Some of us in the coming weeks will experience something not unlike Neil Armstrong’s “one small step for man …” moment. We will decide to test the unknown. Not all of us will be that apprehensive because we suspect that this new virus entered California last December. I know I had the flu between Christmas and New Year’s, and as I ask around, many other people reported the same flu affecting the whole family—children and adults. This will be an important issue to investigate in the aftermath of this unprecedented event, because some are saying this lockdown and panic will be the “new normal.” I really despise that resignation. What was the “new normal” after the 1918 Spanish flu or the avian flu or the swine flu?
This new virus was treated differently because we knew nothing about it at all. To err on the side of caution is prudent. We have the technology to handle the unknown more swiftly than any previous generation. To resign to a “new normal” means we should shut down the economy every flu season.
Influenza is an annual event for which we wisely get a flu shot and do not cough and sneeze on other people, and it’s best not to visit people in frail health.
God help us if we decide to cower in fear of the unknown. It hasn’t been our nature for as long as recorded history, even as the naysayers said the world is flat. May I include a big fat zero appreciation to those who stirred up panic for political reasons.
Jan Lipski
Vandenberg Village
This article appears in Apr 30 – May 7, 2020.