COVID-19: A Cultural & Darwinian Choice

To: American Public, US Policy Makers and News Entities

America and the world are anxiously awaiting a COVID-19 vaccine(s). Under more normal times this anxiety would be a unifying circumstance and in much of the world efforts to develop a Corona virus vaccine is operating more as a unifying effort but not in the United States. In the US, there is virtually no facet of the Corona virus pandemic that has not been wastefully misused because of politics. Not even the normal stupidity of politics, but raised to an extraordinary level of incompetence, abuse, and divisiveness. In a sad way, just another example of American exceptionalism; but not of the type that Americans want the nation’s image to be tarnished by. Much of the damage being inflicted on the US’s reputation, image and standing comes from our political parties and elected representatives. What motivates this self-inflicted damage? The 2020 elections. This is hardly surprising, but it magnifies the importance of having accurate information, competent decision-making, and informed policies when reacting to a national crisis (or to national issues). We have seen the impacts of poor & foolish governance in reacting to the spread of the virus. We have seen the impact of slowly responding to healthcare resources and needs in treating those infected. We are still dealing with the inadequate and inept policies of containing the outbreaks across the nation. And the economic fallout has shown how ill-suited our political leaders are in addressing the needs of the public and the interests of the nation.

As we await a vaccine that will enable the US to bring the Corona virus under control, the process of developing a vaccine has also come under the interfering thumb of politics. There is some hope that even our politicians can’t screw this up as frequently and readily as they do most things. After all, the development of a vaccine is highly dependent upon STEM (science, technology, engineering & mathematics). The research and development rely upon our STEM capabilities, not upon what politicians or political ideologies want to be the case. The testing and certification of a vaccine’s safety and efficacy rests mostly upon established STEM methodologies. Even the manufacturing and production of a vaccine follows from STEM not an ideological view. This does not mean that politics can’t cause problems for a vaccine being produced. If politicians inject themselves into the decision process of certifying a vaccine, then we could see the STEM approach contaminated to serve other ends than protecting the public and nation against a deadly virus.

Hopefully, the healthcare experts and professionals will not succumb to political pressure to abandon the established STEM methodologies. Hopefully, the public will be properly informed about the vaccine and its safety; and should there be any deviations from the normally acceptable standards for approving a vaccine we must hope that the STEM-oriented professionals will make it clear why any deviations were accepted and what the risk-reward trade-offs were that justify the deviations.

Even if the vaccine follows all the expected and appropriate assessment efforts to approve its release to immunizing the population, there are still some political issues that will impact this stage of the nation’s response to the Corona virus. There is a sizeable segment of the population that is unwilling or reluctant to be vaccinated with an approved vaccine. This reluctance includes a political component and societal component.

On the societal side, there are the anti-vaxxers, which is also aligned with politics. On the political side, there is the ‘distrust’ of government and governmental entities; mostly brought about by politicians, political parties, and ideological positions. The resistance to protecting the nation from the COVID-19 threat will thus include a suppression of the immunization effort and increase the harm from the virus that is and will continue to be inflicted upon the nation.

Now there are actions and efforts that our politicians could undertake to make the vaccine efforts more beneficial, but they would need to be working for the interests of their constituents rather than their re-election and their political party. So, it is unlikely that the government will be effective in accomplishing the high level of vaccinations that would be in the nation’s interests. There will be consequences from the level of immunization achieved for the Corona virus. It may even serve as an informative evaluation of how politics and societal divisions can impact different demographic groups. There’s an opportunity that America will experience a Darwinian evolutional choice effect. Following the principle of natural selection, the choice to be vaccinated or not is an evolutionary choice. That choice will express itself in societal terms and in biological terms. The decision to get vaccinated or not isn’t just a choice for you, but there is a risk to that choice to you, nonetheless. Your choice also has implications for your family, including the family you have today or may have tomorrow if you survive. The choice has implications for your community, including all of their families present or future; and of course, it has implications for the nation’s families today or tomorrow.

These choices when aggregated along political, ideological, religious, or societal lines are the stuff that Darwinian evolution speaks to for a nation or humanity as a whole. This near and long-term perspective of the Corona virus and a vaccine may have as big or even bigger consequences than previous vaccines.

Now one can choose to listen to politicians, or one can choose to listen to STEM-informed professionals and individuals. Who you choose to listen to is a societal test, and an intelligence test. How you score is much more important than are most situations in which you have to decide for yourself, your family and your country. Those who choose wisely will define the Darwinian outcomes.