Originally Posted by Jeffery J. Haas
Originally Posted by NW Ponderer
Finally, I am excited about the remdesivir results. It will probably only be a stop-gap until a better, more specific anti-viral is developed.

I am experiencing a mixture of hopefulness and despair, hopefulness because Remdesivir might be promising, and despair because it may turn out that CV19 is just the first in a large FAMILY of new virii, each of which want to take a whack at the human race.

Maybe Mother Earth has decided she's had enough of us and this is just the first hit, with a fusillade of hits to come.

The SARS family of coronavirii are not new, but it's possible that this is the shining moment where SARS decided it likes us too much to just let us go.
I, too, experience this cycle of hope and despair. And anger. I am mightily angry that the current circumstance has come to pass because of endemic short-sightedness. We've known the risk of a SARS-related pandemic for decades - DECADES - and steps were initially taken to mitigate the potential catastrophe we are experiencing.

After the H1N1 epidemic of 2009, which WAS so contained, our national leadership (read: Republicans) simply lost the thread. The budget was slashed, requiring Hobson's choices for the Obama Administration about what to restock in the National Stockpile - unfortunately making some of the wrong choices. But those understandable choices were exacerbated by the completely insane choices of the current administration. Disbanding the Pandemic Response Team, demoting experts that issued warnings about the potential catastrophe that was looming (sounds like China's response, actually), stubbornly refusing to take steps to mitigate the impact - with warnings, restocking, or planning, and pushing the response to the State and local level - for a NATIONAL epidemic. That is inexcusable. Until the leadership is reorganized (removed), I fear the worst.