Long Stretch

Looks pretty harmless doesn't it?  Kind of like a ball of textured yarn.  Sort of. 

So many people not understanding what a virus is.  How it works.  Frankly we still don't know much about this one, in part because the effect it has on the human body is complex and individuals can react in unexpected ways.

We don't know the extent of the 'injury' that it causes to the body or how long those effects will linger.  We are beginning to understand that we can be re-infected because the rate of mutation is high and just because you may have had it in February, doesn't mean you won't get it again in July.  As some people have already experienced.

People are saying 'it's just the flu'.  People are saying 'just everyone get it so that everyone will have had it and get it over and done with.'  People are saying 'yeah a few people will die, everyone dies.'

While that last one is true, I for one don't want to die just yet.  And most certainly not from this virus.

Until there is a cure, all we have are treatments for the symptoms.  And if you don't like wearing a mask, I can guarantee you will hate a ventilator.  Ventilators are so awful that when I had to have one for my cardiac surgery, they gave me a drug to make me forget having been on it.  That's how awful it is to be on one.

And hospitals are running out of such drugs because so many people are requiring a ventilator or a bed in the ICU.  Which is why it is important to flatten the curve - so that hospitals and medical practitioners are not overwhelmed with patients requiring complex care.

If you are old enough to remember polio, cast your mind back to the iron lung.  How much fun was that?  And yes, people died from polio.  A percentage of people were left with muscle weakness and mobility issues.  Decades later people were dealing with something called 'post polio syndrome'.

While I live in a town with a very low rate of cases (so far) it will take just one person shedding the virus to start an outbreak.

So I will continue to stay safely at home (because I can remove myself from the line of transmission), when I go out I will wear a mask if I can't guarantee safe social distance (minimum of six feet), and wash my hands when I get home.

We may be done with the virus, but the virus is not done with us.  Yet.