Consider the following:

  1. People fear what they don't understand.
  2. One way to resolve fear and return to complacency is to adopt the first idea that comes across the Internet as truth, and assume that one now understands.
  3. Any idea will do, correct or not.
  4. Once returned to complacency, people will resist anything that puts complacency at risk.

Yes, this is a cynical view of how people think (or don't think) but it seems to reflect reality. I found a similar model when I studied how consumers make decisions about cellular carriers. People don't want to spend time thinking about it, but once forced into it, you have a short window of time to make your case. After that, they don't want to think about it any further.

It's just how people operate.

We're starting this cycle with Omicron. Early information suggests that it's highly contagious but the illness it causes may or may not be that serious. However, the same was said in the early days of the Delta variant. The truth is that this variant is new and we just don't know what it does. Fact-finding takes time. At this point we still may not know the full extent of the damage caused by the Alpha (original) version of Covid.

What we do know is that Omicron has spread very rapidly in Southern Africa (during what is their summer) and has hit younger adults hard. That's the wrong season for severe spread, and the targets may make the disease seem less severe than it will be for older adults.

What we also know is that this version has a very large number of mutations that appear to support ease of spreading. Everything else we will learn with time.

Sorry. We live in a stochastic world. Nothing is certain, if you are honest with yourself, including whether you will be alive to see the holidays next year. That's just how life is.

Jumping rope is good exercise. Jumping to conclusions is not.

Source:

  1. https://www.prevention.com/health/health-conditions/a38370247/what-is-omicron-covid-19-variant/
 This free site is ad-supported. Learn more
​