The Pandemic Blues, Part 19: A glimmer of hope? Only if we do the work --- and work together!

 

When I wrote this article in early December, COVID-19 deaths in the United States had exceeded 300,000 and had risen to more than 350,000 by the time it was published on Jan. 8.
Coronavirus deaths in less than two weeks since then have grown to more than 404,000 as the virus continues to surge and the new strain of the virus is making more inroads in the United States.
As the vaccine rollout stalls, pending action by the Biden administration, it’s legitimate to ask where we are with the virus and our seemingly impossible quest for a touch of “normalcy.”
A friend suggested that we’re in the ninth inning of the crisis, while others have suggested that we’re nearing the closing stages of a marathon, but I submit that we’re a lot farther away from getting this pandemic under control than those sports analogies suggest.
Given the fact that we’re still, as a nation, attacking this virus from 50 different ways with each state on its own --- and with the vaccine distribution plan having been dumped on the states by the previous administration --- there is a helluva lot of work to do before we even approach the ninth inning or the Heartbreak Hill (18-mile point of the 26.2-mile Boston Marathon) stage of the pandemic --- more like the half-marathon (13.1-mile) point.
That’s why, in my humble view, I believe the pandemic is at the ninth inning of the first of two games of a doubleheader or in the 10^th or 11^th inning of The Longest Game, which lasted 33 innings in 1981. (The Pawtucket Red Sox and Rochester Red Wings of the Triple A International League played the longest game in professional baseball history on April 18-19 and June 23 of that year.)
I admit that’s not an optimistic view, but our inability to work together as a country to date makes it doubtful in my view that we’ll be able to get back to resuming any of these activities, which I listed in this column, in 2021, and we’ll be lucky to do so by June of 2022.
The only way that dire forecast will be improved is if the new administration starts fighting this disease on the federal level, so that every state, with certain exceptions, would stop doing their own thing.
We desperately need that leadership from the top to:
* Distribute the vaccine with the help of the Army or National Guard, so that the task of immunizing people with both shots is handled in a uniform and timely manner.
* Get each state, with some exceptions, on the same page with this virus instead of having every state decide its own rules. It’s ludicrous and entirely without sense, for instance, that we in Massachusetts have been, with few exceptions, treated like virtual prisoners in our homes for almost a year, and have been avoiding most aspects of normal life, while thousands attend college and pro football games in many states. Sorry, but that’s not only unfair and adds to the confusion that so many rules have caused because of the way they're being enforced, but it makes no sense and sends dangerous mixed messages.
* Establish guidelines for students to return to school --- and back those rules up with the money that states and school districts will need to accomplish that goal.
* Provide economic aid for all the small businesses that have closed or are in danger of closing directly due to COVID-19. Downtowns won’t be the same for a long while; Boston, for example, could be a ghost town for years to come.
President Biden has said that the pandemic will be his administration’s No. 1 priority, and that must be the case. Because until we start taking the pandemic seriously and get it under control, life will stand no chance of returning to whatever normal will look like when the virus is finally eradicated.
Right now, people are either still taking this threat too lightly or are so scared out of their minds, thanks to the constant barrage of dire warnings by health professionals, doctors and government officials for nearly a year now, that they’ll be extremely reluctant to return to normal activities for a long while.

This column was published in the January 2021 edition of Jewish Rhode Island in Providence.

As I write this in December, the first COVID-19 vaccine had just been approved by the Federal Drug Administration and a second one wasn’t far behind. Although they won’t be ready for wide distribution to the public until spring, front-line workers and first responders were given some of the earliest doses.
That was a rare bit of optimism as 2020’s year of the coronavirus pandemic drew to a close, but progress on fighting the disease nonetheless was fleeting. Despite millions of people following limits imposed in many states, more than 300,000 Americans had died from COVID-19 by year’s end, and rising cases in the region and nationwide makes it unlikely that the pandemic will be over anytime soon in 2021, even with the vaccine.
With such a sobering outlook, I’m wondering whether it’ll be 2021,  2022 or even 2023 when:
* We stop hearing health experts and governors constantly scolding and lecturing us during this never-ending health emergency that started with our leaders not only frightening us regularly, but also by scarring our psyches to the point where we’ve become considerably less social, fairly isolated and afraid of living our lives.
* These expressions will mercifully disappear from our lexicon: “new normal,” “we’re all in this together” (that’s never been the case), “contact tracing,” “social-distancing” and “flatten the curve.”
* I’ll be able to stop wearing a mask on my daily jaunts, in stores and at medical and dental appointments.
* I can resume doing things I once took for granted such as shaking hands or high-fiving friends, having a conversation with my neighbors without self-consciously checking whether I’m 6 feet apart and holding meetings in person instead of on virtual platforms.
* It’ll be kosher to have lunch with more than one friend, and not be forced to restrict those infrequent get-togethers to outside locales, something that will be extremely rare during the winter.
* I’ll be able to take my wife out on a date without worrying whether a potentially deadly virus is an unwanted guest at the dinner table, the movie theater or concert hall.
* I can resume volunteering for a local holiday drive that entailed stuffing and sorting a lot of gifts, an effort that I declined to participate in last month due to the risks involved.
* We’ll see 65,000 people packed into Gillette Stadium, be able to attend a Red Sox game at Fenway Park or watch other spectator sports with friends and not be told to sit in different sections --- that’s if the powers that be ever allow any fans back into the stands.
* I can run a road race with a few hundred other runners and be able to chat with some of them after the race, as I did in the “old days.” (I last ran non-virtual races Nov. 9-10, 2019.)
* I’ll be able to stop worrying about dodging other runners, walkers and bikers while on my daily jogs by moving to the other side of the road.
* The Boston Marathon will resume with 30,000 runners from across the globe completing the 26.2-mile course from Hopkinton to Boston. (The 2021 race has already been scrubbed for April.)
* We’ll see the term “hybrid” again refer only to an automobile that runs on both electricity and gas and not to students in grades K-12 attending classes in person only twice a week.
* We can plan a vacation in New England without being the target of scorn by natives of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut or other states that view tourists as interlopers --- and without being told by those governors to quarantine for two weeks (as if anyone in their right mind is going to go on “vacation” to another place only to be stuck in a quarantine.)
* My wife and I will be able to visit my close relatives in Canada’s province of Ontario (which year will the Canadian border reopen to regular folks?) or plan a trip in the United States without worrying about restrictions that take the joy out of going away.
* We all can stop worrying about whether we have an insidious disease every time our throats get dry and scratchy or we sneeze or cough from leaves, pollen or other allergens.
* I’ll be able to enjoy an-person Relay For Life to benefit the American Cancer Society, an event that normally draws hundreds of participants and volunteers, but which went virtual in 2020, and won’t return to anywhere close to “normal” in 2021.
LARRY KESSLER (larrythek65@gmail.com) is a freelance writer based in North Attleboro. He blogs at  https://larrytheklineup.blogspot.com/