Lessons from the SARS epidemic

The bad boy virus COVID-19 is on Canada’s doorstep, trying to smash down the door.

The betting is that it will break through and spread into communities across the country. It has infected people in more than 60 countries and is about to become a global pandemic.

The SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) crisis of 2003-2004 gave us good lessons about how to handle infectious disease emergencies. I’m not certain how well we have learned from those lessons, but I guess we are about to find out.

One important lesson of SARS is: Keep the politicians out of this. Medical crises need to be handled by medical professionals basing decisions on science, not politicians acting on the whims and wishes of their parties and their supporters.

The SARS Commission, an independent panel established to investigate the introduction and spread of SARS, reported that crisis demonstrated the importance of “medical leadership that is free of bureaucratic and political pressure.”

“SARS showed us that while co-operation and teamwork are important, it is essential that one person be in overall charge of our public health defence against infectious outbreaks,” the commission said. “The Chief Medical Officer of Health should be in charge of public health emergency planning and public health emergency management.”

The United States has ignored this lesson, and that’s bad news for us because it is our closest neighbour.

President Donald Trump has appointed politically toxic Vice-President Mike Pence to lead that country’s efforts against the virus. Pence was governor of Indiana during the 2015 HIV epidemic there and was criticized for his handling of that health emergency. It took him two months to declare an emergency, then critics accused him of saying that prayer, not science, was the way to stop the epidemic.

Another key lesson from SARS was the importance of effective communication that is factual and undistorted: Effective information provided by medically-trained people whose jobs are to make decisions on rigorously tested evidence.

U.S.  medical authorities now are forbidden to make COVID-19 information public without having it vetted by Pence.

We individual citizens need to ignore misinformation campaigns, conspiracy theories and other factless information that floats through the airways as easily as the virus itself.

We all need to listen to our medical professionals, and not overreact. Fear tends to give people louder voices, and emptier heads.

For instance, don’t run out and stock up on medical masks. Masks bought off a drugstore shelf will not prevent you from getting the virus. They don’t stop tiny particles from being inhaled into the lungs.

Masks that do block tiny particles, such as the N95 respirators, often are in short supply during epidemics and should be reserved for medical workers.

The other thing about masks, even those effective in filtering tiny particles, is that you just can’t slap them on your face and be guaranteed safe. They need to be properly fitted by someone who knows what they are doing.

Health professionals say that the best way to prevent infection is to be vigorous in practising basic hygiene.

Wash your hands regularly, and properly. Most of us do that after using a washroom, but don’t after touching handrails or something else used by hundreds of other people.

Wearing rubber gloves is not recommended because they pick up germs just as your skin does. If you are washing your hands regularly, you don’t need gloves.

Health professionals also advise avoiding crowded places, and touching things that a lot of other people touch. Keep a few feet of distance from people who are coughing or sneezing.

The SARS Commission emphasized the precautionary principle: That where there is reasonable evidence of a public health threat we should not wait for absolute proof of the threat before taking action against it.

COVID-19 is a threat requiring individuals to take precautions – based on accurate medical information - in a calm and reasonable manner.

“Public co-operation is essential in the fight against any outbreak of infection,” the SARS Commission said in its final report . . . . “It was voluntary public co-operation, not legal orders or emergency powers, that won the fight against SARS.”

Public cooperation means voluntarily isolating yourself if you feel ill during this COVID-19 epidemic and checking with your healthcare professional sooner than later.

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The story of Trumpinocchio

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin was a solitary child with no interest in things that amused other children. His sole plaything was a fat red crayon with which he drew world maps.

His crayoned maps showed a world in which Russia was given greater space and prominence. One showed Greenland as part of the United States. A later one showed the U.S., including Greenland, a part of Russia.

Vladimir Spiridonovich Putin and Maria Ivanova Putina worried that their son Vladi was too introspective, too sullen. They consulted a child psychiatrist who recommended a hobby for the boy, so they bought him a wood carving set.

Vladi was delighted. His first project was a puppet. He carved the legs, arms, body from tamarack and the head from soft pine. He glued on yellow straw for hair.

Then he strung all the pieces together with strings attached to an X crossbar.

He practised manipulating the cross bar so the puppet danced and jumped and did whatever Vladi wanted it to do.

He wanted to name his puppet Goldilocks but it did not translate well into Russian. So he called it Trumpinocchio, which translates as pine seed brain.

Vladi worked the strings so expertly that the puppet looked like a real person - arms and legs moving, eyes blinking.

Then one day the puppet’s lips moved. They just twitched at first, then fluttered, then flapped at hurricane force speed.

“I want to be a real person,” Trumpinocchio began jabbering. “A real guy who does really big things and makes things really great again. Are there any cheeseburgers here?”

Vladi was excited. But as the weeks passed the blabbering puppet became annoying, pestering relentlessly about becoming a real person.

So Vladi took him to see Baba Yaga, a mystical woman who lived in a dark forest nearby, and was known for her magic.

Baba Yaga granted magical favours to important and powerful people, and could see into the future that Vladi would become a spymaster, spin doctor and powerful politician. She agreed to turn Trumpinocchio into a real person.

“But I can’t guarantee how he will turn out,” she warned. “It’s hard to predict when the head is made of pine. He needs to go to school.”

So the Putins enrolled Trumpinocchio in school, bought him a laptop computer and signed him up for a Twitter account. He blabbered and Twittered incessantly, bragging about his accomplishments and spreading fake news about teachers and students at his school.

At home he preened at the bathroom mirror for long periods, causing other household members to have bladder accidents. There was constant arguing over the television because he hogged it to watch American shows.

Trumpinocchio refused to learn to spell or to add numbers. The school nurse observed that his nose grew whenever he lied, which was often. The school principal reported complaints from female students.

“He’s ruining our lives,” Mr. Putin Sr. told his family. “He’s taken over the bathroom! He’s taken over the TV! Yesterday he walked into the door and punched a hole in it with his nose. He’s got to go!”

“Send him to America,” said Mrs. Putin. “He’s always talking about Big Macs and Cokes.”

So Vladi called his friend Mitchikov and asked him to help settle Trumpinocchio in America where Vladi expected that he might become useful.

Vladi financed his puppet in various business ventures, including real estate, but they all failed because Trumpinocchio could not add. There was Trumpinocchio Airlines, Trumpinocchio Hotels, Trumpinocchio University. Even Trumpinocchio Vodka with its 24-karat gold labelling went bankrupt.

As predicted, Vladi became a powerful Russian spymaster, who was increasingly frustrated that Trumpinocchio could not get focussed and become useful.

So he returned to the dark forest to consult Baba Yaga. Her advice was cryptic.

“Look beyond what you can see, Vladimir,”  she said. “Reality is what you tell people it is. There are always alternate facts and alternate realities. Go back to Moscow and think about what I have told you.”

Vladi spent days in his Kremlin office pondering Baba Yaga’s enigmatic advice. Then it hit him like a lightning bolt. He grabbed his telephone and called America.

Some months later Trumpinocchio became a reality TV star.

And, as they say, the rest is history.

Why I can’t stomach Trump

When you write, you get messages from readers. Some are complimentary. Some are not.

I have received a couple that accuse me of being anti-American, anti-Donald Trump.

Yes, I am anti-Trump. I can’t stomach the man.

But I’ve never really understood exactly why. Why should a basic Canadian nobody be concerned or have any feelings about who is president of the United States or what is happening in that distant country?

I discovered why last week when I was watching a TV news clip while doing some history research. The news clip was about the New York Times’ new publisher,  A. G. Sulzberger, meeting Trump to discuss Trump’s constant denigration of the news media.

In the meeting Trump boasted about rising out of the Jamaica, Queens neighbourhood of New York City to become president of the U.S.A. As if he is some unfortunate who overcame the disadvantages of poor living conditions and attained the country’s highest office.

That’s when I returned to the history research I had just set aside. It was research on another New York City neighbourhood and a person who was the exact opposite of Donald Trump.

That person was Deborah Moody, a strong, keenly intellectual woman who founded Gravesend, which became part of Brooklyn, the borough neighbouring Trump’s Queens.

Deborah Moody was born in 1586 to a wealthy and religious English family. She came into more wealth and power when she married Henry Moody, an estate owner and member of Parliament who was knighted, then made a baron.

Henry died young and Deborah, now Lady Moody, was left to run Gareson, their substantial estate. She immediately ran afoul of the dreaded English Star Chamber, which dictated the duties of estate owners.

Then she ran afoul of religious fanatics who were burning people at the stake for having different views. Lady Moody was an Anabaptist, a person who believes babies should not be baptised until they reach an age of reason when they can truly understand and commit to Christianity.

Fed up with restrictions on individual freedoms, she sailed to America’s Massachusetts Bay Colony to begin a new life. Puritan religious leaders there were annoyed by her Anabaptist views, labelled her a dangerous woman and excommunicated her. So she and some followers moved to New Netherland, the Dutch colony that later became New York when it was taken over by the British.

The Dutch offered her land that is now part of Brooklyn, told her she could build a town there and have total freedom of civil and religious beliefs. Lady Moody became the only known woman to establish a town in colonial North America.

She and her followers laid out streets, built houses and other buildings, including a church to be used by all faiths, including Quakers who were not appreciated by the Dutch Calvinists.

Lady Moody became the mayor of the new town of Gravesend and wrote its charter, part of which reads:

“There shall be complete social, political and religious freedom. In agriculture and cultural development, we shall open the door to wayfarers of whatever creed . . . .”

Deborah Moody was everything that Donald Trump is not. She was an intelligent visionary, a successful builder and a dynamic leader who attracted committed followers because she believed in them and in protecting their rights.

One of those followers was a guy named John Poling who helped with the others to build the town. He was an ordinary guy, not known for anything, except perhaps for being the progenitor of my Poling family lineage.

His line produced seven generations of evangelical ministers, the last of whom was my distant cousin Lieutenant Clark Vandersall Poling, a U.S. Army chaplain.

Seventy-six years ago this week, Clark Poling and three other military chaplains drowned in the torpedoing of the troop ship SS Dorchester headed to the war in Europe. They died after helping soldiers into life boats and giving their own life jackets to those who did not have them.

Deborah Moody, her followers and their ancestors were unselfish comforters, givers and builders. Donald Trump is a distempered, self-centred taker who says he prefers soldiers who don’t get captured, or presumably killed.

The comparison is why I can’t stomach the man.

Laughing out loud

It is indeed a wonderful life, especially when we begin laughing at ourselves.

Laughter is a magic elixir that improves our lives. It is a bonding agent that calms conflict and helps us get along with each other. We need more of it in an increasingly troubled and angry world.

Judging by some recent television viewing, we are getting more if it.

For example, NBC’s Saturday Night Live (SNL) is giving us strong doses of laughter by poking fun at the train wreck of American politics. A train wreck that is causing hardship and division around the world.

SNL’s recent parody of the 1946 movie It’s A Wonderful Life is an example of how laughing at ourselves better equips us to face the madness surrounding us.

A little memory jog: In the movie, George Bailey, played by actor James Stewart, is overwhelmed by problems and decides to jump off a bridge and end his life. A wingless  angel named Clarence appears and shows him what George’s town would have looked liked without all his work over the years.

The SNL version has Donald Trump, overwhelmed by problems, wishing he had never become president. Enter Clarence the angel who shows Trump what life would be like if he had not become president.

Melania is divorced and speaks clearly and without an accent. “They said being around you was hurting my language skills,” she tells Trump.

Mike Pence is a DJ at a White House Christmas party, happy and thankful that he did not have to sit in meetings as vice-president and look stone-faced bored and stupid.

Near the end of the 1946 movie the little daughter of George Bailey tells her dad that whenever a bell rings, an angel has received its wings.

In the SNL version, Kellyanne Conway, one of Trump’s mouthpieces, says to her boss: “Every time a bell rings, somebody you know quits, or goes to jail,”   

Canadian television also has us laughing at ourselves with the popular CBC show Still Standing. It is a hybrid comedy-reality series in which Newfoundland comedian Jonny Harris visits small Canadian towns that have gone through hard times.

Harris, also seen in the Murdoch Mysteries TV series, gives stand-up comedy shows in front of locals who have stuck it out in their towns, getting them to laugh at themselves. Along with the stand-up routine are video clips of Harris doing stuff with some of the residents.

For instance in a recent show from Wells, B.C. (population 245) Harris takes a side-by-side four-wheeler pedal bike ride along a snowy street with resident writer-actor-director James Douglas. Douglas is the filmmaker behind The Doctor’s Case, an award-winning movie based on a Stephen King short story.

During the ride Harris and his TV audience  learn about the town’s founder, Fred Wells, who discovered gold there. Wells was a mining boom town during the 1930s but as mining waned so did the town. Then in the 1970s hippies moved in, buying vacant houses and properties and established an arts community.

The town now is a mix of artists and miners, a dichotomy that Harris explores along with its stories and aspirations, weaving in jokes about the town and its people.

The towns Harris visits all have something sad in their past. A fishery collapsed and young people moved away. A logging operation closed, cancelling most of the town’s jobs.

Still Standing recognizes the melancholy produced by past events but finds humour that helps the residents laugh, or at least smile, at themselves. It also recognizes their resilience in staying on and working at building a strong community spirit.

It is a show that makes you feel good despite difficulties and reinforces the age-old message that good people overcome bad things when they laugh and work together.

Here’s how one person on Twitter described a Still Standing episode: “I needed that. The world (and my twitter feed) has been so UGH. @jollyharris and @StillStandingTV gives hope, spreads light & humor and shows us the best of people.”

We all need more of this. Hopefully we will see more of it as we enter 2019, which some folks say will bring continuing social, economic, political and climate upheaval.

Email: shaman@vianet.ca
Profile: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B001K8FY3Y