Living In New York During The COVID-19 Outbreak

Coronavirus is spreading rapidly in America. Some cases of COVID-19 have already been reported in Mexico, Ecuador, Brazil, and the Dominican Republic. But worst of all, the situation is, oddly enough, in the United States. As of March 2, there were 91 cases of coronavirus in the United States and six deaths from the disease. A day earlier, there were significantly fewer cases – 60 people. With such dynamics, one can expect the most unpleasant events shortly. See live update of coronavirus in the United States

Many Americans are already expecting them and are preparing at an accelerated pace for the upcoming apocalypse. Even without corona virus, in America there was always a lot of “people preparing,” as they ironically call those who dig bunkers, buy electricity generators, store medicines, water and supplies, store weapons (fortunately, it is not difficult to buy them in the States) and in other ways prepare for the end of the world – at least in the terrestrial interpretation of this concept. The epidemic of the corona virus significantly replenished the ranks of the “preparers” and swept respirators and masks from shops, pharmacies and online shopping portals – now orders are accepted at best for April.

Millions of people of East Asian origin live in large cities in America – Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, Vietnamese, Filipinos. So far, thank God, there are no signs of hostility towards them because this terrible scourge came from their part of the world. Of course, no one is safe from the insane. For example, in a New York subway recently, some psycho attacked an Asian woman in a protective mask shouting: “It is because of you that the corona virus came to us!” But in general, everything is calm. Even in the northwestern state of Washington and the main metropolis there –

Seattle – there are no noticeable excesses, although it is there that the most sick and dead from coronavirus are there.

The situation is worse in terms of the attitude of Americans to Asian restaurants, grocery stores, etc. Many people became afraid of Chinese, Japanese and Korean food, reasoning in such a way that the Asians working there have a connection with the “countries of origin” – from there relatives and friends come to them, they go there themselves and, accordingly, can infect the products, which are in contact here in America, in the kitchen or warehouse.

A new disease is still a mystery for physicians – in America there are cases of infection without any contact with countries where there are foci of corona virus (China, Korea, Iran, Italy, etc.), without explicit contact with people from these countries and without contact with their food. Where in these cases the infection came from is not clear.

But something else is clear enough: the American way of life contributes to the spread of the epidemic in the United States. In America, people from childhood are raised by workaholics, robots who must live to work, and not work to live. Children spend seven hours a day at school with one shift, while adults have two to three weeks of vacation per year. There may not be any paid “sick days” for the employee, or their number is negligible – 4-7 days a year. Further – pain at your own expense, and even then not too long: absence from work for a couple of weeks or more is a direct way to lose this work.

Employers do not stand on ceremony with hired labor: in the United States, only about 10% of workers are unionized and protected by collective bargaining agreements, and only a few individuals of particularly valuable qualifications have individual contracts. The overwhelming majority is completely dependent on the arbitrariness of the owner: “Tomorrow you cannot come to work, the security guards you until the exit, there will be no severance pay.”

Also, unpleasant tendency reigns in the labor market for twenty years, to put it mildly: there are fewer good jobs, more bad ones. The low unemployment rate in the US should not deceive anyone: there is work for almost everyone, but – mostly bad, not enough good. In such conditions, people hold on to their workplace with all their might, trying to go to work even to the smithereens of the sick. Quite often you see how people sneeze and cough at work. And if it is a coronavirus?

Well, the loudest final chord in this disturbing song is the lack of universal state health insurance in America. The USA is the only country in the developed world where access to medicine for the entire population is not ensured. In light of the global threat of coronavirus, even those who live on the other side of the planet paid attention to this: for example, The Jakarta Post Indonesian newspaper wrote that 8.5% of Americans have no insurance, that a visit to a doctor for their money can cost hundreds of dollars, that medicines sometimes cost monstrous amounts and that clinics in rural areas of the USA are poorly equipped, although large American cities have the most advanced medical science and technology in the world.

Seattle and the surrounding areas, where there are the most cases of illness, are not a hinterland, but one of the best quality cities in America. This means that they are ill because they are either afraid not to go to work, or do not have medical insurance, and thus the opportunity to be treated.

Coronavirus is not an incurable disease: of the 90,000 infected in the world, more than half have already recovered, 3,000 have died, i.e. a little over 3%. But patients should be treated – and this is not always the case in the USA.

Maybe those in power are concerned about the state of American society, if not for the health of ordinary citizens, then at least for the health of the economy. The latest forecast of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) states that global GDP will grow by only 1.5% in 2020, which is half that economists had previously predicted. Western Europe and Japan will face a recession, while North America will face zero growth, says OECD chief economist Lawrence Boone. Goldman Sachs investment bank experts also give a similar forecast – The New York Times cites these data. There is something for America to think about, and with it all the rest.