| From August, 2020. Let’s see how his predictions match up to developing reality, dear Reader. |
[Rolling Stone] Never in our lives have we experienced such a global phenomenon. For the first time in the history of the world, all of humanity, informed by the unprecedented reach of digital technology, has come together, focused on the same existential threat, consumed by the same fears and uncertainties, eagerly anticipating the same, as yet unrealized, promises of medical science.
In a single season, civilization has been brought low by a microscopic parasite 10,000 times smaller than a grain of salt. COVID-19 attacks our physical bodies, but also the cultural foundations of our lives, the toolbox of community and connectivity that is for the human what claws and teeth represent to the tiger.
Our interventions to date have largely focused on mitigating the rate of spread, flattening the curve of morbidity. There is no treatment at hand,
| ...there are actually lots of treatments on hand, an ever expanding list of previously approved treatments for other diseases, some a century or more old. The key is to use them together with several other things, each addressing one or another aspect of the disease process — and whatever you do, don’t sleep on your back! |
and no certainty of a vaccine on the near horizon.
| Over two million people around the world have received their first jab already, and the pace is accelerating as more manufacturers come into the final stretch toward approval around the world. |
The fastest vaccine ever developed was for mumps. It took four years. COVID-19 killed 100,000 Americans in four months. There is some evidence that natural infection may not imply immunity,
| ...and there is now other evidence that the natural infection conveys immunity between six months and many years. The question then becomes how well the various vaccines convey immunity to mutations of the disease, which appears to mutate about as easily as the influenza virus, for which a new vaccine is available annually... |
leaving some to question how effective a vaccine will be, even assuming one can be found. And it must be safe. If the global population is to be immunized, lethal complications in just one person in a thousand would imply the death of millions.
| Thus far they’ve only seen the occasional case of non-lethal anaphylactic shock, easily treated with a shot of epinephrine. We’ll need to wait a year to see if it causes more lasting damage. |
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