“The most terrifying words in the English language are, ‘I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.’” -President Ronald Reagan
The COVID-19 race seems to be between a political-driven remedy and a politically-driven tyranny. Is it really?
“Hope springs eternal in the human breast; Man never is, but always To be Blest.” -Alexander Pope (1688-1744)
Hydroxy-chloroquine might be helpful, but the media has dismissed its use as dangerous medical malpractice. Hope dashed? More recent studies suggest confirmation of the original studies. Hope revived?
Remdesivir may be a PR-hoax. The drug reduces severity slightly but mortality? A study by the maker says yes. Believe the pharmaceutical company? Maybe.
Now, news of a new vaccine. Would that the news be true.
Vaccines, however, can be more harmful than helpful. Recall the flu-vaccine that in 1976 that caused cases of Guillain-Barré Syndrome (GBS) or the Dengue-vaccine that enhanced the virulence of the virus.
To paraphrase William Congreve in 1693, act in haste; repent in leisure. The pressure from politicians is immense to release a vaccine in haste. In 1986, the same sort of political pressure caused the explosion of Challenger. Let a premature “cure” not be worse than the disease.
Vaccines are risky. There are short-term side-effects and long-term. The world, for example, now faces a potential plague of measles in adults as a consequence of administering a vaccine against it that has limited duration, boosters being progressively less effective.* In children, measles is relatively mild; in adults, severe.
*Wakefield AJ: “The Sixth Extinction.” J American Physicians & Surgeons: 24:3 (2019).
Pressured by bureaucrats, administering on a mass basis the first vaccine produced by a new technique for a novel pathogen can be extremely risky. At the moment, who is at risk from COVID-19? Mainly, the enfeebled old, the chronically ill, and the constitutionally weak. Are we to administer the vaccine to healthy medical and para-medical personnel and, by doing so, risk their lives more from the political vaccine than from the biological virus? Would you be the first?
If, once again, hope has been raised only to be dashed upon the rocks of reality, what? A perfect context to inflict even further upon us Americans the most egregious power-grab in our peacetime history.
Could the awful truth be that there is no real COVID-19 race, after all? Biologically, will the Wuhan-virus simply run its course while politically the politicians run rampant over the remnant of the Founding Fathers’ vision?
Science is the remedy for COVID-19 with its guidelines from the Scientific Method as described in the novel, Retribution Fever. Science also is the remedy for political tyranny.