(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Failing Public Health [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-01-06 One size doesn't fit all; customize your straps for a better fit. We're now beginning the fourth year of the pandemic, with COVID entrenched as the third leading cause of death in the US, life expectancy continuing to decline, and millions of Americans with varying levels of disability from long COVID. The government response remains anemic, emphasizing vaccination while about 10% of the population is vaccinated with the bivalent booster. Gregg Gonsalves, in an excellent article in The Nation, points out that this dumpster fire is another aspect of the victory of selfishness and individualism over community. Government officials routinely ignore the advice of public health experts, and even the American Medical Association. The CDC serves the interests of politicians rather than the public. And none of them talk about the importance of looking out for the community as a whole. Disaster capitalism is clearly one of the root causes, with the tech, media, and medical industries profiting from the pandemic. But it's clearly more than disaster capitalism when the CDC only acknowledges that the COVID variants are coming from places with large numbers of infections after China starts having more infections, after 3 years of silence on this fact. The CDC is more interested in finding scapegoats than controlling diseases. What now? What can people who think that the US should not be worse than #40 in the world in public health do now? First, accept that big business and the government will not lead us out of this. Overall, they are just fine with our declining health and life expectancy. If we want to make progress, we have to be the leaders. Second, since we're the leaders, we're going to have to act like leaders. Going into a store with a bare face is voting with your face for the pandemic to continue indefinitely. Going drinking in a crowded bar is voting with your feet for our life expectancy to decline another couple years. Refusing to spend money on HVAC improvements like HEPA filters is voting with your wallet for more long COVID suffering. Wear your N95 mask, fix your indoor air, avoid crowded places, take your COVID tests regularly whether you have symptoms or not. Third, we need to keep the pressure on the politicians. Bernie Sanders is right, we need a national health service, or we'll drop from #40 in public health to #60 in the world. We need to call for “whole-of-society and whole-of-government approaches” to the pandemic; a communal approach instead of an individual risk approach. Fourth? Please add your suggestions in the comments! [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/1/6/2145837/-Failing-Public-Health Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/