From my clutter to your screen: coronavirus oddments

If you haven't seen this, you have to (unless perhaps you are easily upset by "bad" language). If you've seen it before, play it again. It might cheer you up.

An article in STAT, a credible medical news publication, points to a COVID-19 Self Triage Tool, developed out of USC. It's a website that helps you evaluate whether that tickle in the back of your throat is a serious symptom or not. Of course, unless you are seriously ill there is nothing medicine can do for you, but still, for most of us this can be reassuring.

Economist Dean Baker has been beating the drum for years, insisting that drug companies shouldn't win exclusive rights to new drugs -- instead the government should incentivize innovation with one time cash prizes to the inventors. He argues it is time to take the patent-seeking motivation out of efforts to develop a vaccine.

The situation we see today is that many top-notch researchers, in Germany, China, the U.S., and elsewhere, are racing to develop a vaccine that can enter the testing process. The problem with this picture is that they are working in competition, not collaboration. This means that they are not widely sharing information with each other, since they don’t want to give their competitors an edge.

... Each team of researchers hopes to be able to gain a patent on an effective vaccine. This could in principle lead to an enormous payoff, as they will have a monopoly on a vaccine that protects people from a potentially deadly disease. But these are not ordinary days. The coronavirus pandemic cries out for an alternative approach. Instead of competing, these teams of researchers could be working in cooperation with each other, sharing new findings quickly and fully.  

When a successful vaccine is developed, it can be placed in the public domain, which means that it can be sold as a cheap generic from the first day it is approved by the Food and Drug Administration. This would mean that we don’t have to worry about begging a drug company to make its vaccine available at an affordable price. Drugs are almost always cheap to manufacture and distribute. If there were no patent monopoly, drug companies would not be able to charge high prices.

... Rather than giving out patent monopolies so that they may recover additional private expenditures, it would make far more sense just to have the government pick up the rest of the tab for the research and testing so that the companies would have no research costs to recover. This would be the best route to ensure the quick development of an affordable vaccine. 

Baker is completely convincing; the drug monopolies are incredibly powerful. But they shouldn't have the power to condemn people to death for profit.

Juan Cole points out:

Why Burning Fossil Fuels is to Today’s Pandemics as Fleas were to the Black Death
... There is an exact analogy between Trump’s treatment of Covid-19 and his treatment of the climate emergency. In both cases, he and his surrogates attacked the science and took pride in giving the finger to reality. Trump actually promotes coal and petroleum, the dirtiest fossil fuels, as though he is impatient to see the lower floors of his Trump Tower in Manhattan under water. Likewise, he takes pride in holding infectious rallies and shaking hands. ...

Everything comes down to our coal burning.

My favorite writer on training for long distance running, David Roche, responded to the anxiety his coached athletes were showing.

Psychologists say that anxiety is partially related to our brain’s desire to map structure onto an uncertain world. Well, right now we have lots of uncertainty and the removal of lots of structure. It’s an immensely hard and strange time. Some people feel overwhelmed, scared, or sad. Some people become problem-solvers, which in this uncertain moment could manifest as some interesting social-media posts. Some launch into fear, denial, anger. For others it’s like a snow day, full of adventure. All of this is mapped onto a world where economic disparity and privilege is inextricable from actions and options.

Through it all, the beauty of the human spirit shined. People are thinking about social good and collective action in a way that is unique to crisis. And it’s on full display in the athletic community. But throw that beauty of the human spirit in with the fragility of the human body, the uncertainty, the political situation and the economic downturn, and it can get overwhelmed by the bitter tastes, particularly if you’re looking at TV news or Twitter. 

Fast forward to now. We are in a world of uncertainty, and probably will be for a bit. I coach psychologists who are scared and sad. I coach hourly workers who are laughing. Our responses to the crisis are as unpredictable as the pandemic itself.
In that swirl of uncertainty, just try as hard as you can to cut yourself slack. ...

Good advice.

Just one more thought. Maybe we should listen to a nun.

People say they want peace and quiet. Then when it is thrown in their lap, they panic. They don’t know how to be alone. They are afraid to confront their “shadow side,” the hard truths about themselves that they don’t like. They fill their lives with noise to run away from their emotions. Life isn’t meant to be rushed. Use this time to get to know yourself.

Stop. Be still. You can either waste this period of social-distancing and be frustrated, or you can choose to make it the best it can be.