Weekend Update: New Virus, Very Old Virus

This past week, the US officially passed 100,000 deaths resulting from the covid virus.  The moment was anticipated by the NY Times with its front page list of every known victim, and by the Washington Post and other news outlets with photographs of victims.  Photos powerfully personalize, but the Times also added identifiers that did so as well, not just occupations and achievements, but "known for his amazing Donald Duck impersonation."

Every week now there is news about Covid 19 itself--new studies, new studies of past studies, new questions.  Many of these are or seem contradictory.  Last week there was hope for a vaccine, and doubt that Covid would cease for many years (those these are not mutually exclusive exactly.)

But some conclusions were being drawn, however provisionally.  Eric Levitz at New York Magazine summarized some.  Of the ones he wrote about, I've selected the following as especially significant and/or provocative.

"Estimates vary, but multiple research teams believe that the typical COVID-19 patient does not infect a single other person."  Most infections come from "super-spreaders," who infect a number of people. "[A]bout 10 percent of coronavirus patients are responsible for 80 percent of all new infections."

These superspreaders don't appear to have super powers in spreading the disease, except maybe cluelessness.  They infect a lot of people by breathing on them a lot, at home or especially in confined spaces and large groups.  Levitz's example is the guy who infected people at choir practice.

This comports with other trending conclusions: that Covid spreads more easily indoors than outdoors, and much more easily from prolonged contact with an infected person than from surfaces.  And if this is so, it might be a good idea to start reporting on the proportion of cases that emerge from nursing homes, meatpacking plants etc.  It also suggests that it may be a long time before people can safely gather as audiences or participants in indoor large-group activities.  However, the prospects for workplaces seem more complicated--depending, for example, on air-conditioning systems that can spread the virus.

We may also learn how valid this new conventional wisdom is in a couple of weeks, when the crowds at beaches and other outdoor venues over Memorial Day have either spread a lot of infection or haven't.  Already it is known that at least one participant in the Missouri lakeside crowd on Memorial Day has tested positive.The same with "socially distant" indoor gathering, as venues "reopen."  Again, already there is a case in Georgia in which employees in a hair salon have tested positive, and contact tracing is being done on all known customers.

The Levitz summary also alerts to the possibility currently being explored that some immunity to covid 19 is conferred by antibodies from other coronaviruses, including colds.  Also confirmation that covid19 virus carriers cease to be infectious after two weeks.

But perhaps the most hopeful of the studies he cites suggests that there are biomarkers that can be found in a simple blood test that indicate whether a covid19 patient is facing a mortal threat or not, some 10 days before this becomes apparent.

This has been one of the scariest and most unusual elements of covid: patients who seem to be recovering or seem to have a light case who suddenly plunge into life-threatening conditions.  The blood test which claims 90% accuracy, would tell doctors which patients need to be hospitalized early, and gives them a head start on treatment.  And treatment is likely to be crucial for a long time to come.

An article in Scientific American which Josh Marshall summarizes, is yet another in a growing body of opinion that wearing masks protect the wearer as well as others.  The study says the distinction that had previously been made, between "droplets" and smaller "aerosol" particles is obsolete and specious.  The virus is airborne, the study claims.  "If you’re close enough that you can smell the tobacco smoke from someone smoking a cigarette you’re probably close enough to be inhaling aerosolized COVID virus."

But masks offer some protection. The study suggests that this is partly why densely populated Japan and South Korea don't have a high proportion of infected people--because these are societies used to wearing face masks (because of air pollution.)   In any case, it's another argument in favor of masks.

The for or against debate on masks seemed to be resolving very definitely on the "for" side.  Several prominent Republicans as well as governors of both parties spoke in favor of masks, and yet another poll shows high mask use: up to 90% among Democrats.  Trump and his AlwaysTrumpers anti-maskers remain the small minority.  But they are becoming more than audacious.  Senator Lindsay Graham, desperate in his bid for re-election (the last poll showed him tied) held a big fundraiser where there were few masks and no social distancing, and ostentatious use of the same microphone.

The Old American Virus: Racism

The weekend begins with continuing and new protests in a growing number of cities, with reported violence. And so again we return focus to the formative American virus of racism is a quiet epidemic, not the least because it remains structural, built into institutions as well as learned behaviors.

The protests began in the Twin Cities because of a white police officer caught on video applying deadly force to unarmed black man, stopped because a nearby storekeeper suspected someone of passing a phony $20 bill.  On Friday this officer was arrested and charged with murder, while investigation into the conduct of other officers continues.

Protests over that incident spread to other cities as the weekend approached.  Meanwhile, during protests in Kentucky over the fatal shooting of a black woman by white police officers, seven people were shot by unknown assailants. These followed protests over the February murder of Ahmaud Arbery, a young black man pursued and shot by two white men while jogging in Brunswick, Georgia.

Also sparking outrage this week was an incident in Central Park, also caught on video, in which a white woman named Amy Cooper threatened to call police when a black man, a bird watcher whose last name happened also to be Cooper, asked her to leash her dog as she was legally obligated to do.  She said she would call the police and tell them he threatened her life. And then she did so, obviously faking her distress, and making sure to mention that her alleged assailant was African American.

The Amy Cooper incident conjured up historical nightmares, as several commentators (including Charles Blow and Aya Gruber) reminded readers of what black men can never forget, that purported violence or sexual advances against white women were frequent excuses for lynching black men, as well as other more recent violence and ongoing prejudice.

But such overt violence is not the only kind that can deform a life. Writing in the context both of this Central Park incident and the covid crisis, journalist Ernest Owens notes in the New York Times that during a recent Zoom session, his therapist observed that he was "glowing."  In quarantine, in the middle of a Pandemic, how could that be?  He concluded: "I'm doing better these days because staying home alone and practicing social distancing has meant I'm avoiding many of the racist encounters that used to plague my daily life."

"I've spent less time simmering with humiliation and rage over offhand ignorant comments, wondering whether my race is the reason for poor treatment, being preoccupied with how to present myself to avoid or minimize discrimination."

He notes these incidents may not be major but they occur often and accumulate.   Now he catches a glimpse of what it's like to be without them.  "Quarantine has meant I don't have to have interactions with people like Ms. Cooper. It has meant I don't even have to worry about having them.  And that's been life-changing."

"It is natural to wish for life to 'just get back to normal,' as a pandemic and an economic crisis upend everything around us," President Obama said through his Twitter feed.  "But we have to remember that for millions of Americans, being treated differently on account of race is tragically, painfully, maddeningly 'normal'--whether it's while dealing with the health care system, or interacting with the criminal justice system, or jogging down the street, or just watching birds in a park."

 White people like me don't think about this much because we don't have to.  It is not, in its particularity, our experience.  But black men in particular do think about it, because they have to.  And that's why we as a society must think about it.

The VP Zeitgeist

This past week Joe Biden suggested he'd name his VP choice by August 1.  Apart from the ongoing vetting, a lot can happen between now and then to affect his choice, just as a few things happened this past week to elevate Senator Elizabeth Warren and perhaps Senator Kamala Harris, while Senator Amy Klobuchar's chances seem to have taken a major plunge.

The anger among African Americans being caused by and focused by the police killing of a black man in Minneapolis is apt to poison Klobuchar's chances, because as county prosecutor she reportedly passed on filing charges in cases of alleged police violence against African Americans (though a report that one of those instances involved the same police officer who killed George Floyd is false.)  Though she was following the prevailing standard of presenting evidence to grand juries rather than issuing indictments (a practice she says she now regrets), the symbolism may now be too much.

As we reached the weekend there was some talk and media opinion that the emotions aroused in the black community by these latest instances of police violence will put pressure on Biden to select a black woman, with Senator Harris of California as the more likely choice.  But then she also has a law enforcement record, some of it controversial in the black community.

But before that, another poll and the very public advice from a major Dem political operative has further boosted Senator Warren of Massachusetts.  Both the poll and the pol claim that she adds votes to the ticket, with strong support among African Americans, Latinos and voters under 45.  Add this to previous polls showing she is the preferred vp candidate in several Midwestern swing states.

Then there's this article that notes the praise she's getting from President Obama as well as her regular communications with Biden, both impressed with her ideas on the covid crisis and economic recovery, which will be crucial tasks for the new administration, and clearly a strong case is being made.

This article also speaks to what I said months ago was a major objection--the loss of her Senate seat to a likely Republican appointee, which could doom the new administration's agenda.  It turns out that Dems have veto-proof majorities in both Massachusetts houses, and so can easily pass a law--that other states have, and MA used to--that a new appointee to the Senate must be from the same party as the departing Senator, before a special election hands the matter to the voters.  It's still a risk but not nearly as much of one.    

Meanwhile a long-shot choice, Senator Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada removed her name from consideration, to focus on her state's economy.  I suspect others will be doing this in the future, especially governors.  At this point it seems to be pretty much between Senators Warren and Harris,  pending results of the vetting, and of course, how things look closer to August.  It may be that by then Biden will be looking at a consensus choice.