After an agonizingly long wait to even get to security at Denver International Airport in mid-October, we made certain we arrived a whopping THREE hours prior to boarding on our two flights this past week to Seattle and back.
Of course, we whisked through both security lines in record time. Denver clocked in at ten minutes, while Seattle was even quicker, at seven.
I felt both relieved and annoyed by the efficiency of TSA in full emergency mode, or far more people working, or whatever happened. It's always better to be a bit earlier than needed, as Kathleen often reminds me, but there is also something to be said for minimizing the time we spend confined in a airport.
My hope is the recent announcement of the newest of the Covid variants -- omicron -- might produce the same emotions: a mix of relief and annoyance.
As always, the news media have opted for mostly "worst case" scenarios -- which may turn out to be true, BTW -- over other, perhaps more logical ways the new mutation may go.
Most viruses TEND to evolve into more contagious but less deadly versions, and that makes sense even to a layman such as myself. If the "purpose" of a virus is to replicate itself, killing off your hosts leads to elimination, so instead developing quick transmission mechanisms seems evolution-friendly.
Our instruments in fighting the virus are quite blunt, it turns out, as the world once again attempts to slow or stop the spread through travel restrictions. But this is always too late, since the mutations have already traveled.
We just have to do SOMETHING.
Just as wearing a mask into a restaurant before immediately doffing it to eat or drink seems like a bit of theater, and just as putting our shoes on a conveyor belt to be examined for explosives -- but not a bulky sweater -- seems based on fears from 20 years ago, so imposing a travel ban AFTER infected people have traveled seems like too little, too late.
My three Pfizer vaccine doses may help me avoid omicron or may not. There's a chance the drug makers will need to produce yet another version of the vaccine that directly addresses omicron's threats.
All I know is that you can't go wrong buying stock in a drug company that is fighting the pandemic. Human nature means there will be no end to the threats.
And no end to the profits.
No comments:
Post a Comment