In
my May
25 blog post, I referred to Scylla and Charybdis, two sea monsters found in
ancient Greek mythology. In this article, I am again using that story to
highlight the exceedingly difficult problem of dealing effectively with the
covid-19 pandemic without consigning millions to poverty—and to death because
of starvation.
The
Two Monsters in the U.S.
As
was widely noted at the end of May, the number of deaths in the U.S. from
covid-19 topped 100,000 people—and now that number is already nearing 115,000.
It has also been noted, although not so widely, that the number of deaths is disproportionately higher among non-white and financially poor people.
According
to a 5/28 article in The Guardian, “Figures
compiled by APM Research Lab from 40 states show
that African Americans are being killed at almost three times the rate of white
people.
“Black
Kansans are seven times more likely to die
from the virus than white Kansans. In Missouri, Wisconsin and Washington DC the
ratio is six times.”
That
same article goes on to quote William Barber, co-chair of the Poor People’s
Campaign (whom I first wrote about in this 9/15/16 blog post).
Barber
emphasizes that covid-19 is a disease of the poor. “People are being forced to
work, putting profit over protection,” he says. “This pandemic will highlight
how poverty—and our willingness to let people remain in it—presents a clear and
present danger for all of us.”
The
wealthy can practice social distancing, work from home, etc. But what if you
have only an over-crowded—or no—home to go to, and no paying work at all if you
stay home?
According
to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, nearly half of U.S. workers earn less than
$15 an hour and nearly 70% have less than $1,000 in savings. Most of these
people must show up for work if they are going to be paid.
Caught
between the monsters of the pandemic and poverty, many must go back to work in
unsafe conditions and take their chances of not getting sick.
The
Two Monsters in the LICs
Worldwide,
when the number of deaths reached 100,000 in the U.S., there were more than
350,000 deaths from covid-19. But more than 64% of those deaths were in just
five of the wealthier countries: the U.S., the UK, France, Spain, and Italy.
But
just this month, as the number of deaths worldwide topped 410,000, Brazil became
the country with the third most deaths—and the surge has just started in the LICs
(low-income countries) of sub-Saharan Africa and southern Asia.
Most
of the attention of us citizens in the USA has been on the domestic crisis—and that
is especially true of DJT. As the headline in a June 3 WaPo editorial expresses it, “Trump
irresponsibly abandons the WHO while the pandemic surges in less developed
nations.”
A
week earlier, a Boston U. epidemiologist wrote an op-ed piece titled “The
coronavirus pandemic will turn into a poverty pandemic unless we act now.” The
author contends that “the long-term health costs of an economic depression
could ultimately far eclipse what covid-19 has wrought.”
That
is especially true for the LICs. According to that article, a regional director
of the WHO for Africa said last week that the coronavirus pandemic will move
about 27 million Africans to extreme poverty.
Earlier,
a May
28 article in a newspaper of India said, “The economic consequences of the
COVID-19 pandemic could push as many as 86 million more children into poverty
by the end of 2020.” (The image above accompanied that article.)
A report
issued by Gospel for Asia the day before World Hunger Day on May 28 declared,
“It’s estimated that nine million people will die in a coronavirus-worsened
‘scandal of starvation’ this year.”
The
U.S. and countries around the world have made great efforts to avoid/control the
monster of the covid-19 pandemic. Isn’t it time we also make a more concerted effort
to avoid/control the monster of poverty?
Well, let's see: We have government dominated by a minority political party made up largely of white nationalists who don't care what happens to the poor or African Americans and sure as hell don''t care what happens to people outside the USA. Nope. Nothing is going to be done unless we have a sweeping change in November at elections that we can see are already stacked against most Americans.
ReplyDeleteDisagree with your sweeping statement that Nobody cares.
DeleteAmerica has done more for the poorer countries in the world than Any other group in the world.
I would rather you say there are a lot of people who don't care.
Thanks for posting comments early this morning, Anton. I don't know if they are pessimistic or realistic, but I certainly agree that a sweeping change in the U.S. government is critical for things to improve significantly for PoC in this country and for the majority of people in the LICs of the world.
ReplyDeleteThinking Friend Eric Dollard in Chicago shares these comments:
ReplyDelete"Thanks, Leroy, for your comments, with which I fully agree.
"Almost everyday on the news, we see images of grieving people of color who have lost loved ones to gang violence and senseless shootings. Much of this is rooted in poverty and in the consequences of systemic racism. Now we have the Covid-19 crisis, which has made matters even worse.
"Until we elect politicians who are truly committed to confronting the serious challenges we face as society, such as racism, economic inequality, climate change, etc., matters will only get worse and America will continue its slow decline."
Eric, your comments are much the same as Anton's (above), and I wish all of my Thinking Friends and others more widely could realize the truth of your and Anton's comments.
DeleteMy initial decision to write this blog post came after reading an article in the May 23 issue of The Economist -- and then I ended up not even citing anything from it. Here is the link to that important piece:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.economist.com/international/2020/05/23/covid-19-is-undoing-years-of-progress-in-curbing-global-poverty
Here is a brief, and appreciated, comment from Thinking Friend Glenn Hinson in Kentucky:
ReplyDelete"The question we must ask, Leroy. Thank you for highlighting it so powerfully!"
And then I received the following from local Thinking Friend Marilyn Peot:
ReplyDelete"Your [blog posts] are heart-wrenching. Keeping the Truth before us is uncomfortable but necessary. During these days of quarantine, there is this heavy cloud of horror passing over our planet...and getting our attention. Thank you for keeping us honest and down on our knees."
Ed Kail, another local Thinking Friend, makes this very brief comment:
ReplyDelete"I say 'AMEN!!'”
When the ship Titanic struck that famous iceberg on its maiden voyage, all the good options were in the past. We are in the same place with COVID-19 and world poverty. When the Titanic hit the ice it already had a smoldering fire below deck. Not a bad metaphor for the world's handling of world poverty. When the owners and captain of the Titanic ignored iceberg warnings, and all the accumulated wisdom about icebergs, that was a powerful metaphor for how many nations, especially the United States, ignored the accumulated wisdom concerning pandemics, especially coronavirus pandemics, leaving many nations, including USA, in terrible position to handle the wreckage.
ReplyDeleteOne only needs to compare COVID-19 in America, Russia, Brazil, etc. with Taiwan, South Korea, and New Zealand to understand just how badly we mangled our response. Even China, where it all began in confusion, ended up handling COVID-19 far better than much of the rest of the world. Look at the governments of the countries with the highest death totals and a story of incompetence, corruption, and cruelty emerges with Trump in USA, Bolsonaro in Brazil, and Putin in Russia. Somehow all three countries have exceeded the death totals in India and China, which are by far the most populous countries on earth. The only question left is, Is police brutality a metaphor for COVID-19 brutality; or is COVID-19 brutality and metaphor for police brutality? Either way, the world moans, "I can't breathe!"
Thanks for your erudite comments, Craig.
DeleteYou have often written about problem of climate change, so I also wonder if the current displays of brutality may be metaphors of the world in the future moaning "I can't breathe" because of global warming.
Earlier today, Thinking Friend Frank Shope in New Mexico emailed me comments, which he gave permission for posting here:
ReplyDelete"Poverty is such a monster. It is extremely difficult to escape and is passed on from one generation to another. I have been part of The Poor People's Campaign and am participating in the June 20th protest. In my work here in New Mexico the largest issue is helping people understand poverty and the ways it is exploited by politicians and other structures who want to edify themselves.
Poverty is the monster that releases the demons of abuse and takes hold of families passing the pain and suffering of poverty from one generation to another. Without outside resources that impact family and community systems in positive ways. The poor will continue to be marginalized.
Local Thinking Friend Bob Leeper forwarded this blog post to a friend of his, John C. Hall, MD. Dr. Hall then wrote me the following comments and gave permission for me to post them here:
ReplyDelete"Read your article with great interest. I have been taught that poverty is a true form of violence to those who endure it. 70% of bankruptcy cases in usa are due to inability to pay medical bills. So you have the double hit of illness that turns to poverty and illness. It is truly one of the American nightmares that many(including some in the medical field) seem to ignore.
"If we want to make America become a land of opportunity this problem must be addressed. Universal health care, in my opinion, is the only solution. Working as a medical volunteer for 35 years, I can attest to the fact that we are never going to be able to claim to be a leader of the free world until we can achieve health care for all. Now we have a president who wants to be leader of the rich tyrants who suppress half of the world.
It is hard to imagine, but at this time in our history maybe enough people can see that we have the greatest health care on earth for the rich but not the poor. This makes it one of the worst health care systems in the world---check life expectancy, perinatal death rates for mother and child, percent of population with no health care. All this seems incompatible with the country I want to see my grandchildren live in."