Without vaccinations, Dr. Day said, the hospitalization rate would be much worse.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re concerned right now that we\u2019re on the rise of a surge here in San Francisco and the Bay Area,\u201d Dr. Day said. \u201cBut what we\u2019re seeing is very much what the data from the vaccines showed us: You can still get Covid, potentially. But if you do get it, it\u2019s not severe at all.\u201d\u2026<\/p>\n
Staff members at both hospitals have continued to wear personal protective equipment, Dr. Day said. But the number of staff infections reported in July is about as many as during the peak of the winter surge.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
It\u2019s like a science fiction story where the earth has been invaded by aliens, who can be contained but cannot be dislodged. This life form (the authorities think) comes from some Species X or Missing Link and nobody knows for sure what it will do next. \u201cThe virus becoming endemic is likely, but the pattern that it will take is hard to predict,\u201d\u00a0says Angela Rasmussen<\/a>, a virologist from Georgetown University. Among the scenarios now envisioned are:<\/p>\n
\n
- Some regions might become temporarily virus-free but remain at risk from reinfection;<\/li>\n
- The virus will never go away, but constant vaccination and restriction will prevent widespread hospitalization;<\/li>\n
- Humanity will be able to eventually reduce the menace to the impotence of the common cold.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
This shift in tone is a significant one because it sets the stage for an indefinite period of vigilance. Gone are the categorical expectations of quick triumph. In its place is a protracted total war where the key word is \u201cmandatory.\u201d<\/p>\n
The headlines are full of the word:<\/p>\n
\n
- \u201cFactbox: Countries make COVID-19 vaccines mandatory\u201d<\/li>\n
- \u201cCheck In app now mandatory if you want to enter thousands of businesses\u201d<\/li>\n
- \u201cCompulsory vaccinations for care home staff in England backed by MPs\u201d<\/li>\n
- \u201cCovid vaccine certificates to be compulsory for crowded venues in England\u201d<\/li>\n
- \u201cAnti-Covid masks now mandatory outdoors in 30 French departments\u201d<\/li>\n
- \u201cGermany Imposes Mandatory COVID-19 Testing Requirement for Unvaccinated People\u201d<\/li>\n
- \u201cNew York City and California to Require Vaccines or Tests for Workers\u201d<\/li>\n
- \u201cBiden Orders Military to Move Toward Mandatory COVID Vaccine.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
Mandatory, compulsory, required and we might break even, cross our hearts and hope to die. But the problem with \u201cmandatory\u201d is that nobody can say how long it will take to work or, honestly, whether it will work at all. There is \u201cNo end in sight for COVID \u2018Phase A\u2019 on Australia\u2019s path out of lockdowns,\u201d writes\u00a0ABC news<\/a>. The sad truth is that many world leaders didn\u2019t even know they would need a Plan B in the confident early days of fact-checkers. But we are now in a game dominated, not by the original coronavirus and the world of 2019, but by a\u00a0new situation<\/a>\u00a0shaped by the public policy response since then.<\/p>\n
\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nSecond Order Effect refers to the idea that every action has a consequence, and each consequence has a subsequent consequence. In other words, this means that a single decision can initiate a series of cause-and-effects, something which we might not have knowledge or control of. Therefore, it can be very difficult for us to predict possible implications of the original decision (unless we are somehow blessed with an all-seeing crystal ball).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
We now live in the second-order world. \u201cGet Ready for a Spike in Global Unrest,\u201d writes\u00a0Foreign Policy<\/a>. What was supposed to be the summer of recovery has become the season of disaster.<\/p>\n
To call 2021 the summer of discontent would be a severe understatement. From Cuba to South Africa to Columbia to Haiti, often violent protests are sweeping every corner of the globe as angry citizens are taking to the streets.<\/p>\n
Each country has different histories and realities on the ground \u2026 butd they all faced a perfect storm of preexisting social, economic and political hardships which fallout from the Covid-19 pandemic only inflamed farther.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Though the problem is worst in the Third World, even European and North American countries face the same dilemma: how to fight this now-endemic disease without running out of economic energy that at some stage will mean stall, crash and burn \u2014 unless \u201cmandatory\u201d works before then.<\/p>\n
The longer it takes for \u201cmandatory\u201d to work, if ever it does, the more political shibboleths will become unaffordable. At some point, fossil fuel taxes will become insupportable. Further on, perhaps \u201copen borders\u201d must go. Further still, even public-sector unions and academia will feel the pinch. Yet if history is any guide, ideologues will cling to their obsessions even at the cost of survival. \u201cMandatory\u201d may give a false impression of light at the end of the tunnel when, as\u00a0Slate<\/a> writes, that is just a \u201cnoble lie.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0When experts or agencies deliver information to the public that they consider possibly or definitively false to further a larger, often well-meaning agenda, they are telling what is called a noble lie. \u2026<\/p>\n
Later in 2020, Fauci participated in a second noble lie. In December, he explained in a phone interview with then\u2013New York Times reporter Donald McNeil that he had been moving the target estimate for herd immunity based in part on emerging studies. \u2026<\/p>\n
In his own words, he \u201cnudged\u201d his target range for herd immunity to promote vaccine uptake. Even though his comments were made to influence public actions to get more people vaccinated (a noble effort), the central dilemma remains: Do we want public health officials to report facts and uncertainties transparently? Or do we want them to shape information, via nudges, to influence the public to take specific actions? \u2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
The epidemic of \u201cmandatory\u201d suggests that rather than becoming more flexible and adaptive before an endemic disease, the experts are hanging on to the mantle of certitude. Slate sadly concludes: \u201cNoble lies are a trap. We cannot predict the public\u2019s behavior, and loss of trust is devastating. The general population is far too skeptical to blindly follow the advice of experts, and far too intelligent to be easily duped.\u201d True. And that loss of trust is how we arrived at mandatory.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/08\/b419f7e3-5e33-4905-b1ac-8a23ce31efef-860x475-1.jpg\")
AP Photo\/Damian Dovarganes<\/p><\/div><\/p>\n