This is a response to those who imply the virus killing 90,000 is not a big deal because it effects only 2.5 percent of the American population.
When 9/11 happened we mourned the deaths of 3000 Americans. We held vigils and memorial services for weeks after. When a jet crashes and several hundred are killed it is a big deal. To say that 90,000 deaths is only a small minuscule of the American population is to insult and demean the grieving mother of a dead child, or the grieving wife of the dead husband. That dead child or that dead husband is of more value than some number or statistic.
90,000 dead! A child’s giggling is lost, gone forever. The love of a caring husband will be felt no more. Children of deceased father or mother will mourn for years taking little comfort in the statistic that it was only 2.5 percent of Americans.
How cold! How heartless! Ice must run in the veins of you who cite meaningless numbers. Where in God’s name did your sense of decency go? Have you at long last no sense of decency?
No doubt about it, Coronavirus is very serious and has already killed, in the United States more than the Vietnam and Korean wars, combined, and some other notable statistics that I saw recently. No death is decent. Brash talk about death may be indecent. But I recall President Obama not long ago stating that the United States, "Could absorb another 9/11," by our resilience, regardless of the circumstance. Much greater peril lays ahead. Perhaps we will survive those obstacles as well.
No one is quoting statistics of death caused by unemployment and a depressed economy. In our city, the police chief has told us that crime has increased. Nearly half of the inmates in the county jail were freed to avoid possible death in close quarters. There are more calls for household disturbances. Those with marginal illnesses may be dying from lack of the proper food or healthcare.
I know you are mocking right wing claims by using the word, "decency," but I believe that hard statistics and comparisons, can help us understand the enormity of it all.
Ron