2020. 2021. Now 2022. Three years of Covid. Three years because we are being held hostage by people who won't do the bare minimum to try and reduce the spread of this pestilence.
It started when Donald Trump downplayed the disease and its spread. He admits on tape to downplaying it. Cult members won't care, besides they're mad at him because he made complimentary comments about the Covid vaccine and admitted to having gotten the booster. It's that mentality that keeps us mired in this pandemic.
We are being held hostage by two forces: greed and anti-intellectual, right-wing ideology.
More of the world needs to be vaccinated. That's just not happening. Wealthy nations are buying millions of doses for their citizens, while most of the countries in Africa are well below 40 percent vaccinated. Pfizer, BioNTech, and Moderna are making a combined $65,000/minute in profit. They'll continue to make big money as they will need to continue to tinker with the Covid vaccine to address emergent strains of the virus.What needs to happen is for these companies to release their patents and let other manufacturers produce the vaccine and increase the global supply. Luckily, it looks like there is a new vaccine recently approved that could be made more quickly, less expensively, and without the patent restrictions.
The other force holding us hostage are the self-proclaimed "patriots" who refuse to wear masks or get the vaccine. There are far too many of them. They possess a stupid amount of guns. Finally, they've demonstrated over and over that they will scream and pout and plot to kidnap and execute Gretchen Whitmer, governor of Michigan. Only eight states have a broad mask mandate. Eight. That is not enough. This is why the country is in the midst of yet another surge.
Maybe it ends soon. Maybe not. We've handled this whole mess poorly and my expectations are low.
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