As I discussed last week, the battle against the various respiratory viruses goes on. Numbers for RSV have declined but influenza and Covid are still active threats.
There is concern about new Covid variants. It seems that is a constant worry. This has proven to be a remarkably adaptive virus. That, of course, is the central reason why it continues to be such a challenge.
Another reason why our fight against Covid has been less effective than we would like is that there continues to be resistance to basic public health measures – especially vaccination. The scientific evidence supporting both the efficacy and safety of Covid vaccines is solid. Nonetheless, many folks have been hesitant to accept these vaccines.
Hesitancy about vaccines has always been an issue. People don’t like shots. Some feel that the disease in question simply is not a threat to them. Others worry about side effects and allergic reactions. These concerns have always been issues but in the last few years they have become more, not less, prominent.
One of the dominant reasons for the increase in vaccine hesitancy is the widespread access to conflicting sources of information on the internet. Some of this is valid and reliable. Much of it is not. For the average reader it can be extremely difficult to determine which news should be trusted and which should not.
All this is important. The fact is that the US has not done a good job in responding to the Covid pandemic. The most recent data from the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security is that worldwide there have been 6.68 million deaths from Covid 19. In the US there have been 1.08 million Covid deaths. This means that the US with approximately 4% of the world’s population accounts for 16% of the Covid deaths. There certainly are reasons to quibble with the accuracy of these numbers but if they are even half right it means that we have suffered twice as many deaths as we would have expected.
This is obviously a very complex issue. I am concerned, however, that it is a manifestation of a much broader and even more important issue – that is the decline in trust in traditional sources of authority. Some questioning of authority is, and always has been, appropriate. However, the emergence of seemingly endless sources of information on the internet has allowed virtually anyone, from any point of view, to find information to support their position. In effect, valid or not, they become instant experts.
Theimportantchallenge, from my perspective, is how do we sort out the “wheat from the chaff”? Who do we believe? As a first step I would simply suggest that we need to talk to each other. No one has all the answers. Honest disagreement and exchange of ideas is healthy and is a fundamental cornerstone of democracy.
How can we facilitate that exchange? I would suggest that one of the most important vehicles for such exchange is local newspapers. Your ideas are important. Make them known.