It is clear that if the world were managed by intelligent people with expertise, instead of the current domination of society by priests and politicians, the outcome of today’s COVID 19 pandemic would be very different.
Perhaps the most graphic illustration of this simple fact is the following:
“South Korea and the United States had their first coronavirus cases on the same day, but Seoul did a far better job of managing the response. The upshot: It has suffered only 174 coronavirus deaths, equivalent to 1,100 for a population the size of America’s.
“That suggests that we may lose 90,000 Americans in this wave of infections because the United States did not manage the crisis as well as South Korea did.”
If you kill someone because you are doing something very dumb while driving a car for example, is that negligent homicide? When you are responsible for the death of 90,000 Americans? I wonder what that is.
By contrast with the US shambles, other people demonstrated that what the Korean’s did, anyone could have done. Here are such examples of what was/is possible when the criteria for action are science, expertise, or at least common sense – rather than politics, ideology, mental delusions, and beliefs:
The Italian town of Prato is home to 50,000 Chinese people who have a close relationship with China and knew exactly the havoc this virus was capable of. They went into lockdown three weeks before the first recorded Italian case. “’Among Chinese residents in Prato there isn’t even one case of Covid contagion,’” said Renzo Berti, top state health official for the area.” By persuading the Italians in the town to also take care the result was an infection rate that is half the national average.
Another Italian town also took the obvious step of testing every one.
They dramatically reduced the impact of the pandemic.
Taiwan again showed what was possible with a little foresight and intelligence: In spite of, and perhaps because of, being on Mainland China’s doorstep their response is regarded as among the best in the world.
For most of the world, the time for smart prevention may have passed. Seeing the current situation in Europe and the US, and the resultant trajectory towards economic collapse and so many deaths, perhaps it is time to consider a different strategy.
Supposing we were to do an experiment.
If successful, it could be expanded and adjusted depending on the results. We could identify a small area like a town or an easily identified part of a city — say 10,000 people — and try out the following:
Anyone who has clearly had Covid 19, (and for sure knows it!), or anyone who has this confirmed by a positive test for the disease is considered as one group – the post-Covid group.
The experts could give a pretty accurate guesstimate of when the people in this group are almost certainly no longer infectious. (Antibody testing would make this assessment more accurate.)
So, there will be an increasing population of post-Covid people who can then go back to their regular life. They either have no masks to indicate their status, or a colored mask if deemed necessary, and/or a green hat – to identify the people in this group.
Everyone over 50 (or younger people with other serious conditions) stays as isolated as possible.
That is about 34% of the population. That is 3,400 out of our original 10,000 people. By remaining isolated this group would mostly then avoid death rates of 1.3 to 14%. If any of these 50+ pre-Covids do contract the disease, once they recover they can rejoin regular society with the other post-Covids.
Also, these 50+ pre-Covids could be offered the opportunity to learn meditation. It naturally supports us to be alone and to enjoy that aloneness and not confuse it with loneliness. It allows us to dissolve our fears and anxieties and to really see death, and life, in a totally different way. It helps us understand that life is about growing up, not just growing old.
And when these 50+ pre-Covids re-emerge into society, whether as post-Covids or after the whole pandemic has passed, we would be blessed to have a more conscious, understanding, compassionate, and loving older generation, who might then appreciate humility and accept that this whole pandemic is a result of the way those in power, almost all over 50, have been managing this planet.
Osho is clear, without a change in consciousness, the only outcome will be more catastrophes.
Meanwhile, hand the economy over to the under 50s.
Those in this group, that have not had the disease, the 50- pre-Covids, can continue to live and work and earn. They can wear a different colored mask, so they are easily identified.
The major global economic depression being forecast could then be avoided if this worked.
The death rate for the under 50s is about 0.25%. They say that left to its own devices the virus would likely infect 60-80% of the regular population. So, eventually many of that younger 66% (6,600 from our original 10,000) will contract the disease, say 5000 – with a likely number of deaths in the range of 12 to 13. At some point, the number of post-Covids could rise to a level that ends the pandemic, even if an immunization program didn’t end it sooner. One expert estimated this point might be reached when the post-Covids comprised about 60% of the total population. Again, only monitoring the actual data will clarify this.
So, for our experimental village, if we compare the current approach to this approach, it might look like this. If we take that high 80% figure for example, then 80% of the 3400 50+ pre-Covids are going to become infected eventually. That is 2720 people with an overall mortality of perhaps 5%. That would mean 136 deaths in this group. If the mortality were 2.5%, then 68 deaths.
Of the 6600 in the 50- pre-Covid group, 80% become infected, which is 5120 people, with a mortality of about 0.25%. That would mean about 13 deaths.
So the total deaths predicted by our current approach would eventually be 81 (if the mortality of the older ones is 2.5%) or 149 if the mortality turns out to be 5%.
If we could really keep that older group from becoming infected, as in this proposed experiment, then the reduction in overall mortality would be in the order of 85-90%.
And if we take the lower estimate of 60% of the population eventually becoming infected, the reductions in mortality are similar.
The levels of permitted social interaction and public gatherings and such like, for the 50- pre-Covids would need to be adjusted as the evidence indicates – to minimize the chance of a spike in infections which might overload the health care system. With such relatively low morbidity and mortality in this group, these restrictions might be fairly relaxed.
The economy picks up as the post-Covids and 50- pre-Covids go back to work. Compare that with today’s situation where 81% of the global workforce of 3.3 billion people have already had their workplace fully or partly closed.
The under 50s are happy not to have all those old guys telling them what to do all the time. The nightmare of the police trying to enforce a lockdown on young people would end. The current related pandemic of domestic violence could be drastically reduced. Or all the people who will die because of delayed treatments for cancer, or postponed kidney transplants….
The health care system could easily take care of those that do get sick.
And the number of hospitalizations and the total death rate would be radically reduced, relaxing the strain on health care resources. The rate of hospitalizations for Covid 19 in this younger group is about 5%, and about 5% of those who are hospitalized then require critical care – resulting in a death rate for this group of about 0.25%. By contrast, the percentage of over 50’s that require hospitalization for Covid 19 infections rise from 10% to nearly 30% depending on the age. The proportion of those who are hospitalized who then require critical care rises, again with age, from 12% to 70%!
That would also save the lives of so many people who will die because of delayed treatments for cancer, or postponed kidney transplants, or all the other regular medical activities which are now on hold due to the current situation where the health care system is overwhelmed.
People could be very creative in how to manage the 50+ pre-Covid group. If testing, screening, and contact tracing with mobile phone apps were available, as in places like South Korea, the restrictions on their lives might be minimized, as long as they don’t come into contact with the 50- pre-Covids. And they could remain productive working from home as many already do now.
As to the cost of keeping the 50+ pre-Covids isolated, it cannot be more than the current situation of locking down the whole population and killing the economy in the process. Not to mention the savings involved in the reduced overall costs of hospitalizations, disease, and death.
This would also mean a steady state could be achieved by constantly modulating the variables, rather than the current approach which seems to predict that we will be lurching from complete lockdown, to lifting the restrictions, and then dealing with new spikes of cases, followed by another lockdown, on and on as suggested by the Imperial College in London. A situation which will kill the economy as well as a lot of people! Wave after wave for months ahead! Now they are saying these lockdowns need to last 45 days. Meanwhile, as an additional consideration: Who will be growing the food to feed everyone? How will it get delivered?
This experiment would only be a temporary measure till the cavalry arrives with possible new treatments and eventually an immunization program.
At the same time, other intelligent experiments can be tried: Like using one ventilator for two to four people, or ramping up the production of Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) devices, adjusted to avoid viral spread, which are much simpler to build than ventilators and could reduce the need for the more intrusive ventilators by about 50%.
Regular testing of the under 50s would allow them to change the color of their masks or their hats or whatever as they move from the pre-Covid to the post-Covid group. If resources were limited, there might not be much point in testing this group, unless they got sick. There might be no need to isolate their contacts because it is assumed that eventually about 60-80% of this group will get infected anyway.
Those decisions would all depend on careful monitoring of the number that became sick at any one time. Perhaps monthly testing would allow an increasing proportion of the pre-Covids to join the post-Covids.
Antibody tests that measure the level of antibodies to the virus in a post-Covid individual will be launched in the next few days from Stanford University. This will allow a much better assessment of the immunity of post-Covids. And of course, continued testing, screening, and quarantining of the over 50s would remain crucial as now. However, without having to prioritize testing of the under 50s there would be many more resources available for this more vulnerable population.
For example, perhaps the only people who would need an N95 mask would be pre-Covid people knowingly in contact with infectious people, like doctors and nurses. The rationale for this is that we don’t want to lose doctors and nurses, even young ones to a mild disease, and until there is more hard data on this, it just seems very possible that if you get hit by one virus or a million viruses, the outcome might be different.
Then there would be no shortage of these valuable life-saving masks.
Just as the levels of immunity of post-Covids is not clear yet, there also is no certainty about the continued infectiousness of this group. But if it is assumed that most 50- pre-Covids are going to become infected with the virus anyway, the continued infectiousness of the post-Covids would only matter if they were taking care of the 50+ pre-Covids. With careful monitoring, this kind of data would be rapidly available, and the protocols adjusted accordingly.
Once this issue of post-Covid infectiousness is clarified, then a natural suggestion would be to have the post-Covids taking care of the 50+ pre-Covids. This would need to be very carefully monitored, but with precise testing and screening, this might dramatically reduce the risk of infection for the 50+ pre-Covids.
Having post-Covids taking care of those while they are suffering from the disease, and during their convalescence, does seem like a very attractive option. They must be less vulnerable to catching the disease a second time than a pre-Covid would be of catching it the first time.
Clever epidemiologist could easily adjust these ideas, make obvious improvements, and try different approaches, depending on the resulting data and local circumstances.
Given the current proposed trajectory of millions of dead and dying people and no economy to pay for all this, let alone feed those that are still alive, it seems sensible to consider more radical possibilities.
At the same time, we can really wise up about how to prevent – or at least be intelligently prepared for – the next pandemic which is surely on the way. There are apparently thousands more in waiting!
Amrito M.D.
As Osho explains:
“When this civilization is destroyed, people may think it was a natural calamity. It is not. We have created it.”
To read this complete talk and see all available formats:
Osho, The Razor’s Edge, Talk #11 – Bring the Dawn, Dispel the Darkness
