From TPM Reader Anon …
I would say my COVID-19 turning point was January 25, 2020. I had also been following what was going on in Wuhan, but then saw a post at dKos by a member who goes by the name of AKALib. The post was titled “Wuhan Coronavirus – An Update, Prognosis and Projections”. It listed 18 countries that the virus was in, including 5 cases in the U.S. The post included clear graphs showing exponential growth of cases, and statements by virologists:
“I’ve seen it all: bird flu, SARS, influenza A, swine fever and the rest. But the Wuhan pneumonia makes me feel extremely powerless. Most of the past epidemics were controllable, but this time, I’m petrified.”-Gaun Yi.
“Infectious disease modeller/epidemiologist. Director of J-IDEA and the MRC Centre for Global Infectious Disease Analysis “…start planning for the scenario that containment efforts may not succeed.” -Neil FergusonIt was then that I realized that the virus is in the U.S and it is going to explode. I had planned a trip to the Tucson Sonoran Desert Museum and The Grand Canyon for a foreign exchange from Italy that was living with me and my wife. I told them that day that we may have to reconsider the trip at the rate the disease was developing. I cancelled all flights and travel arrangements on March 12th, two days before we were to leave. After her Spring break (on South Padre Island, where we live, which is a whole other story) the high school never started up again, and our exchange student was required to return to Italy by April 8th, one of the last exchange students to leave our area.
It was around this time that I became so disgusted with the U.S approach to the pandemic, that I decided to leave retirement and go back to work at a local university to help develop antibody assays for COVID-19, and that is what I am now doing. Not as heartbreaking as so many other stories you will hear, but a drastic change to how my life was going before the virus.
