65 years of age. This differs greatly from typical seasonal influenza epidemics, during which about 70 percent to 90 percent of deaths are estimated to occur in people 65 years and older.

Though the 2009 flu pandemic primarily affected children and young and middle-aged adults, the impact of the (H1N1)pdm09 virus on the global population during the first year was less severe than that of previous pandemics. Estimates of pandemic influenza mortality ranged from 0.03 percent of the world’s population during the 1968 H3N2 pandemic to 1 percent to 3 percent of the world’s population during the 1918 H1N1 pandemic. It is estimated that 0.001 percent to 0.007 percent of the world’s population died of respiratory complications associated with (H1N1)pdm09 virus infection during the first 12 months the virus circulated.

The United States mounted a complex, multi-faceted and long-term response to the pandemic, summarized in The 2009 H1N1 Pandemic: Summary Highlights, April 2009-April 2010. On August 10, 2010, WHO declared an end to the global 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic. However, (H1N1)pdm09 virus continues to circulate as a seasonal flu virus, and cause illness, hospitalization, and deaths worldwide every year.

Here's one about the seasonal flu:

Seasonal flu death estimate increases worldwide

Press Release

Embargoed Until: Wednesday, December 13, 2017, 6:30 p.m. ET
Contact: Media Relations
(404) 639-3286

According to new estimates published today, between 291,000 and 646,000 people worldwide die from seasonal influenza-related respiratory illnesses each year, higher than a previous estimate of 250,000 to 500,000 and based on a robust, multinational survey.

The new estimate, from a collaborative study by CDC and global health partners, appears today in The Lancet. The estimate excludes deaths during pandemics.

“These findings remind us of the seriousness of flu and that flu prevention should really be a global priority,” says Joe Bresee, M.D., associate director for global health in CDC’s Influenza Division and a study co-author.

The new estimates use more recent data, taken from a larger and more diverse group of countries than previous estimates. Forty-seven countries contributed to this effort. Researchers calculated annual seasonal influenza-associated respiratory deaths for 33 of those countries (57 percent of the world’s population) that had death records and seasonal influenza surveillance information for a minimum of four years between 1999 and 2015. Statistical modeling with those results was used to generate an estimate of the number of flu-associated respiratory deaths for 185 countries across the world. Data from the other 14 countries were used to validate the estimates of seasonal influenza-associated respiratory death from the statistical models.

Poorest nations, older adults hit hardest by flu

Researchers calculated region-specific estimates and age-specific mortality estimates for people younger than 65 years, people 65-74 years, and people 75 years and older. The greatest flu mortality burden was seen in the world’s poorest regions and among older adults. People age 75 years and older and people living in sub-Saharan African countries experienced the highest rates of flu-associated respiratory deaths. Eastern Mediterranean and Southeast Asian countries had slightly lower but still high rates of flu-associated respiratory deaths.

Despite World Health Organization recommendations to use flu vaccinationexternal icon to help protect people in high-risk populations, few developing countries have seasonal flu vaccination programs or the capacity to produce and distribute seasonal or pandemic vaccines.

Global flu surveillance protects all nations, including U.S.

CDC works with global partners to improve worldwide capacity for influenza prevention and control. CDC has helped more than 60 countries build surveillance and laboratory capacity to rapidly detect and respond to influenza threats, including viruses with the potential to cause global pandemics.  These efforts, along with technical support, has helped some partners generate estimates of influenza-associated deaths, which contributed to this global effort.

Global surveillance also provides the foundation for selecting the viruses used to make seasonal flu vaccines each year. This helps improve the effectiveness of flu vaccines used in the United States. Global surveillance also is crucial to pandemic preparedness by identifying viruses overseas that might pose a human health risk to people in the United States.

“This work adds to a growing global understanding of the burden of influenza and populations at highest risk,” says CDC researcher Danielle Iuliano, lead author of The Lancet study. “It builds the evidence base for influenza vaccination programs in other countries.”

The study authors note that these new estimates are limited to flu-associated respiratory deaths and therefore may underestimate the true global impact of seasonal influenza. Influenza infection can create or exacerbate other health factors which are then listed as the cause of death on death certificates, for example cardiovascular disease, diabetes, or related complications. Additional research to estimate non-respiratory causes of flu-associated deaths are ongoing.

###
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICESexternal icon

How about car deaths a year worldwide, from the World Health Organization. This goes back a few years, so we can assume it is more now. 

• Nearly 1.25 million people die in road crashes each year, on average 3,287 deaths a day.
• An additional 20-50 million are injured or disabled.
• More than half of all road traffic deaths occur among young adults ages 15-44.
• Road traffic crashes rank as the 9th leading cause of death and account for 2.2% of all deaths globally.
• Road crashes are the leading cause of death among young people ages 15-29, and the second leading cause of death worldwide among young people ages 5-14.
• Each year nearly 400,000 people under 25 die on the world’s roads, on average over 1,000 a day.
• Over 90% of all road fatalities occur in low and middle-income countries, which have less than half of the world’s vehicles.
• Road crashes cost USD $518 billion globally, costing individual countries from 1-2% of their annual GDP.
• Road crashes cost low and middle-income countries USD $65 billion annually, exceeding the total amount received in developmental assistance.
• Unless action is taken, road traffic injuries are predicted to become the fifth leading cause of death by 2030.

Another from the World Health Organization about drownings a year.

In 2016, an estimated 320 000 people died from drowning, making drowning a major public health problem worldwide. In 2015, injuries accounted for over 9% of total global mortality. Drowning is the 3rd leading cause of unintentional injury death, accounting for 7% of all injury-related deaths.

And the coronoavirus as of today:

Coronavirus Cases:

134,670

view by country

Deaths:

4,973

Recovered:

69,142

Why is this happening? Why is the press in the United States, in particular, so set on scaring the beejezus out of every man, woman and child? It is one thing to report the reality of the outbreak. Fine. But to orchestrate emotional, psychological, economic and national damage in the name of freedom of the press is pure evil particularly in light of the fact that this event is no better nor worse than the many things to which fragile human existence is heir. 

I can imagine how many purported witches would have been burned at the stake had today's media been in charge of the reporting in those dark days. Or who would have been blamed for the bubonic plague in the 14th century? I wonder if they had their version of Donald Trump?

You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it's an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.

Rahm Emanuel

Like, maybe, destroy a whole civilization. Oh, we have done that before.

History will record, if we survive history, that the American Media was one of the key reasons for the end of the United States. My father used to say, "Thank God I won't be alive to see it."  I understand now where he was coming from.