Note: Links alluded to within the post can be found at the bottom of the post.
I must admit that when this whole coronavirus mess started, I didn't take it so seriously.
In fact, I quickly developed a fatalist attitude when I heard that recovering from a coronavirus infection might not confer immunity.
What's the point? I thought.
There is no way to be immunized from the disease. Even if you recover, you'll be just as vulnerable after recovery as everyone else. This means there's no one who can care for patients without getting infected too.
(Now I realize that they don't know for sure there's no immunity. Maybe yes, maybe no.)
Anyway, my hishtadlut was to go out and buy extra vitamins, soap, aluminum foil for Pesach (and other Pesach supplies), and tzitzit for my 5-year-old in the expectation that shopping would be more difficult at some point and to get stuff then, when I still could do so easily.
(This expectation has since been fulfilled, unfortunately.)
I still don't take the masks seriously, although if I were to go out, I would put one on to avoid problems with the police.
The only reason why I ended up going out less was because of what Rav Avigdor Miller warns about leaving home during a time of dever (plague), and also what Rav Yehudah Petiyah describes in Minchat Yehudah (which will be described in a future post – hopefully soon).
Much of what's resulting from coronavirus simply doesn't make sense.
Let's look at how this whole coronavirus fiasco being mishandled.
I must admit that when this whole coronavirus mess started, I didn't take it so seriously.
In fact, I quickly developed a fatalist attitude when I heard that recovering from a coronavirus infection might not confer immunity.
What's the point? I thought.
There is no way to be immunized from the disease. Even if you recover, you'll be just as vulnerable after recovery as everyone else. This means there's no one who can care for patients without getting infected too.
(Now I realize that they don't know for sure there's no immunity. Maybe yes, maybe no.)
Anyway, my hishtadlut was to go out and buy extra vitamins, soap, aluminum foil for Pesach (and other Pesach supplies), and tzitzit for my 5-year-old in the expectation that shopping would be more difficult at some point and to get stuff then, when I still could do so easily.
(This expectation has since been fulfilled, unfortunately.)
I still don't take the masks seriously, although if I were to go out, I would put one on to avoid problems with the police.
The only reason why I ended up going out less was because of what Rav Avigdor Miller warns about leaving home during a time of dever (plague), and also what Rav Yehudah Petiyah describes in Minchat Yehudah (which will be described in a future post – hopefully soon).
Much of what's resulting from coronavirus simply doesn't make sense.
Let's look at how this whole coronavirus fiasco being mishandled.
Irrational Quarantine Strictures
First of all, there is a lack of clarity about COVID-19's source.
Is it a naturally developing disease that mutated from China's wet market to human beings?
Or is it a human-cultivated bioweapon that either escaped or was released?
There is evidence for both.
But no one knows for sure.
And apparently, figuring out how to treat it most effectively and possibly develop a vaccine (if you can vaccinate against something that maybe does not confer immunity naturally) is influenced by whether it's manmade or not.
Secondly, while it's apparently highly contagious, its fatality rate seems to primarily affect people who already suffer pre-existing conditions and an already compromised immune system.
In other words, healthy people, especially if they are under 70, do not need to have any fear of dying of COVID-19 – statistically speaking. (And really, people over 70 have also recovered nicely.) Furthermore, healthy people under age 70 do not really need to even fear suffering complications.
This is clearly a limited disease so far.
These currently known facts mean that the quarantine measures are neither here nor there.
You wouldn't allow your borders open for any reason, even to bring home fellow citizens who wish to leave coronavirus hot spots.
And you wouldn't quarantine for only 14 days.
In fact, for such a new virus about which so little is known and the testing isn't even completely up to par, 14 days is a silly idea. One needs at least 30 days, preferably 40 days.
Do you know how to remove a mask in a sterile manner?
I don't.
Doctors & nurses do. But most regular people don't.
Think about it: You go out in a mask, picking up all the germs on it, then take all those germs into your home.
And get them on your fingers when you remove the mask.
Then you let it sit in your garbage can, still live & contagious.
Is that rational?
Other people have already noted that what masks really do is protect others if you are unknowingly already infected.
But that's not why people were buying the masks initially; initially, they acquired masks for their own protection, to prevent themselves from infection, not to protect others.
For example, the virus floats around in the air and sticks to surfaces for a long time.
So how does maintaining a 6-foot distance from others really help? It's in the air and people and the virus are moving around in that same air. Unless you are going to stand in a place where no one else has breathed and where the virus hasn't floated to, how do these measures really help, speaking from a purely rational point of view?
Also, let's look at the stats for other infectious & potentially fatal diseases:
Yet in none of these situations did countries shut down their systems or deny necessary medical treatment to sufferers.
Furthermore, shutting down society, storm shelters, police services, medical treatment, and the economy is clearly causing more problems than it's solving.
Is it a naturally developing disease that mutated from China's wet market to human beings?
Or is it a human-cultivated bioweapon that either escaped or was released?
There is evidence for both.
But no one knows for sure.
And apparently, figuring out how to treat it most effectively and possibly develop a vaccine (if you can vaccinate against something that maybe does not confer immunity naturally) is influenced by whether it's manmade or not.
Secondly, while it's apparently highly contagious, its fatality rate seems to primarily affect people who already suffer pre-existing conditions and an already compromised immune system.
In other words, healthy people, especially if they are under 70, do not need to have any fear of dying of COVID-19 – statistically speaking. (And really, people over 70 have also recovered nicely.) Furthermore, healthy people under age 70 do not really need to even fear suffering complications.
This is clearly a limited disease so far.
These currently known facts mean that the quarantine measures are neither here nor there.
- If coronavirus was a truly lethal plague, like the 14th-Century Black Plague that eliminated around a third of Europe (and half the population of England), then you wouldn't have neatly arranged hours for "essential" tasks like shopping.
You wouldn't allow your borders open for any reason, even to bring home fellow citizens who wish to leave coronavirus hot spots.
And you wouldn't quarantine for only 14 days.
In fact, for such a new virus about which so little is known and the testing isn't even completely up to par, 14 days is a silly idea. One needs at least 30 days, preferably 40 days.
- Masks are also a not-very-effective idea, especially since a mask shortage resulted early on.
Do you know how to remove a mask in a sterile manner?
I don't.
Doctors & nurses do. But most regular people don't.
Think about it: You go out in a mask, picking up all the germs on it, then take all those germs into your home.
And get them on your fingers when you remove the mask.
Then you let it sit in your garbage can, still live & contagious.
Is that rational?
Other people have already noted that what masks really do is protect others if you are unknowingly already infected.
But that's not why people were buying the masks initially; initially, they acquired masks for their own protection, to prevent themselves from infection, not to protect others.
- Social-distances measures can't possibly be effective, according to what we currently understand of coronavirus.
For example, the virus floats around in the air and sticks to surfaces for a long time.
So how does maintaining a 6-foot distance from others really help? It's in the air and people and the virus are moving around in that same air. Unless you are going to stand in a place where no one else has breathed and where the virus hasn't floated to, how do these measures really help, speaking from a purely rational point of view?
Also, let's look at the stats for other infectious & potentially fatal diseases:
- The 2009 swine flu pandemic is estimated to have killed between 151,000 and 575,000 people worldwide.
- Ebola has around a 50% death rate.
- In 2017 to 2018, the worst flu season on record in the U.S. outside of a pandemic, approximately 80,000 Americans died. (Do hear about that? Probably not.)
- During this past flu season in the USA, the CDC reported 38 million illnesses, 390,000 hospitalizations and 23,000 deaths.
Yet in none of these situations did countries shut down their systems or deny necessary medical treatment to sufferers.
Furthermore, shutting down society, storm shelters, police services, medical treatment, and the economy is clearly causing more problems than it's solving.
People Playing God
A very real concerning & ethical problem is how many hospitals are postponing necessary procedures in order to clear space for potential coronavirus patients.
For example, a woman needs surgery to remove lung tumor, but is postponed because of the possibility of coronavirus patients.
It hasn't happened yet, but they want everything cleared out & ready.
Is that ethical?
Can a doctor decide that it's okay for a person to die of a lung tumor as long as they're not dying of coronavirus?
Patients dying of neglect & lack of treatment is not better than dying of coronavirus, particularly since coronavirus is only lethal for a specific part of the population, while someone in desperate need of a lung transplant does NOT have an 90% chance of recovery – a chance that a coronavirus patient DOES have.
Furthermore, a season prone to natural disaster is upon us: spring & summer.
Hurricanes, tornadoes, and wildfires.
In fact, America's South & Midwest have already been hit with tornadoes.
And their public shelters are affected by coronavirus-fear.
Meaning, not all shelters may open and those that do may not allow as many people to shelter within.
Again, this means you have human authorities playing God.
Basically, people in authority will decide that some people should die of a tornado rather than coronavirus.
And maybe that person wouldn't die at all, not even of coronavirus, but wasn't allowed in a tornado shelter.
Also, I still think Italy's high death rate is at least partly due to denying treatment to people over a certain age. They're playing God and by denying treatment, they're killing people who might not necessarily die otherwise.
They're also souring the Heavenly Judgement over themselves with such unethical behavior.
Also, if these economic lockdowns continue, many areas of the world will start to riot, which leads to property damage, injuries, and deaths.
For example, a woman needs surgery to remove lung tumor, but is postponed because of the possibility of coronavirus patients.
It hasn't happened yet, but they want everything cleared out & ready.
Is that ethical?
Can a doctor decide that it's okay for a person to die of a lung tumor as long as they're not dying of coronavirus?
Patients dying of neglect & lack of treatment is not better than dying of coronavirus, particularly since coronavirus is only lethal for a specific part of the population, while someone in desperate need of a lung transplant does NOT have an 90% chance of recovery – a chance that a coronavirus patient DOES have.
Furthermore, a season prone to natural disaster is upon us: spring & summer.
Hurricanes, tornadoes, and wildfires.
In fact, America's South & Midwest have already been hit with tornadoes.
And their public shelters are affected by coronavirus-fear.
Meaning, not all shelters may open and those that do may not allow as many people to shelter within.
Again, this means you have human authorities playing God.
Basically, people in authority will decide that some people should die of a tornado rather than coronavirus.
And maybe that person wouldn't die at all, not even of coronavirus, but wasn't allowed in a tornado shelter.
Also, I still think Italy's high death rate is at least partly due to denying treatment to people over a certain age. They're playing God and by denying treatment, they're killing people who might not necessarily die otherwise.
They're also souring the Heavenly Judgement over themselves with such unethical behavior.
Also, if these economic lockdowns continue, many areas of the world will start to riot, which leads to property damage, injuries, and deaths.
A Variety of Problems Exacerbated by the Current Response
(Note: I'm taking this information from anywhere EXCEPT China; Chinese authorities are notoriously dishonest about reporting information that dishonors them.)
Finally, the actual coronavirus numbers:
And hospitalizing those from that 80% could actually make them worse.
People with a slight fever need lots of rest and nutritious easy-on-the-throat-and-digestive-system foods, like a hearty chicken-vegetable soup.
Rest & nourishing foods are hard to come by in hospitals. (No offense.)
Good, nourishing rest is extremely hard to come by in hospitals, particularly in this era of the cell phone.
Also, hospitals are bastions of germs.
(In Israel, less than 1% of diagnosed coronavirus patients have died.)
To put in perspective, let's again look at the numbers for previous infectious illnesses:
However, the 10% coronavirus death rate reached in some countries a high percentage of a highly contagious illness.
And that's where our concern should really lie.
Except that it doesn't.
Even in Italy, where both the infection rate & fatality rate have been very high (around 10%), 85% of deaths occurred to those over age 70.
Most people over 70 have at least minor health problems. Not all do, but most.
Indeed, over 90% of coronavirus fatalities worldwide – regardless of age – occurred in people with pre-existing medical conditions.
In fact, 99% of Italy's coronvirus fatalities occurred in people with pre-existing medical conditions, which made them especially vulnerable to the virus.
Statistically speaking, this means that coronavirus is not fatal for people without pre-existing medical conditions.
Heck, even if you're over 70, coronavirus is only a problem in those with pre-existing medical conditions – statistically speaking.
In fact, the current quarantines are NOT protecting the vulnerable.
How can they?
By allowing the higher-risk population to shop, say, an hour a day around potentially infected staff and touching items that possibly infected people have touched and being out near people who are possibly infected...this still puts them at risk.
For example, several years ago, when my friend was immuno-compromised due to her kidney transplant, she did not go out at all and her family was careful around her themselves.
Likewise, she does not go out at all now – not during special hours, not with a mask & gloves, nothing. The only effective & logical way to protect herself is to not go out at all. And despite the fact that she's an active, extroverted person, she doesn't leave her home and is very careful about who enters her home. In fact, her married daughter lives nearby, but could not come to the Seder for fear of her husband/the son-in-law compromising my friend's immunity.
Now, the guilt trip has been that we all need to quarantine in order to protect vulnerable members of society.
But that is never the way this kind of protection works.
You cannot shut down society during every flu season or virus season ONLY to protect immuno-compromised people with pre-existing medical conditions.
Society would disintegrate if you did that.
Sort of like now.
What vulnerable people usually do is protect themselves.
For example, my friend mentioned above who, in her thirties, received a kidney transplant from her twin sister.
During her recuperation at home, there was a sign on the door warning potential visitors who've received a vaccine (which often makes people contagious for a bit) or any illness.
Her husband & children also needed to take extra precautions around her.
But please note: The municipality did not shut down the entire city in order to protect her.
That would have been silly and extremely harmful.
Then she was fine. But now she has needed to quarantine herself again for her own protection, and this has once again affected the comings and goings of her immediate family.
And that is how it should be.
Right now, people are under enormous stress (which also affects physical health and disease susceptibility).
People who are ill with other illnesses are NOT getting the treatment they need to survive!
And that's a crime of ethics.
Right now, societies are quasi-protecting POSSIBLE victims while abandoning ACTUAL CURRENT victims of other medical issues.
Again, that's ethically problematic and also irrational.
In some areas of America, police activity has been limited. Meaning, the police will not show up for certain crimes.
Furthermore, with this school year in the trash, children will need to repeat their grade.
And how to do that with the incoming wave of children for next year? My son is in the middle of gaining the critical skill of reading. He knows his letters and the vowels of kamatz & patach (ah), tzerei & segol (eh). But he's already gotten weak in the last 2 and it will be up to us to teach him shuruk (oo), cholem (oh), etc.
Or school next year...if it happens.
Medical students are been graduated early if they're willing to help the crisis in the hospitals. (This means they're less qualified to practice medicine. Is that a good thing in a hospital? Yeah, I get that the hospitals haven't much choice right now, but objectively speaking, is it beneficial?)
Vulnerable people should protect themselves.
And those of us who are not over 70 and/or with pre-existing medical conditions should help them by running their errands, leaving sterilized food packages by the door, walking their dogs, etc.
That would be the logical response to coronavirus.
Except that's not how nations are responding.
The question is why?
Finally, the actual coronavirus numbers:
- 80% of those infected experience a light illness: a fever, maybe snuffles & some coughing...
And hospitalizing those from that 80% could actually make them worse.
People with a slight fever need lots of rest and nutritious easy-on-the-throat-and-digestive-system foods, like a hearty chicken-vegetable soup.
Rest & nourishing foods are hard to come by in hospitals. (No offense.)
Good, nourishing rest is extremely hard to come by in hospitals, particularly in this era of the cell phone.
Also, hospitals are bastions of germs.
- Around 10% experience severe symptoms...but most recover.
- And around 10% die.
(In Israel, less than 1% of diagnosed coronavirus patients have died.)
To put in perspective, let's again look at the numbers for previous infectious illnesses:
- The 2009 swine flu pandemic is estimated to have killed between 151,000 and 575,000 people worldwide.
- Ebola has around a 50% death rate.
- In 2017 to 2018, the worst flu season on record in the U.S. outside of a pandemic, approximately 80,000 Americans died.
- During this past flu season in the USA, the CDC reported 38 million illnesses, 390,000 hospitalizations and 23,000 deaths.
However, the 10% coronavirus death rate reached in some countries a high percentage of a highly contagious illness.
And that's where our concern should really lie.
Except that it doesn't.
Even in Italy, where both the infection rate & fatality rate have been very high (around 10%), 85% of deaths occurred to those over age 70.
Most people over 70 have at least minor health problems. Not all do, but most.
Indeed, over 90% of coronavirus fatalities worldwide – regardless of age – occurred in people with pre-existing medical conditions.
In fact, 99% of Italy's coronvirus fatalities occurred in people with pre-existing medical conditions, which made them especially vulnerable to the virus.
Statistically speaking, this means that coronavirus is not fatal for people without pre-existing medical conditions.
Heck, even if you're over 70, coronavirus is only a problem in those with pre-existing medical conditions – statistically speaking.
In fact, the current quarantines are NOT protecting the vulnerable.
How can they?
By allowing the higher-risk population to shop, say, an hour a day around potentially infected staff and touching items that possibly infected people have touched and being out near people who are possibly infected...this still puts them at risk.
For example, several years ago, when my friend was immuno-compromised due to her kidney transplant, she did not go out at all and her family was careful around her themselves.
Likewise, she does not go out at all now – not during special hours, not with a mask & gloves, nothing. The only effective & logical way to protect herself is to not go out at all. And despite the fact that she's an active, extroverted person, she doesn't leave her home and is very careful about who enters her home. In fact, her married daughter lives nearby, but could not come to the Seder for fear of her husband/the son-in-law compromising my friend's immunity.
Now, the guilt trip has been that we all need to quarantine in order to protect vulnerable members of society.
But that is never the way this kind of protection works.
You cannot shut down society during every flu season or virus season ONLY to protect immuno-compromised people with pre-existing medical conditions.
Society would disintegrate if you did that.
Sort of like now.
What vulnerable people usually do is protect themselves.
For example, my friend mentioned above who, in her thirties, received a kidney transplant from her twin sister.
During her recuperation at home, there was a sign on the door warning potential visitors who've received a vaccine (which often makes people contagious for a bit) or any illness.
Her husband & children also needed to take extra precautions around her.
But please note: The municipality did not shut down the entire city in order to protect her.
That would have been silly and extremely harmful.
Then she was fine. But now she has needed to quarantine herself again for her own protection, and this has once again affected the comings and goings of her immediate family.
And that is how it should be.
Right now, people are under enormous stress (which also affects physical health and disease susceptibility).
People who are ill with other illnesses are NOT getting the treatment they need to survive!
And that's a crime of ethics.
Right now, societies are quasi-protecting POSSIBLE victims while abandoning ACTUAL CURRENT victims of other medical issues.
Again, that's ethically problematic and also irrational.
In some areas of America, police activity has been limited. Meaning, the police will not show up for certain crimes.
Furthermore, with this school year in the trash, children will need to repeat their grade.
And how to do that with the incoming wave of children for next year? My son is in the middle of gaining the critical skill of reading. He knows his letters and the vowels of kamatz & patach (ah), tzerei & segol (eh). But he's already gotten weak in the last 2 and it will be up to us to teach him shuruk (oo), cholem (oh), etc.
Or school next year...if it happens.
Medical students are been graduated early if they're willing to help the crisis in the hospitals. (This means they're less qualified to practice medicine. Is that a good thing in a hospital? Yeah, I get that the hospitals haven't much choice right now, but objectively speaking, is it beneficial?)
Vulnerable people should protect themselves.
And those of us who are not over 70 and/or with pre-existing medical conditions should help them by running their errands, leaving sterilized food packages by the door, walking their dogs, etc.
That would be the logical response to coronavirus.
Except that's not how nations are responding.
The question is why?
We Actually Don't Know Much
There is no clear logical reason for the contradictory quarantine rules, which are not ultimately so effective.
As described above, they're not being applied in a logical way that actually protects against and prevents illness.
Taking Eretz Yisrael as an example, Tel Aviv District (which includes Bnei Brak) & Jerusalem District have the highest levels of coronavirus, but the Center District (Netanya, Rechovot, Raanana, etc.) isn't far behind.
Yet they're primarily closing off the charedi areas.
In fact, one hospital is automatically detaining within a special coronavirus ward any person from one of the major charedi cities who comes, even if they don't display signs of coronavirus. By automatically placing a healthy person in the coranavirus ward, they are intentionally infecting that person with coronavirus.
Again, coronavirus is not lethal for the overwhelming majority of people, but it is highly infectious to the point that locking someone in a place teeming with coronavirus coughs and germs on the surfaces will mostly likely infect anyone who enters. (And anyway, as explained above, hospitalizing people who aren't so sick can actually make them sicker.)
BTW, the brings us to another issue: testing.
It isn't clear to me that, with such a new virus, the tests are so accurate. Remember, it's COVID-19. There are similar viruses, like SARS CoV-2.
In fact, the common cold, pneumonia, and MERS are all included in the coronavirus family, of which COVID-19 is one strain amid this virus family.
It was already reported in the USA that early tests for COVID-19 offered false negatives – sometimes multiple times.
Furthermore, all countries have reported a shortage of testing kits.
And I suspect the low reported incidence of COVID-19 across Africa has more to do with lack of testing than lack of infection.
So who's being tested exactly? And how?
And are the people who tested positive for COVID-19 actually infected with that and not another member of the same virus family (like the common cold – which is actually how COVID-19 expresses itself in around 80% of those infected)?
And how do we know the real rate in populations?
For example, no one in my family have been tested. I don't know people who've been tested. It could be that the rates in these seemingly low areas are actually just as high as the Tel Aviv or Jerusalem Districts, but people haven't been tested. (Or they received a false negative.)
Again, IF the test is actually accurate – and I'm not sure that it is. Literally, I'm not sure.
However, the result of the quickly mounting rules is that frum people are actually complying.
If these strictures were imposed out of clearly anti-Torah personalities and ideologies, then the frum people would rebel. For example, it would be a sign of courage & yirat Shamayim to continue holding secret minyans & yeshivot, etc.
But the way it's being done, including secular Israeli leaders and Leftist celebrities coming out protesting discrimination against charedi communities.
It's nice of them, but I do wonder what made them suddenly turn around and display such sympathy.
Theories abound, like how leaders secretly wish to crash their own economies, thus forcing their populations to be dependent on them.
Not sure about that one.
More logically, most world leaders are in the vulnerable group: They are over 70 with pre-existing medical conditions.
So maybe, in their own minds, it's a self-protection racket.
But here's what I really think...
As described above, they're not being applied in a logical way that actually protects against and prevents illness.
Taking Eretz Yisrael as an example, Tel Aviv District (which includes Bnei Brak) & Jerusalem District have the highest levels of coronavirus, but the Center District (Netanya, Rechovot, Raanana, etc.) isn't far behind.
Yet they're primarily closing off the charedi areas.
In fact, one hospital is automatically detaining within a special coronavirus ward any person from one of the major charedi cities who comes, even if they don't display signs of coronavirus. By automatically placing a healthy person in the coranavirus ward, they are intentionally infecting that person with coronavirus.
Again, coronavirus is not lethal for the overwhelming majority of people, but it is highly infectious to the point that locking someone in a place teeming with coronavirus coughs and germs on the surfaces will mostly likely infect anyone who enters. (And anyway, as explained above, hospitalizing people who aren't so sick can actually make them sicker.)
BTW, the brings us to another issue: testing.
It isn't clear to me that, with such a new virus, the tests are so accurate. Remember, it's COVID-19. There are similar viruses, like SARS CoV-2.
In fact, the common cold, pneumonia, and MERS are all included in the coronavirus family, of which COVID-19 is one strain amid this virus family.
It was already reported in the USA that early tests for COVID-19 offered false negatives – sometimes multiple times.
Furthermore, all countries have reported a shortage of testing kits.
And I suspect the low reported incidence of COVID-19 across Africa has more to do with lack of testing than lack of infection.
So who's being tested exactly? And how?
And are the people who tested positive for COVID-19 actually infected with that and not another member of the same virus family (like the common cold – which is actually how COVID-19 expresses itself in around 80% of those infected)?
And how do we know the real rate in populations?
For example, no one in my family have been tested. I don't know people who've been tested. It could be that the rates in these seemingly low areas are actually just as high as the Tel Aviv or Jerusalem Districts, but people haven't been tested. (Or they received a false negative.)
Again, IF the test is actually accurate – and I'm not sure that it is. Literally, I'm not sure.
However, the result of the quickly mounting rules is that frum people are actually complying.
If these strictures were imposed out of clearly anti-Torah personalities and ideologies, then the frum people would rebel. For example, it would be a sign of courage & yirat Shamayim to continue holding secret minyans & yeshivot, etc.
But the way it's being done, including secular Israeli leaders and Leftist celebrities coming out protesting discrimination against charedi communities.
It's nice of them, but I do wonder what made them suddenly turn around and display such sympathy.
Theories abound, like how leaders secretly wish to crash their own economies, thus forcing their populations to be dependent on them.
Not sure about that one.
More logically, most world leaders are in the vulnerable group: They are over 70 with pre-existing medical conditions.
So maybe, in their own minds, it's a self-protection racket.
But here's what I really think...
A Clear Act of Hashem
To summarize the main points:
Putting it altogether, this is all clearly from Hashem.
And despite how it feels otherwise, it's actually a chessed.
Hashem has disrupted our lives in a way that is so similar to anti-Jewish edicts & attitudes in the past, but has done so without the actual hatred, persecution, and attacks (whether via missile attacks from enemy countries or a violent police force, like Nazis or Communists).
And He has sent us a disease which isn't actual so fatal for the vast majority of people.
In fact, it's not even experienced as so horrible for the vast majority of patients; chicken pox is a lot more annoying.
The truth is that at this point, unless you are over 70 AND already suffer a pre-existing immuno-compromising medical condition, it is totally unlikely you will die, chas v'shalom.
In fact, it's unlikely you will even become seriously ill.
And that's a big chessed because looking at previous pandemics (the Black Plague, the Spanish Flu, Ebola), a pandemic can actually be lethal.
This isn't (outside of the vulnerable populations).
Furthermore, Hashem has given us a massive wake-up call without actually having unendurably terrible things happen (like terrible suffering or death).
We're not in ghettos.
We're not being bombed.
We still have running water & electricity & all our nifty hi-tech stuff.
Yes, we are stressed-out with frayed nerves. We feel stifled. We are extremely inconvenienced. We feel frustrated, overwhelmed, exasperated, and worn-out both emotionally & physically.
We're being forced to live one day at a time.
But we still have a tremendous amount to be grateful for at this time.
So this is really a tremendous wake-up call from Hashem.
While the world response has been extreme, the actual impetus is not so extreme.
And this is the chessed in the wake-up call from Hashem: We're getting the wake-up call WITHOUT the severe suffering the exaggerated & ineffective response implies.
And now we get to the part of the wake-up call that is extremely painful & distressing:
We're losing our leaders.
Roshei yeshivot, askanim, older & wiser teachers, rebbes, rabbanim...Hashem is plucking them from our midst, particularly in the thriving frum communities in the USA.
Again, this is a bizarre and traumatic result from a virus that is actual not so fatal.
So why is it so fatal for them?
Chazal states several reasons for this kind of thing:
This is extremely distressing and should impel us toward teshuvah.
And regarding the irrational & not-terribly-effective quarantine measures, I'll be writing about those from a spiritual perspective in an upcoming post.
Because while these wacky quarantine measures are not so effective against such highly infectious germs that live a long time on surfaces and travel through the air quite easily (despite the feel-like-I'm-doing-something-effective-but-am-actually-not social-distancing formations), going out less IS effective against malachim mashchitim (destroying angels), as Rav Avigdor Miller has emphasizing and as Rav Yehudah Petiyah describes in Minchat Yehudah.
- The quarantines & protective measures around the world are not being applied in an effective manner – meaning, it seems to be more for the sake of feeling like something is being done, rather than actually protecting against infection. Masks are not being used properly and social distancing is a joke with the way this virus operates & spreads.
- This isn't such a dangerous disease (compared to other pandemics like the Spanish flu or the Black Plague); its lethalness really only affects a very specific population that is easily identifiable and thus possible to protect.
- In other words, unless one is over 70 and have some underlying health condition that compromises your immunity, the death rate isn't anywhere near 10%. Hardly quarantine worthy.
- The most effective way to protect people from death by COVID-19 would be to quarantine ONLY the vulnerable individuals (rather than the entire country) until the disease disappears. This is the obvious solution & the better one, yet no one is doing it.
- These not-terribly-effective quarantines have resulted in a complete disruption of Jewish life, with the compliance of Jews themselves. If these dictates were coming from any other source in any other way, we would never comply. (Or we would comply outwardly while continuing to not comply in secret.)
- The disruptions in Jewish life are eerily reminiscent of Nazi Germany and other edicts of the past (disruption of both religious obligations & being blocked from work). Even their rhythm, like how every day there's a new decree & we don't know what will happen next, is very similar to past Jew-hating edicts.
- Certain segments of society are trying to blame specifically the charedi community, and target the charedi community, even though we don't really know how many people are really infected, both within the charedi community & without. (This also echoes anti-Jewish sentiment of the past.)
- Despite the disease's non-lethal effect outside of vulnerable populations, the frum community has taken a severe hit with the ongoing deaths of our leaders: rabbis rosh yeshivahs, rebbetzins...especially in New York, they're leaving us one after another.
Putting it altogether, this is all clearly from Hashem.
And despite how it feels otherwise, it's actually a chessed.
Hashem has disrupted our lives in a way that is so similar to anti-Jewish edicts & attitudes in the past, but has done so without the actual hatred, persecution, and attacks (whether via missile attacks from enemy countries or a violent police force, like Nazis or Communists).
And He has sent us a disease which isn't actual so fatal for the vast majority of people.
In fact, it's not even experienced as so horrible for the vast majority of patients; chicken pox is a lot more annoying.
The truth is that at this point, unless you are over 70 AND already suffer a pre-existing immuno-compromising medical condition, it is totally unlikely you will die, chas v'shalom.
In fact, it's unlikely you will even become seriously ill.
And that's a big chessed because looking at previous pandemics (the Black Plague, the Spanish Flu, Ebola), a pandemic can actually be lethal.
This isn't (outside of the vulnerable populations).
Furthermore, Hashem has given us a massive wake-up call without actually having unendurably terrible things happen (like terrible suffering or death).
We're not in ghettos.
We're not being bombed.
We still have running water & electricity & all our nifty hi-tech stuff.
Yes, we are stressed-out with frayed nerves. We feel stifled. We are extremely inconvenienced. We feel frustrated, overwhelmed, exasperated, and worn-out both emotionally & physically.
We're being forced to live one day at a time.
But we still have a tremendous amount to be grateful for at this time.
So this is really a tremendous wake-up call from Hashem.
While the world response has been extreme, the actual impetus is not so extreme.
And this is the chessed in the wake-up call from Hashem: We're getting the wake-up call WITHOUT the severe suffering the exaggerated & ineffective response implies.
And now we get to the part of the wake-up call that is extremely painful & distressing:
We're losing our leaders.
Roshei yeshivot, askanim, older & wiser teachers, rebbes, rabbanim...Hashem is plucking them from our midst, particularly in the thriving frum communities in the USA.
Again, this is a bizarre and traumatic result from a virus that is actual not so fatal.
So why is it so fatal for them?
Chazal states several reasons for this kind of thing:
- Hashem brings consequences upon tzaddikim in order to frighten reshaim into doing teshuvah.
- Hashem plucks out good people (especially sinless people like tzaddikim or children, chas v'shalom) as a kapparah for the sins of society so in that way, only 1 or a few people die rather than thousands.
- Hashem removes really good & caring people from the world so they won't suffer seeing the destruction of their beloved Am (like how He removed the Chafetz Chaim, Sara Schenirer, Rav Meir Shapiro of Daf Yomi & Lublin Yeshivah, and others just prior to the Shoah).
This is extremely distressing and should impel us toward teshuvah.
And regarding the irrational & not-terribly-effective quarantine measures, I'll be writing about those from a spiritual perspective in an upcoming post.
Because while these wacky quarantine measures are not so effective against such highly infectious germs that live a long time on surfaces and travel through the air quite easily (despite the feel-like-I'm-doing-something-effective-but-am-actually-not social-distancing formations), going out less IS effective against malachim mashchitim (destroying angels), as Rav Avigdor Miller has emphasizing and as Rav Yehudah Petiyah describes in Minchat Yehudah.
Note: I just want to emphasize something because on the Internet, people's eyes tend to skim rather than read carefully (mine are guilty of the same, BTW).
I do NOT mean to dismiss the very real dangers for those over 70 or who suffer underlying pre-existing medical problems. Every life is precious and even those in a vegetative state are completing vital tikkunim.
So I'm NOT saying to throw old or unhealthy people out the window.
NO.
I'm saying that this whole thing could be handled differently (and MORE EFFECTIVELY) without depriving both the over-70 and immuno-compromised AND everyone else of parnassa, medical care, quality of life, storm shelters, police protection, supplies, and so forth.
We can more effectively take care of vulnerable members of our society AND everyone else.
I want everyone to live and to experience a good quality of life as much as they can.
May Hashem keep us all mentally & physically healthy, and may we take the lessons learned now and do complete teshuvah.
I do NOT mean to dismiss the very real dangers for those over 70 or who suffer underlying pre-existing medical problems. Every life is precious and even those in a vegetative state are completing vital tikkunim.
So I'm NOT saying to throw old or unhealthy people out the window.
NO.
I'm saying that this whole thing could be handled differently (and MORE EFFECTIVELY) without depriving both the over-70 and immuno-compromised AND everyone else of parnassa, medical care, quality of life, storm shelters, police protection, supplies, and so forth.
We can more effectively take care of vulnerable members of our society AND everyone else.
I want everyone to live and to experience a good quality of life as much as they can.
May Hashem keep us all mentally & physically healthy, and may we take the lessons learned now and do complete teshuvah.
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