Back in March, the world shook impossibly hard. In an instant, the lives we once knew disappeared. And everything now feels out of balance and unstable. Because we are in unusual times.
Or so the ads of any company would ever believe us.
The truth is, these times are not exactly unusual. A virus has swept across the world, leaving a staggering death toll in the wake. People have in the past protested against the use of masks contrary to recommendations for public health. Cities opened too early and suffered the consequences of that early opening. Schools have been shot. Children are in quarantine. The world has previously waited with frightened breath for a light at the end of a dark tunnel.
In 1918, a deadly flu swept around the world. All told, 500 million people around the world became infected, and more than 50 million people died. About 675,000 of those deaths occurred in the United States. In an effort to stop the spread of this deadly flu, which in contrast to COVID-19 targeted younger individuals harder than parents, governments are closing bars, theaters, restaurants and schools. Many cities, such as San Francisco, have imposed masking requirements, which could result in fines or short prison sentences if they fail to comply.
Then, as now, these public health efforts to stop the spread of a virus that killed people were resisted. Wearing masks – if not wearing masks – became a political statement. People complained that they could not breathe and that masks violated their constitutional rights (which is not yet clear). And, as of now, violence has arisen over whether or not people should wear masks. The New York Times told the story of a fight between an anti-mask and a health inspector that ended in shots being fired and bystanders running for cover.
Then we also lack a nationwide response to fighting a virus. Different cities also took different approaches to the pandemic. Philadelphia went ahead with a parade to support the war tension and 600 people died within two weeks of the event. At least 1,700 Philadelphians died in one day. In contrast, St. Louis, who was late by her commissioner for health, closing schools and shops and canceling all public meetings. Residents complained, but they lived. More residents of St. Louis survived. The city emerged from the pandemic with one of the lowest excessive deaths in the nation.
Quarantine summers are also not new. During the polio outbreak in the 1940s, children brought summers home. Sue Gray, an 84-year-old woman in Chicago, told USA Today about her summers growing up as a child in Kansas City. “[Y]you could not go to swimming pools, you could not go to the movies, you just stayed home. ‘
The 1918 flu pandemic finally ended in 1920 when herd immunity was achieved. The human costs were high. Fifty million lives were lost. Fifty million families were devastated. The number is almost too high to really understand. Similarly, the polio pandemic was eventually ceded when a vaccine was discovered. Children were able to recover their summers. The instability and fear subsided. The normal routines of life came back.
One of the best (saddest?) Moms who has flooded my social media feed in recent weeks is the one who complains about the truth about human nature. It says, “We need to withdraw the expression ‘appear like the plague’ because it turns out that people do not.”
But the truth is, that’s not news. We learned that sad truth almost a century ago.
I do not know if the fact that history repeats itself so closely gives me hope that things will be okay, like heartbeat we have not yet learned at this time. Maybe both.
There’s something almost ominous about hearing the arguments of people from more than a century ago that echo in our modern streets. We need to know better now, should we not? We should know that wearing a mask, suffering from a touch of discomfort to protect each other, and ourselves, is not the government’s attempt to undermine a constitutional right. It’s almost discouraging to read stories about the horrific price paid in the form of 600 lives after the Philadelphia parade, and then to read the stories of political rallies where social distance and masks do not are needed. Shouldn’t we have learned a lesson? And there is something heartbreaking about knowing that the answer is that we should have learned, but we have not. As a society, we learned the hard-won lessons of a century earlier.
And yet, it gives me hope to know that there will be a light at the end of the tunnel. Things will feel safe again. There will be routines and stability. Finally. History leads me to believe that it is true. (But I hope with all hope in my heart that we get that stability through a fax and not because we have allowed so many millions to die to achieve herd immunity.)
And I have to hope that maybe this time, this pandemic, will be the one that finally teaches us the lesson. And maybe another generation will learn from our mistakes.
See the original article at ScaryMommy.com
