With Apologies to Billy Shakespeare

To mask, or not to mask: that is the question:

Whether ‘tis nobler in the public to suffer

The slings and arrows of an outraged public

Or to take arms against a sea of fear,

And by opposing end it?  To die: to sleep;

No more; and by sleep to say we end 

The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks 

That flesh is heir to, ‘tis a consumption

Devoutly to be wish’d.  To die, to sleep;

To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub;

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come

When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,

Must give us pause: there’s the respect 

That makes calamity of so long life;

For those would bear the whips and scorns of time,

The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s conformity

The pangs of guilt, the law’s ignored

The insolence of office holders spurned by the rules

The patient merit of unworthy rules, 

When he himself might quietus make

With bare nostrils? Who would burden bear, 

To wheeze and sweat under such a dreary mask

But that the public dread the plague of increase

The undiscover’d cure forsakes for a grand control

No survivor of that evil does rebuke

And makes us rather bear those ills we have

Than fly to other we know not of.

Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;

And thus the native hue of resolution

Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of though.

And individuals with little regard to science 

Think ill of those who challenge the mob

And loose the condemnations of virtue

And by losing, condemn virtue to its own.

 

As we progress forward with a society more divided than we can recall in our living memory I choose to share a few observations.  Observations admittedly biased by my own history, and opinions of a global civilization that spans 10 or so millennia.

Pandemics have been around since more than a handful of humans lived together as a family group.  As we think back to Egypt and the Hebrews it is alleged the Hebrews and Jehovah brought a variety of plagues upon the heartless Pharaoh in an effort to secure their freedom.  The last was the death of the first-born male of each Egyptian household, which was not marked by the blood of an innocent lamb. This was a big deal because culture called on the first-born male to carry on the family lineage.

Those of us who had a history class in high school probably learned about the black death (bubonic) plague of the 14^th century that cut the population of Afro-Eurasia down by somewhere between 75 and 200 million people.  Of course, there have been a whole bunch of smaller plagues as time went on ranging from Small Pox to the flu.

Speaking of the flu, some may recall Spanish flu, (named back when using a location was fashionable) which caused the pandemic of 1918-1920.  A plague that infected about 1/3 of the world’s population (500 million-ish) and killed somewhere between 17 and 100 million people. Early in this latest pandemic, originating in Wuhan (choose your preferred source) China, the world’s experts took pains to point how much deadlier this SARs virus was than the flu. But let’s start this discussion with a review of what we call “THE FLU.”

NOTE: For this discussion, I am taking my information from the University of Alabama-Birmingham site: https://uabmedicine.org/-/flu-strains-explained-and-how-the-vaccine-works

According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, there are four types of flu.  Three of them can affect humans and the fourth affects cattle.  Of the three types we need to worry about (A, B, and C) A and B are the most dangerous and there are respectively 18 and 11 subtypes. The annual flu shots many of us get each year are made to prevent the CDC’s best guess as to which subtypes will be most likely to spread around.  For example, for the 2020-21 season the flu vaccine cocktail was designed to address the Hawaii/702019 (H1N1)pdm09-like virus, the Hong Kong/45/2019 (H3N1)-like virus, the Washington/02/2019 (B/Victoria lineage)-like virus, and he Phuket/2073-like (Yamagata lineage) virus.  The first two were Type A the last two Type B subtypes.  Some years the CDC guesses right and the resulting flu season seems mild. Other years they are not so right and flu takes a heavier toll on the workforce and our children.

So, what’s my point?  Each year the flu viruses mutate and the CDC has to give its best guess as to what will prevent widespread illness and possibly death.  Up until President Trump, the decisions of the CDC were pretty much accepted by us all and it was viewed as a non-political government agency.  That all changed with this pandemic.  You can blame whoever you want, Trump and the Republicans, or Pelosi and the Democrats, but at the end of the day the CDC was put between a rock and a hard place and it will never again be viewed as god-like and non-partisan.

Now we come to COVID-19.  We are now up to the Delta variant, and I assume it is just a matter of weeks before we hear about the Echo variant.  The virus will mutate as it infects people and is altered by the biology it encounters.  BTW, the fact it mutates does not mean the earlier versions will disappear, it just makes the probability of creating a vaccine that will counter the most recent strain, as well as the previous strains harder. For the average American there is an open question, will this plague behave like the flu, or will it be like smallpox where the vaccine will ultimately be able to stop it for all humanity?

The sad thing is we never see the experts discuss this, which strongly suggests they don’t know, and are afraid to even speculate.  This leads to the question of goals and objectives.  The more cynical of us see this as a pandemic as a huge profit maker and political tool those in power will keep going as long as possible, while the more fearful seek reassurance they are doing everything the experts want in an effort to eliminate all risk to them and their loved ones.  In today’s world of virtue-signaling and social condemnation, this means flooding social media with all the memes they can think of about how important wearing a mask is.

To what purpose do we wear a mask?  In the beginning, it was to protect us, although science suggested the average surgical or cloth mask did little to stop the virus itself since it was so small it would filter in between the strands of material.

Then it was to reduce the spread when coupled with social distancing, until such time as a vaccine could be developed so hospitals would not be overwhelmed.

Next, it was to protect others who might not have had the opportunity to receive the vaccine.

And now we return to protecting ourselves even though we’ve been vaccinated since we may still get COVID and just won’t know it (e.g., asymptomatic) as well as protecting others and stopping the spread.

The fact our media and politicians chose to approach this pandemic as a political opportunity has divided us on what is the right thing to do, but even if we knew there was a “right thing” history has shown a lot of mankind would choose another path.  That stubbornness seems to be a human trait.  For example, let’s look at our professional athletes, some of whom are happy to guide us in what they believe to be the morally right path.  How many of them have been vaccinated?  If you don’t want to ask that question then let’s look at another example.  Performance-enhancing drugs – we are told they are bad, but until everyone started getting caught using them how many athletes decided they didn’t need them to compete, or better yet how many athletes did?  In my opinion, the average professional athlete is not the sharpest pencil in the pack.

So, at the end of the day, should you wear a mask?  The answer to that depends on you and you alone.  If it makes you feel safer then by all means do so.  If you think it will save someone else from you then of course.  If you want to show you are part of the crowd that wants everyone to wear a mask then it’s probably a good idea.  If you refuse the vaccine, then it might make you feel safer, but then again it might make you feel the government is controlling your life so that’s a tough call.  If you think everyone should wear a mask to make you feel safer then stay inside your house with your mask on and leave everyone else alone.