Enlight21

Author: Gladwyn d'Souza | Category: Business | Date: 02-09-2021

The newspaper says stay at home. That’s easy. I’m practiced; since mid March of last year. Say hello, the British variant has arrived. Another story: Business people are protesting closed restaurants and hair dressers. What’s wrong with these people I say. My wife looks up from her paper. Nothing, I say, I’m talking to the paper. Business didn't have masks or PPE but can deploy thousands of nuclear weapons, on the public dime. So much so that Unstable-45 with the nuclear football was a global concern in the pandemic. In viral land the kleptocratic government has given employees a choice between starvation and death. The bribers, sanctified by Citizens United, are demonstrating against safety restrictions! And clamoring for liability waivers, which Republicans have dutifully written into pending legislation. Way to go Congress.

I turn the page. There’s a food drive and the photo shows cars snaking around the parking lot. Civil society provides alternate food distribution staffed by volunteers. Earlier they had distributed home made masks. I got two from my sister who had volunteered to make them for her city hospital. My neighbor dropped off six from a set she volunteered to make for senior centers. The masks are going to be useful when fire season comes back, what with N95s still in short supply. I need to go for a walk.

The next day the newspaper reads like a tourist invasion. There’s a South African and Brazilian variant and they are fighting over who is more infectious. We knew from March last year that airlines were a problem. Instead Congress bailed them out in the Cares Act! Seven months and $60B later the flying wizards have figured out how to defeat the vaccine. Without universal health cares or contact tracing and a robust vaccination program there is no way to stop the variants from consuming the next five years. We are going to give billions to monopoly drug companies to made vaccine booster shots! My wife looks up. Nothing I say I’m talking to the paper. At least we have billions to flush down the viral toilet. While I have to stay home to avoid getting my passport stamped. Way to go Congress.

I turn the page. Once forgotten technologies have scaled unimagined heights. Zoom is the default platform for business and families. States are looking to expand broadband access. Senator Gonzales wants to bring a $1B into upgrading the broadband infrastructure equitably. Commute patterns are changing. BART parking permits have gone from a backlog of 25,000 to a surplus. Cities are rethinking neighborhoods, delivery, and public space with parklets, work/play zones, and slow streets. Bars and restaurants and parks and trails are more important to public life. Wonder of wonder people have rediscovered walking; and bicycles are expected to be sold out through 2021. I need to go for a ride.

The next day the paper says there is a variant in every state! It’s not the blue variant or the red variant it’s the all-American stately variant. UCSF says at some point the variants over power the vaccine and you start all over again. The drug companies say they are expanding like crazy; and their stock prices reflect it. There have been over 8000 covid cases in East Palo Alto and less than 1500 in Palo Alto but San Mateo won’t release death numbers by city. Stay home during the Super Bowl the paper says. An in-home family party; whatever that means. As if the pandemic wasn’t enough wildfire smoke carries pathogens which can be inhaled causing unknown diseases said a UC Davis researcher. Way to go Congress, I’m eyewitness to a train wreck.

The news drones on. We’ll reach half a million deaths in March. But only one in eight will be vaccinated by May. California is having trouble distributing the vaccine. We’ve become too efficient- we have the lowest nurse to patient ratio in the country. The more private the hospital the less able it is to vaccinate. Enter volunteers, who hospitals are busy recruiting. You got to be kidding me. My wife looks up. Nothing I say I’m talking to the paper. Volunteers have figured out how to stretch the dose so that instead of vaccinating four they can do five. Pfizer says they will charge 20% more retroactively. Wow, I better go work in the garden.

Today New Zealand says they will not reopen until everyone is vaccinated. Western Australia has gone into a three week total lockdown because one person was discovered with the virus. Surely someone can see the link between stopping the virus and a healthy economy, right? Teachers unions say they will strike if they are forced to go back to work. That’s why every job should be a union job I say. My wife looks up. Nothing I say I’m talking to the paper. Stacey Abrams in Georgia has literally saved democracy with non profit volunteers from Fair Fight. She’s one of the candidates for the Nobel Peace Prize the paper says. I better go read her book before Congress puts it in quarantine. Between volunteers, zoom, and the extra masks I can double mask. But leaving home in 2021 is a different proposition.

About: Gladwyn d'Souza