Bring Out Your Dead
The working title of this piece began with the word “Throw”
but when I mentioned that to a friend, a
Jesuit priest at the nearby university, he suggested it was “a bit too cold-hearted,
inhumane 21st Century.” Recognizing I may soon be in need of his
services, I reverted to the historic version of the phrase.
In 1347, almost 700 years ago, in Italy, where the toll is
now climbing despite much of the country being on lockdown, a plague called The
Black Death arrived with travelers from Asia. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Entire towns were wiped out. People who fled
to the countryside did not know that livestock was also infected and
contagious. Universities were abandoned. Learning and civilization shut down.
Firm statistics are impossible to confirm, but some estimates
say one-third to one-half of Europe’s population perished over the course of 3
to 5 years before the plague burned itself out. It may have killed more than 20
million Europeans and an estimated 200 million in Europe and Asia.
Monty Python dramatized it https://youtu.be/GU0d8kpybVg
Which brings us to Eric Idle’s advice to always look on the
bright side of life. When you consider Covid’s
high mortality rate among seniors, it does suggest a possible solution to the
often predicted collapse of the Social Security system. Also, after a brief burst in demand, Medicare
claims will dry up. The post-WW2 baby boomers have been cashing in at the rate
of thousands of new recipients per day. But, thanks (if that’s the right word)
to the virus, there might soon be a huge drop in active beneficiaries.
The loss of revenue due to generous senior discounts on
public transit and movie theaters may slow. Fewer expensive handrails in public
bathrooms. Faster moving supermarket aisles. More parking spaces close to the
door at Walmart.
If you haven’t yet heard that the virus is a conspiracy to
accomplish all that, consider yourself on notice.
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