Worrisome Article on the Next Few Years

David Trammel's picture

I am guessing just about everyone here is worried about the next few years. We've collectively dug ourselves a 6 foot hole in the ground and are standing at the edge.

This article has a pretty even tempered look at the problems society is facing and some of the probably outcomes.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/07/20/what-lies-ahead-2/

Not much good for anyone I'm afraid.

mountainmoma's picture

I had read this one before, something that realy stood out for me here as well as other writings is to talk about lack of childcare -- but how would childcare be "safe" and school not be safe ? Teachers unions I guess, groups of children not safe at school but are safe if no accredited teacher. Inconsistent

But, yes, it totally will not work, we cannot have a functioning society with everyone out of work for half a year ! Unprecedented

I think that's nuts. I suppose that since childcare workers as a group are young women working at minimum wage, their health doesn't matter. And how could a daycare be safer for the kids than the school?

Also, thinking about the article and worldwide instability: if Three Gorges dam in China does collapse, the ramifications on top of Covid-19 will be extensive.

alice's picture

He writes:"Through mid-June to mid-July, the COVID-19 infection rate, hospitalization rate, and soon the death rate, have all begun to escalate once again. Daily infections consistently now exceed 60,000 cases—i.e. more than twice that of the earlier worst month of April 2020. "

Not sure it's accurate re covid; looking at a dashboard for the USA https://covid19info.live/us/ it looks like daily covid deaths are down to ~1200 from a peak in mid April. I have not been inclined to consider number of positive tests alone as a reliable indicator of anything due to increased test capacity and the fact that most cases early on were untested; certainly in the UK people who were sick were encouraged not to block up the phone lines trying to let the health service know about it but to home nurse, and there was no capacity to test any of those people.

Sections of the press here in the UK seem to have a panic about a second wave at least every other week but so far the daily death and cases are still dropping steadily from the mid-April peak. cf https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

mountainmoma's picture

The United States are huge, you have to look at state data like it is for a country, and large states like California and Texas, each region has to be looked at seperately.

Places being hot now are not on a second wave, they are just areas that are having a first wave.

My area has not had a first wave yet, unless it was so mild no-one noticed. Likely it just hasnt got here yet. It will and it has to, the delay has not helped us at all, makes it worse for us in the long run economically.

Any place that is looking at country wide data for the USA is just wrong and will have wrong conclusions. What we can see from the data is that places in their first wave, like Florida nd Texas, are having much better outcomes ( death rate) than New York and New Jersey. This is not a second wave though, just a different location having its first wave