The science and tech is usually always there to tackle problems. It's the political will and policymaking ability which pulls things back.

Yeah, personally very upset about the policymaking that prevented the hundreds of vaccines/treatments ready on day 1 from hitting the market.

Or are we just talking about the ones that work?

In fairness, scientists have no doubt about climate change either. And yet, here we are. That's exactly my point.

Sure, science was never the problem.

It’s always a few people that save everything before resulting in a clown fiesta. I hope there will always be the few people.

And all it needed was a Great Depression-level drop in the stock market, every ICU filled to the brim for months, and thousands dying every day.

The effects of climate change have occurred much more slowly and silently. At some point it will no longer be silent, but it will already be too late to meaningfully change its trajectory.

And let's not sugarcoat it, the pandemic is far from over, there are still thousands dying every day, but we're pretending that it's all much better now because we are not currently at the peak.

But in truth, and on a global scale, when it comes to new cases and deaths we are at roughly 60% of that peak right now, and still going up quite rapidly.

edit: And of course, the fact that the bulk of the problem is now facing the developed world certainly isn't a factor. /s

Let's see how long that attitude lasts, once we realize that covid anywhere is the equivalent of covid everywhere there may be a change of heart there.

Mobilizing scientists is easy because you don’t need to explain to them that everyone’s survival depends on it.

It only becomes difficult when you have to mobilize politicians and regular folks.

We've done a great job of making everyone's life difficult enough that they don't have the spare cycles to worry about anything farther away than next week.

How many people would take the vaccine if it meant their great grandchildren might see some benefits.

And in fairness, lot's of smart people have worked to create renewable alternatives to energy, etc.; but a subset of society has decided we don't need that. Sounds a lot like the COVID/vaccine situation.