we have got to start taking our place on this planet seriously and not as a privilege and also not over-congratulating ourselves when we scrape by once again. we cannot continue to ignore people saying, with mountains of evidence, that events will happen. and we cannot sustain growth at all costs economies and policies.
but your point is good. we gotta get through this first and maintain a sense of calm and hope. but we really have got to take a step back and re-evaluate when this passes in whatever form it does.
You say overpopulation is a problem? Fine. Give me a practical and ethical solution.
You say encroachment on wildlife? Ok, fine. Please provide a practical and ethical solution.
We, as people, live on this planet. By and large people are doing the best they can. Should we do more for the environment? Of course. But suggesting that disease as a result of overpopulation is our fault without offering a practical solution adds nothing to the dialog.
Governments shutting down pandemic response units (eg https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/03/14/world/science-h...) because there hasn't been a pandemic recently is a self-imposed, short-sighted, and unnecessary limit.
It's not fair to say the healthcare system has limits if you're only providing the bare minimum (or less).
One government specifically did this.
> It's not fair to say the healthcare system has limits if you're only providing the bare minimum
Healthcare systems all over the world are struggling are preparing to struggle in the coming weeks, many of which do not provide only the 'bare minimum' but seek to provide good national coverage.
While we'd all love to see more joined up thinking between countries in tackling these kinds of crises both during and before, you're being unnecessarily harsh. We are human after all.
Except they didn't, see my reply above.
Check your source. This appears to have been disproved.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/16/no-white-...
So, yes, they downsized and consolidated, but the area of importance at the moment is still there, still functional. That's very different from what's being portrayed and parroted here and elsewhere.
so your response is to just throw our hands up in the air and say "shit happens"? how is that productive in any way? that's exactly how we got here.
this article is a good read: http://nautil.us/issue/83/intelligence/the-man-who-saw-the-p...
just because there are viruses existing in the world doesn't mean we should be cavalier with them. over-population and our encroachment on wildlife is what's leading to the increasing rate of transfers of zoonotic viruses.
> You say overpopulation is a problem? Fine. Give me a practical and ethical solution.
> You say encroachment on wildlife? Ok, fine. Please provide a practical and ethical solution.
you seem to imply that there is literally no point in talking about these problems? as if we couldn't possibly come up with practical and ethical solutions? it isn't an argument to say "unless you have a detailed solution at this moment then the problem isn't a problem". a problem without a solution is still a problem. your argument is petulant.
> But suggesting that disease as a result of overpopulation is our fault without offering a practical solution adds nothing to the dialog.
it's not my suggestion. it's experts' conclusions based strongly upon evidence. it does further the dialog. viruses of this nature, and other issues facing humanity, have happened and will continue to happen at increasing rates. there is no need to have such a huge human population other than narcissism and selfishness. there is no need to eat certain animals. there are not a lot of reasons for much of the stuff we do other than we do it because we can. (however, a lot of interactions with animals with increase naturally simply due to our expansion into their habitat.)
how in the world does it further the dialog to say shit happens and we live on this planet and do our best?
The solutions are well known to a lot of problems we have, we just don't want to talk about them!
Why don't we, for example, look at how all these lock downs we are having to do to slow down the virus spread are impacting the environment positively? So, why don't we try some of this on a more permanent basics to slow down climate change?? The effort for me as a person has been incredibly little: just work from home and avoid going to restaurants and public events. That's it! The effect on the economy would certainly be huge, but what is our priority? You know, and I know, the answer.
But tell me what's next? Dont link to articles from academics and theoretical posits. Tell me what we actually DO without mandated birth control, resource allowance/ration...
I get that we are part of the problem. But that's going to happen again. We can be aggravated that the ignorant population wont get in line or we can talk actual practical solutions. I'm game for a dialog. You go first.
Also, the disease itself may not have been our fault, but the sheer incompetence of many countries in dealing with it most certainly is.
Sorry to say it, but that just demonstrates a major lack of knowledge of this situation and the events that led up to it and the way it was handled. Some of which go back years.
The fact that you think this is just a matter of our medical system. The fact that you think (“shit happens”) that there wasn’t really anything that could have been done.
I don’t have the time or energy to dig up a list of thing for you to read but if you want you’ll be able to find stuff if you read around and do some googling.
Here’s one thing to read https://www.businessinsider.com.au/bill-gates-warns-the-next...
^ this is a list of problems I read in the news over the past few days. Pretty sure there are a lot of solutions people have been proposing, most of which are completely feasible.
Bailouts, which are likely to come, will be from the US government through the Treasury, however.
These two sentences are just waiting for a punch line.