Fear and COVID-19 by Sydney Williams
Fear is an elemental emotion. It can have positive attributes. In combat, fear is a governor on impulse. Fear of wild animals and other tribes was a factor in early man’s forming of communities. It is ubiquitous. We have fears of darkness and loneliness, of failure or rejection, of making wrong decisions. We fear becoming ill or being a burden to loved ones. Fear, we were told by Bertrand Russell, is the main source of superstition. Fear of sorcery was behind the Salem Witch Trials of 1692, which saw fourteen women and five men hung. It descends from ignorance, which wrote Herman Melville in Moby Dick, “is the parent of fear.” Unwarranted fear prevents us from expanding our horizons and improving our lives.
Unscrupulous politicians use fear to seek and hold power. Tyrant-like, they tell us what cannot be done. Classical liberals, like the Founding Fathers, tell us what rights we have – what can be done. With COVID-19, fear has been used for political gain. By the end of 2019, President Trump’s policies had accelerated economic growth. They had provided the lowest unemployment on record, including Black unemployment. Increases in wages for low-income workers outpaced pay rises for upper-income workers. Amir Taheri, the Iranian-born, Europe-based author, wrote: “Prior to the coronavirus crisis, his [Trump’s] administration had one of the best records in job creation and the reduction of poverty among black Americans.” Since the economy is the single most important aspect in a Presidential election, Mr. Trump’s glidepath to re-election, while by no means assured, appeared to have few – and manageable – obstacles.
The arrival of COVID-19 and the resulting shut-down of schools, colleges and the economy changed election dynamics. There is no question that COVID-19 was (and is) a serious health concern, particularly for the elderly and especially for those with comorbidities. Nevertheless, fear was the instrument employed by politicians of both parties. While younger people could (and do) contact the disease, and potentially contaminate riskier segments of the population, the risk to their health was not much worse than that of a bad case of the flu. We will never know what death counts would have been had there been no early shutdowns, but we do know the death tolls from the flu pandemics of 1917-19, 1957-58 and 1968, when there was no shuttering of the economy or schools. Adjusted for changes in population, death rates, with the exception of 1917-1919, were worse during the previous pandemics. In fact, in speaking to friends with whom I was at school in 1957-58 not one had any memory of the flu that year. Yet it killed 116,000 Americans when the population was about one half of what it is today.
In an on-line lecture for Hillsdale College, Heather MacDonald of the Manhattan Institute said that the spread of coronavirus infections “…require what Japan calls the three Cs: confined spaces, crowded places and close contact.” The job of public health officials and politicians should be to limit those venues, to protect the vulnerable, and to urge the public to rely on common sensical behavior as it pertains to personal hygiene, distancing and mask-wearing. Masks, as we all know, should be worn indoors when around others. But, as we also know, they reduce the available oxygen and increase the amount of carbon dioxide we inhale. Edward Cline, in a recent essay for his Rule of Reason blog, noted that the “Occupational Safety and Health Agencies around the world confirm the minimum level of oxygen in the air we breathe should be 19.5%, while carbon dioxide should be around 400 parts per million.” Masks lower the first number and raise the second, so care should be taken when wearing one. Healthcare workers must wear them, and there is no question that they help slow the spread of the virus when one is in close contact with other people. Yet fear has made them pervasive in outdoor settings, to the extent that friends tell me they wear masks while driving alone in their cars, for the virtue-signaling message that doing so sends to others, the less virtuous (like me).
While epidemiologists have responsibility for risks from the virus, politicians have responsibility for both the health and economic well-being of the people, and the media has a responsibility to accurately report news, both that which supports their biases and that which does not. Politicians and media types, none of whom had jobs at risk, placed priority on stopping the pandemic above concerns for the economy. Yet a survey last year conducted by the National Foundation for Credit Counseling found that 45% of U.S. households (fifty-one million) have no savings and 70% have less than a $1000.00. Shutting down the economy caused 40 million Americans, a quarter of the workforce, to lose their jobs, at least temporarily. Congress alleviated economic fears by passing expensive relief packages – a necessary measure – but in doing so raised fears among those who worry about a build-up of debt that must be repaid. No government can survive long on printing presses. All governments tax the productivity of workers. A growing economy, and a concomitant expansion of government services, requires rule of law, protection of private property and an environment that encourages capital investment, all necessary for economic growth.
That fear has become pervasive in this election year can be seen in a media hellbent on defeating President Trump. One example: In last Sunday’s New York Times, a top-right two-column headline, with undisguised bias: “Passing Off Virus Burden, White House Fueled Crisis.” Just below the fold, another editorialized front-page headline covering four columns: “Rising Mistrust of ‘Warp-Speed’ Vaccine May Prolong Pandemic.” If that weren’t enough, and to ensure that readers remain comatose, the front page of The New York Times Magazine: “Why We’re Losing the Battle With COVID-19.” There is no question that the Times deliberately scares people about the virus – I am sure they would say it is for their own good – but the corollary is that economic fear is the progeny of fear of COVID-19. Thus, things worsen.
“The enemy is fear,” said Gandhi. “We think it is hate, but it is fear.” In George Lucas’ movie “Star Wars,” the Jedi master Yoda says, “Fear is the path to darkness. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” While fear has been used by tyrants forever, its use by democracies is rarer and thus more insidious. Governors have used fear of COVID-19 to rule by executive decree rather than relying on the legislative process. What they don’t acknowledge is that that fear creates psychological problems – anxiety and depression, especially for the elderly living alone. It damages our ability to control our emotions. No matter how serious has been COVID-19 as a pandemic, fear has made the problem worse.
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