With all due respect, that's whataboutism. Life is much better than it would be under Ebola, too, but the issue here is that overall quality of life has deteriorated for most humans over the last two years due to the restrictions and interventions related to Covid-19.
> Life in the UK, where vaccination rates are very high, is pretty much normal.
In the UK, but also in many other previously liberal democracies the following are happening at present:
- Freedom of association and freedom of assembly are being made conditional or removed.
- Freedom to travel is being made conditional or removed.
- Freedom to just take part in daily life, e.g. go shopping is being made conditional.
- Freedom to protest is being reduced or removed.
The rule sets under which all this is happening are capricious, changing frequently, based on mostly political considerations with only a sprinkling of scientific reasoning. This removes agency from each of us.
Whether one becomes subject to a restrictive rule by the accident of becoming infected is mostly outside the control of any one person. So this, too, removes agency from each of us.
I see entire countries descending into learned helplessness, while political elites flout the rules they make for others and exploit the urgency of procurement caused by the pandemic to enrich themselves.
This is not a world I want to live in. Improved acceptability of WFH doesn't come close to compensating for all the above.
That said, there is a light at the end of this tunnel. Life in the UK, where vaccination rates are very high, is pretty much normal. Everything is open. Masks were optional until the Omicron scare, we’ll see how it goes. Nurseries, cinemas, restaurants all open, pretty much as normal (cleaner than in the past which is a win).
Maybe it will get worse again but let’s hope not.
Without making hyperbolic comparisons, life is much better net than it was under Bubonic Plague. We’ve seen the alternative to paranoid infection regimes, and it’s total chaos and overwhelmed hospitals. So we’ve been dealt a shit hand and trying to play is as best as we can.