What Is More Important? The Health of the American People or the economy?

“Extreme measures to flatten the virus ‘curve’ is sensible-for a time-to stretch out the strain on health infrastructure. But crushing the economy, jobs and morale is also a health issue-and beyond. Within a very few weeks let those with a lower risk to the disease return to work”-Lloyd Blankfein

from Fred Klonsky’s Blog:

“Lloyd Blankfein is the CEO of Goldman Sachs. As one of the world’s richest capitalists, he is frightened by the current pandemic.

“He’s not frightened because of the possibility that millions of people will die. He is frightened that without workers back on the job, money will be lost, his money and the money of the .01%.

“Donald Trump echoed Blankfein yesterday when he said that the stay-at-home directive of the CDC ‘cannot be worse than the problem itself’.

“The president is questioning whether stay-at-home orders have gone too far. But relaxing them could significantly increase the death toll from the coronavirus, health officials warn, including health experts like Anthony Fauci, who was not at his usual spot during Monday’s press briefing on COVID19. 

“Without government support for the millions of workers who have lost earnings over the past week, the pressure to return to work will be great even at great personal risk.

“Trump is looking to lift the stay-at-home order as soon as 10 days from now. Make no mistake. It is a potential death order for millions.”

A Timeline of the Coronavirus (NY Times)

THE CORONAVIRUS SURFACED in a Chinese seafood and poultry market in late 2019. Here’s [the origin] of the outbreak. [I have added a few of Trump’s lies, exaggerations, and misinformation to the American public on this timeline as well]:

DEC. 31, 2019

Chinese authorities treated dozens of cases of pneumonia of unknown cause. On Dec. 31, the government in Wuhan, China, confirmed that health authorities were treating dozens of cases. Days later, researchers in China identified a new virus that had infected dozens of people in Asia. At the time, there was no evidence that the virus was readily spread by humans. Health officials in China said they were monitoring it to prevent the outbreak from developing into something more severe.

JAN. 11, 2020

China reported its first death. On Jan. 11, Chinese state media reported the first known death from an illness caused by the virus, which had infected dozens of people. The 61-year-old man who died was a regular customer at the market in Wuhan, where the illness is believed to have originated, and he had previously been found to have abdominal tumors and chronic liver disease. The report of his death came just before one of China’s biggest holidays, when hundreds of millions of people travel across the country.

JAN. 20, 2020

Other countries, including the United States, confirmed cases. The first confirmed cases outside mainland China occurred in Japan, South Korea and Thailand, according to the World Health Organization’s first situation report. The first confirmed case in the United States came the next day in Washington State, where a man in his 30s developed symptoms after returning from a trip to Wuhan.

Jan. 22, 2020

[“We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China” -Trump].

JAN. 23, 2020

Wuhan, a city of more than 11 million, was cut off by Chinese authorities. The Chinese authorities closed off Wuhan by canceling planes and trains leaving the city, and suspending buses, subways and ferries within it. At this point, at least 17 people had died and more than 570 others had been infected, including in Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, South Korea and the United States.

JAN. 30, 2020

The W.H.O. declared a global health emergency. Amid thousands of new cases in China, a “public health emergency of international concern” was officially declared by the W.H.O. China’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said that it would continue to work with the W.H.O. and other countries to protect public health, and the U.S. State Department warned travelers to avoid China.

JAN. 31, 2020

The Trump administration [finally] restricted travel from China. The Trump administration said it would suspend entry into the United States by any foreign nationals who had traveled to China in the past 14 days, excluding the immediate family members of American citizens or permanent residents. By this date, 213 people had died and nearly 9,800 had been infected worldwide.

FEB. 2, 2020

The first coronavirus death was reported outside China. A 44-year-old man in the Philippines died after being infected, officials said. By this point, more than 360 people had died.

Feb. 2, 2020

[“We pretty much shut it down coming in from China. It’s going to be fine” -Trump].

FEB. 5, 2020

A cruise ship in Japan quarantined thousands. After a two-week trip to Southeast Asia, more than 3,600 passengers began a quarantine aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Yokohama, Japan. Officials started screening passengers, and the number of people who tested positive became the largest number of coronavirus cases outside China. By Feb. 13, the number stood at 218.

FEB. 7, 2020

A Chinese doctor who tried to raise the alarm died. When Dr. Li Wenliang, a Chinese doctor, died on Feb. 7 after contracting the coronavirus, he was hailed as a hero by many for trying to ring early alarms that a cluster of infections could spin out of control. In early January, the authorities reprimanded him, and he was forced to sign a statement denouncing his warning as an unfounded and illegal rumor. Dr. Li’s death provoked anger and frustration at how the Chinese government mishandled the situation by not sharing information earlier and silencing whistle-blowers.

FEB. 10, 2020

The death toll in China surpassed the number SARS killed worldwide. The death toll in China rose to 908, surpassing the global number of people who died from the SARS epidemic in 2002-3, which killed 774. At this point, the number of confirmed cases of infection in the country had risen to 40,171.

FEB. 13, 2020

There were more than 14,000 new cases in Hubei Province. Officials added more than 14,840 new cases to the total number of infected in Hubei Province, and the ruling Communist Party ousted top officials there. The new cases set a daily record, coming after officials in Hubei seemed to be including infections that were diagnosed by using lung scans of symptomatic patients.

FEB. 14, 2020

France announces the first coronavirus death in Europe. An 80-year-old Chinese tourist died on Feb. 14 at a hospital in Paris, in what was the first coronavirus death outside Asia, the authorities said. The health minister of France, Agnès Buzyn, said the man, who was from Hubei Province, the center of the outbreak, had arrived in France in mid-January and “his condition had quickly worsened.” It was the fourth death from the virus outside mainland China, where about 1,500 people had died, most of them in Hubei.

Feb. 14, 2020

[“Sixty-one percent of the voters approve of Trump’s handling of the coronavirus. And you know, we did a very early move on that. We did a, I was criticized by a lot of people at the beginning because we were the first. We’d never done it before” -Trump].

FEB. 17, 2020

Chinese officials draft legislation to curb the practice of eating wildlife. China said it was reviewing its trade and consumption of wildlife, which has been identified as a probable source of the outbreak. Officials drafted legislation that aims to end “the pernicious habit of eating wildlife,” a statement from the Standing Committee of the Congress said.

FEB. 19, 2020

Hundreds leave the quarantined cruise ship. After a two-week quarantine, 443 passengers began leaving the Diamond Princess cruise ship. It was the first day of a three-day operation to offload people who tested negative for the virus and did not have symptoms. Passengers who shared cabins with infected patients remained on the ship. A total of 621 people aboard the ship were infected.

FEB. 21, 2020

A secretive church is linked to an outbreak in South Korea. Shincheonji Church of Jesus, a secretive church in South Korea was linked to a surge of infections in the country. The number of confirmed cases in the country rose above 200, and more than 400 other church members reported potential symptoms, health officials said. As a result, the government shut down thousands of kindergartens, nursing homes and community centers, and put a stop to political rallies in the capital, Seoul.

FEB. 21, 2020

The virus appears in Iran from an unknown source. On Feb. 19, Iran announced two coronavirus cases in the country, then hours later said that both patients had died. Two days later, Iran announced two additional deaths. The source of the virus in Iran is unknown. By Feb. 20, the number of global cases had risen to nearly 76,000, according to the W.H.O.

FEB. 23, 2020

Italy sees major surge in coronavirus cases and officials lock down towns. Europe faced its first major outbreak as the number of reported cases in Italy grew from fewer than five to more than 150. In the Lombardy region, officials locked down 10 towns after a cluster of cases suddenly emerged in Codogno, southeast of Milan. As a result, schools closed and sporting and cultural events were canceled.

FEB. 24, 2020

The Trump administration asks Congress for $1.25 billion for coronavirus response. As the number of coronavirus cases around the globe continued to climb, the Trump administration began preparing for the virus to arrive in the United States. The White House asked Congress to allocate $1.25 billion in new emergency funds to bolster its preparedness — a significant escalation in the administration’s response. At this point the United States, where Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials warned of an almost certain outbreak, had 35 confirmed cases and no deaths.

Feb. 24, 2020

[“The coronavirus is very much under control in the USA… Stock Market is starting to look very good to me!” -Trump].

FEB. 24, 2020

Iran emerges as a second focus point of the virus. Iran said it had 61 coronavirus cases and 12 deaths, more than any other country but China, and public health experts warned that Iran was a cause for worry — its borders are crossed each year by millions of religious pilgrims, migrant workers and others. Cases in Iraq, Afghanistan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Lebanon, the United Arab Emirates and one in Canada, have been traced back to Iran.

Feb. 25, 2020

[“…My administration is doing a great job of handling the coronavirus… I think that’s a problem that’s going to go away. [The CDC and my administration] have studied it. They know very much. In fact, we’re very close to a vaccine” -Trump].

FEB. 26, 2020

Latin America reports its first coronavirus case. Brazilian health officials said that a 61-year-old São Paulo man, who had returned recently from a business trip to Italy, tested positive for the coronavirus. It was the first known case in Latin America. Officials also began tracking down other passengers on the flight the man took to Brazil and others who had contact with him in recent days.

Feb. 26, 2020

[“The 15 cases within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero… We’re going very substantially down, not up” -Trump].

Feb. 27, 2020

[“One day it’s like a miracle; it will disappear” -Trump].

FEB. 28, 2020

The number of infections in Europe spike. Italy, where 800 people had been infected by Feb. 28, remained an area of concern. Cases in 14 other countries, including Northern Ireland and Wales, could be traced back to Italy. Germany had nearly 60 cases by Feb. 27, and France reported 57, more than triple the number from two days earlier. Both England and Switzerland reported additional cases, while Belarus, Estonia and Lithuania all reported their first infections.

FEB. 28, 2020

Sub-Saharan Africa records its first infection. Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, confirmed its first case of coronavirus on Feb. 28. The patient was an Italian citizen who had returned to Lagos from Milan.

Feb. 28, 2020

[“We’re ordering a lot of supplies. We’re ordering a lot of, uh, elements that frankly we wouldn’t be ordering unless it was something like this. But we’re ordering a lot of different elements of medical” -Trump].

FEB. 29, 2020

The United States records its first coronavirus death and announces travel restrictions. A patient near Seattle became the first coronavirus patient to die in the United States on Feb. 28. As the number of global cases rose to nearly 87,000, the Trump administration issued its highest-level warning, known as a “do not travel” warning, for areas in Italy and South Korea most affected by the virus. The government also banned all travel to Iran and barred entry to any foreign citizen who had visited Iran in the previous 14 days.

March 2, 2020

[“The United States is right now ranked by far number one in the world for preparedness” -Trump].

MARCH 3, 2020

U.S. officials approve widespread coronavirus testing. The C.D.C. lifted all federal restrictions on testing for the coronavirus on March 3, according to Vice President Mike Pence. The news came after the C.D.C.’s first attempt to produce a diagnostic test kit fell flat. By this point, the coronavirus had infected more than 90,000 around the globe and killed about 3,000, according to the W.H.O.

March 3, 2020

[“There’s only one hot spot, and that’s also pretty much in a very, in a home, as you know, in a nursing home” -Trump].

March 6, 2020

[“Anybody who wants a test can get a test. That’s what the bottom line is… And in terms of deaths, I don’t know what the count is today. Is it 11? Eleven people? And in terms of cases, it’s very, very few” -Trump].

MARCH 11, 2020

President Trump blocks most visitors from Continental Europe. In a prime-time address from the Oval Office, Mr. Trump said he would halt travelers from European countries other than Britain for 30 days, as the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a pandemic and stock markets plunged further.

MARCH 13, 2020

President Trump declares a national emergency. Mr. Trump officially declared a national emergency, and said he was making $50 billion in federal funds available to states and territories to combat the coronavirus. He also said he would give hospitals and doctors more flexibility to respond to the virus, including making it easier to treat people remotely.

["I don't take responsibility at all!" -Trump].

March 15, 2020

[“This is a very contagious, this is a very contagious virus. It’s incredible. But it’s something that we have tremendous control of” -Trump].

March 17, 2020

[“I’ve always known this is a real, this is a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic” -Trump].

March 19, 2020

["We're not a shipping clerk" -Trump, referring to the federal government's role in sending out essential medical supplies to the states].

March 20, 2020

[Trump’s answer to reporter Peter Alexander’s question, “What do you say to Americans who are watching you right now who are scared?”: “I say that you’re a terrible reporter, that’s what I say… I think that’s a very nasty question, and I think it’s a very bad signal that you’re putting out to the American people. The American people are looking for answers and they’re looking for hope and you’re doing sensationalism and the same with NBC and Concast. I don’t call it Comcast, I call it Concast! That’s really bad reporting, you ought to get back to reporting instead of sensationalism. Let’s see if it works. It might and it might not. I happen to feel good about it, but who knows? I’ve been right a lot…” -Trump].

NY Times

Two respiratory physicians explain the range of Covid-19 impacts, from no symptoms to severe illness featuring pneumonia

“What became known as Covid-19, or the coronavirus, started in late 2019 as a cluster of pneumonia cases with an unknown cause. The cause of the pneumonia was found to be a new virus – severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2, or Sars-CoV-2. The illness caused by the virus is Covid-19.

“Now declared as a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), the majority of people who contract Covid-19 suffer only mild, cold-like symptoms.

“WHO says about 80% of people with Covid-19 recover without needing any specialist treatment. Only about one person in six becomes seriously ill ‘and develops difficulty breathing.’

“So how can Covid-19 develop into a more serious illness featuring pneumonia, and what does that do to our lungs and the rest of our body? 

How is the virus affecting people?

“Guardian Australia spoke with Prof John Wilson, president-elect of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and a respiratory physician. He says almost all serious consequences of Covid-19 feature pneumonia. Wilson says people who catch Covid-19 can be placed into four broad categories. The least serious are those people who are ‘sub-clinical’ and who have the virus but have no symptoms. 

“Next are those who get an infection in the upper respiratory tract, which, Wilson says, ‘means a person has a fever and a cough and maybe milder symptoms like headache or conjunctivitis.' He says: ‘Those people with minor symptoms are still able to transmit the virus but may not be aware of it.’

“The largest group of those who would be positive for Covid-19, and the people most likely to present to hospitals and surgeries, are those who develop the same flu-like symptoms that would usually keep them off work.

“A fourth group, Wilson says, will develop severe illness that features pneumonia. He says: ‘In Wuhan, it worked out that from those who had tested positive and had sought medical help, roughly 6% had a severe illness.’

“The WHO says the elderly and people with underlying problems like high blood pressure, heart and lung problems or diabetes are more likely to develop serious illness. 

How does the pneumonia develop?

“When people with Covid-19 develop a cough and fever, Wilson says this is a result of the infection reaching the respiratory tree – the air passages that conduct air between the lungs and the outside.

“He says: ‘The lining of the respiratory tree becomes injured, causing inflammation. This in turn irritates the nerves in the lining of the airway. Just a speck of dust can stimulate a cough. But if this gets worse, it goes past just the lining of the airway and goes to the gas exchange units, which are at the end of the air passages. If they become infected, they respond by pouring out inflammatory material into the air sacs that are at the bottom of our lungs.’

“If the air sacs then become inflamed,' Wilson says 'this causes an ‘outpouring of inflammatory material [fluid and inflammatory cells] into the lungs and we end up with pneumonia.’

“He says 'lungs that become filled with inflammatory material are unable to get enough oxygen to the bloodstream, reducing the body’s ability to take on oxygen and get rid of carbon dioxide. That’s the usual cause of death with severe pneumonia,’ 

How can the pneumonia treated?

“Prof Christine Jenkins, chair of Lung Foundation Australia and a leading respiratory physician, told Guardian Australia: ‘Unfortunately, so far, we don’t have anything that can stop people getting Covid-19 pneumonia. People are already trying all sorts of medications and we’re hopeful that we might discover that there are various combinations of viral and anti-viral medications that could be effective. At the moment there isn’t any established treatment apart from supportive treatment, which is what we give people in intensive care. We ventilate them and maintain high oxygen levels until their lungs are able to function in a normal way again as they recover.’ 

“Wilson says 'patients with viral pneumonia are also at risk of developing secondary infections, so they would also be treated with anti-viral medication and antibiotics. In some situations that isn’t enough,’ he says of the current outbreak. ‘The pneumonia went unabated and the patients did not survive.’

Is Covid-19 pneumonia different?

“Jenkins says Covid-19 pneumonia is different from the most common cases that people are admitted to hospitals for. Most types of pneumonia that we know of and that we admit people to hospital for are bacterial and they respond to an antibiotic.’

“Wilson says there is evidence that pneumonia caused by Covid-19 may be particularly severe. He says cases of coronavirus pneumonia tend to affect all of the lungs, instead of just small parts. ‘Once we have an infection in the lung and, if it involves the air sacs, then the body’s response is first to try and destroy [the virus] and limit its replication.’ [Moreover], ‘First responder mechanism can be impaired in some groups, including people with underlying heart and lung conditions, diabetes and the elderly.’

“According to Jenkins, generally, people aged 65 and over are at risk of getting pneumonia, as well as people with medical conditions such as diabetes, cancer or a chronic disease affecting the lungs, heart, kidney or liver, smokers... and infants aged 12 months and under. Age is the major predictor of risk of death from pneumonia. Pneumonia is always serious for an older person and in fact it used to be one of the main causes of death in the elderly. Now we have very good treatments for pneumonia. It’s important to remember that no matter how healthy and active you are, your risk for getting pneumonia increases with age. This is because our immune system naturally weakens with age, making it harder for our bodies to fight off infections and diseases.”

The Guardian

The Epidemiologist Who Helped Defeat Smallpox Explains What's Coming

Steven Levy: I was in the room in 2006 when you gave that TED talk. Your wish was “Help Me Stop Pandemics.” You didn't get your wish, did you?

Epidemiologist Larry Brilliant: No, I didn't get that wish at all, although the systems that I asked for have certainly been created and are being used. It's very funny because we did a movie, Contagion—

We're all watching that movie now.

People say Contagion is prescient. We just saw the science. The whole epidemiological community has been warning everybody for the past 10 or 15 years that it wasn't a question of whether we were going to have a pandemic like this. It was simply when. It's really hard to get people to listen. 

I mean, Trump pushed out the admiral on the National Security Council, who was the only person at that level who's responsible for pandemic defense. With him went his entire down line of employees and staff and relationships. And then Trump removed the [early warning] funding for countries around the world.

I've heard you talk about the significance that this is a “novel” virus.

It doesn't mean a fictitious virus. It’s not like a novel or a novella.

Too bad.

It means it's new. That there is no human being in the world that has immunity as a result of having had it before. That means it’s capable of infecting 7.8 billion of our brothers and sisters.

Since it's novel, we’re still learning about it. Do you believe that if someone gets it and recovers, that person thereafter has immunity?

So, I don't see anything in this virus, even though it's novel, [that contradicts that]. There are cases where people think that they've gotten it again, [but] that's more likely to be a test failure than it is an actual reinfection. But there's going to be tens of millions of us or hundreds of millions of us or more who will get this virus before it's all over, and with large numbers like that, almost anything where you ask “Does this happen?” can happen. That doesn't mean that it is of public health or epidemiological importance.

Is this the worst outbreak you’ve ever seen?

It's the most dangerous pandemic in our lifetime.

We are being asked to do things, certainly, that never happened in my lifetime—stay in the house, stay 6 feet away from other people, don’t go to group gatherings. Are we getting the right advice?

Well, as you reach me, I'm pretending that I'm in a meditation retreat, but I'm actually being semi-quarantined in Marin County. Yes, this is very good advice. 

But did we get good advice from the president of the United States for the first 12 weeks? No. All we got were lies. Saying it’s fake, by saying this is a Democratic hoax. There are still people today who believe that, to their detriment. Speaking as a public health person, this is the most irresponsible act of an elected official that I've ever witnessed in my lifetime. 

But what you're hearing now [to self-isolate, close schools, cancel events] is right. Is it going to protect us completely? Is it going to make the world safe forever? No. It's a great thing because we want to spread out the disease over time.

Flatten the curve.

By slowing it down or flattening it, we're not going to decrease the total number of cases, we're going to postpone many cases, until we get a vaccine—which we will, because there's nothing in the virology that makes me frightened that we won’t get a vaccine in 12 to 18 months. Eventually, we will get to the epidemiologist gold ring.

What’s that?

That means, A, a large enough quantity of us have caught the disease and become immune. And B, we have a vaccine. The combination of A plus B is enough to create herd immunity, which is around 70 or 80 percent.

I hold out hope that we get an antiviral for Covid-19 that is curative, but in addition is prophylactic. It's certainly unproven and it's certainly controversial, and certainly a lot of people are not going to agree with me. But I offer as evidence two papers in 2005, one in Nature and one in Science. They both did mathematical modeling with influenza, to see whether saturation with just Tamiflu of an area around a case of influenza could stop the outbreak. And in both cases, it worked. 

I also offer as evidence the fact that at one point we thought HIV/AIDS was incurable and a death sentence. Then, some wonderful scientists discovered antiviral drugs, and we've learned that some of those drugs can be given prior to exposure and prevent the disease. Because of the intense interest in getting [Covid-19] conquered, we will put the scientific clout and money and resources behind finding antivirals that have prophylactic or preventive characteristics that can be used in addition to [vaccines].

When will we be able to leave the house and go back to work?

I have a very good retrospect-oscope, but what's needed right now is a prospecto-scope. If this were a tennis match, I would say advantage virus right now. But there's really good news from South Korea—they had less than 100 cases today. China had more cases imported than it had from continuous transmission from Wuhan today. The Chinese model will be very hard for us to follow. We're not going to be locking people up in their apartments, boarding them up. But the South Korea model is one that we could follow. Unfortunately, it requires doing the proportionate number of tests that they did—they did well over a quarter of a million tests. In fact, by the time South Korea had done 200,000 tests, we had probably done less than 1,000.

Now that we've missed the opportunity for early testing, is it too late for testing to make a difference?

Absolutely not. Tests would make a measurable difference. We should be doing a stochastic process random probability sample of the country to find out where the hell the virus really is. Because we don't know. Maybe Mississippi is reporting no cases because it's not looking. How would they know? Zimbabwe reports zero cases because they don't have testing capability, not because they don't have the virus. We need something that looks like a home pregnancy test, that you can do at home.

If you were the president for one day, what would you say in the daily briefing?

I would begin the press conference by saying "Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce you to Ron Klain—he was the Ebola czar [under President Barack Obama], and now I’ve called him back and made him Covid czar. Everything will be centralized under one person who has the respect of both the public health community and the political community." We're a divided country right now. Right now, Tony Fauci [head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases] is the closest that we come to that.

Are you scared?

I'm in the age group that has a one in seven mortality rates if I get it. If you're not worried, you're not paying attention. But I'm not scared. I firmly believe that the steps that we're taking will extend the time that it takes for the virus to make the rounds. I think that, in turn, will increase the likelihood that we will have a vaccine or we will have a prophylactic antiviral in time to cut off, reduce, or truncate the spread. Everybody needs to remember: This is not a zombie apocalypse. It's not a mass extinction event.

Should we be wearing masks?

The N95 mask itself is extremely wonderful. The pores in the mask are three microns wide. The virus is one micron wide. So, you get people who say, well, it's not going to work. But you try having three big, huge football players who are rushing for lunch through a door at lunchtime—they're not going to get through. In the latest data I saw, the mask provided 5x protection. That's really good. But we have to keep the hospitals going and we have to keep the health professionals able to come to work and be safe. So, masks should go where they’re needed the most: in taking care of patients.

How will we know when we’re through this?

The world is not going to begin to look normal until three things have happened. One, we figure out whether the distribution of this virus looks like an iceberg, which is one-seventh above the water, or a pyramid, where we see everything. If we're only seeing right now one-seventh of the actual disease because we're not testing enough, and we're just blind to it, then we're in a world of hurt.

Two, we have a treatment that works, a vaccine or antiviral.

And three, maybe most important, we begin to see large numbers of people—in particular nurses, home health care providers, doctors, policemen, firemen, and teachers who have had the disease—are immune, and we have tested them to know that they are not infectious any longer. And we have a system that identifies them, either a concert wristband or a card with their photograph and some kind of a stamp on it. Then we can be comfortable sending our children back to school, because we know the teacher is not infectious.

And instead of saying "No, you can't visit anybody in nursing home," we have a group of people who are certified that they work with elderly and vulnerable people, and nurses who can go back into the hospitals and dentists who can open your mouth and look in your mouth and not be giving you the virus. When those three things happen, that's when normalcy will return.

Is there in any way a brighter side to this?

Well, I'm a scientist, but I'm also a person of faith. And I can't ever look at something without asking the question of isn't there a higher power that in some way will help us to be the best version of ourselves that we could be? I thought we would see the equivalent of empty streets in the civic arena, but the amount of civic engagement is greater than I've ever seen. But I'm seeing young kids, millennials, who are volunteering to go take groceries to people who are homebound, elderly. I'm seeing an incredible influx of nurses, heroic nurses, who are coming and working many more hours than they worked before, doctors who fearlessly go into the hospital to work. I've never seen the kind of volunteerism I'm seeing.

I don't want to pretend that this is an exercise worth going through in order to get to that state. This is a really unprecedented and difficult time that will test us. When we do get through it, maybe like the Second World War, it will cause us to reexamine what has caused the fractional division we have in this country. The virus is an equal opportunity infector. And it’s probably the way we would be better if we saw ourselves that way, which is much more alike than different.   

This interview is from Wired.

Larry Brilliant, MD MPH: Chair, Ending Pandemics; CEO, Pandefense; former Chair, National Bio-Surveillance Advisory Subcommittee; former Prof Epidemiology, UMich, Head of Google.org, CEO Skoll Global Threats, smallpox eradication program WHO, CDC, board member Skoll Foundation, Salesforce.org founder, Seva Foundation, co-founder The Well and author of Sometimes Brilliant and The Management of Smallpox Eradication. TIME100 and Ted Prize; multiple honorary doctorates, CNN on-air analyst @larrybrilliant. info@larrybrilliant.com