Remember back in 2020 when we had to wait in long lines for our turns just to shop at Walmart? We had no choice but to make major adjustments, across the board, in the way we lived our lives.
In the earliest days of the COVID-19 outbreak, our country's exposure was confined to a handful of cases in Washington state. But it wasn't long before the virus made its way to Mississippi and every other state in the union.
This never before seen strain of a coronavirus that we came to know as COVID-19 entered our daily conversations late in 2019. A friend of mine and I discussed the virus headed our way in early 2020 while sipping cocktails at downtown's Thirsty Hippo. I remember thinking nothing of it. She seemed a lot more concerned about the virus's spread than I. My attitude? It was more like, "What, me worry?"
In fact, before the word "pandemic" was joined with COVID-19, I went onto Facebook declaring that this little flu scare wouldn't be doing anything to change the way I lived. And I meant it. Well, for a while, anyway. It wasn't long before the handwriting on the wall forced me to change my mind.
I could see that the shutdowns affecting the rest of the country would soon arrive in Hattiesburg. In fact, before Mayor Toby Barker issued a mandate for many businesses to temporarily close their doors in the interest of public health, I made one last trip to the Keg and Barrel on Hardy Street, realizing it might be the last time I'd be able to go out for a while. And indeed it was.
Admittedly, my early cavalier attitude about COVID-19 may have been linked to the 1968 flu pandemic. If you're my age or older, you'll remember it as the Hong Kong flu, which also originated in China.
I was only a kid when everybody was talking about the Hong Kong flu, so perhaps my child's mind didn't quite grasp the urgency of what was going on. Unlike today though, I don't remember my family's lifestyle, or anyone else's for that matter, changing all that much. My life continued as usual, including attending in-person classes at Hawkins Junior High School, without a single student required to wear a mask. I'm sure my lukewarm concern for COVID-19 was rooted in those memories.
The Hong Kong flu did make the rounds, hopscotching the globe, but was nothing like the great 1918-19 Spanish flu pandemic that resulted in an estimated 25 million to 50 million deaths worldwide. That's compared to 1 million to 4 million lives lost during the Hong Kong flu. COVID-19 has fallen somewhere in the middle, with worldwide deaths approaching 5.9 million.
Here in the United States, almost 1 million Americans have lost their lives to the virus, but that hasn't stopped the battle to defeat it from turning into a political fight. Lately, it seems to be what we do when it comes to just about everything in this country. We make it political. To vaccinate or not to vaccinate? To wear a mask or not to wear? In-person classes for students or virtual learning at home?
The good news is that we have a vaccine to fight the virus now, with millions of Americans taking advantage of it, getting their shots and boosters. Count me in that number.
Most of the people within my inner circle have also gotten their shots. Still, an unsettling percentage of Americans refuse to get vaccinated for a long list of reasons, with much of their resistance fueled by lies and misinformation shared on the internet.
Needless to say, health experts both nationally and locally have stressed how important it is to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Their pleas often fall on deaf ears, so I realize I'm probably preaching to the choir, but here goes.
A point of debate about viruses is whether they are living organisms — something made of cells. Are they "alive?" Scientists are still debating that question. Alive or not, what's important to remember is that a virus has the same goal as we humans. That is, it wants to survive. But a virus can't replicate on its own. It is unable to make a copy of its DNA. It needs help to spread. That's where we come in.
COVID-19, or any other virus, introduces itself to a host cell — that’s us — giving it the ability to make copies of its own DNA, and, in turn, make more viruses. As it does, new and different strains of the virus may be created in the process. That’s where the Delta, and later, Omicron variants of the virus have come from.
The good news, if we can call it that, is that the Omicron variant doesn't penetrate cells deep in the human respiratory tract, as earlier variants of the virus had done. Omicron tends to target the upper respiratory tract. That's why it behaves more like the common cold and usually doesn't end up making us as sick, at least among those of us who are vaccinated.
Those people refusing to get their shots are, in effect, offering their bodies as incubators for the virus, allowing it to survive and mutate. Their obstinance is putting not only themselves at risk but their loved ones, too. COVID-19 has, in large part, become a pandemic of the unvaccinated. Why deliberately place yourself in that group?
Will we ever completely defeat COVID-19? Probably not. Unfortunately, in one form or another, the virus is likely to be with us for a long time. In fact, California has become the first state to shift to treating COVID-19 as an endemic, marking it as a virus we're likely to end up having to live with. In time, COVID-19 may become a milder illness than it was originally, behaving much like the common cold. We're not there yet, though. This is why it remains important to get yourself vaccinated, helping us achieve the herd immunity we heard so much about in the early days of the pandemic. Let's not forget, the regular flu claims about 36,000 lives each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
We've come a long way since the days our churches and schools were closed, when we couldn't go out to dinner with friends and family, or when we had to wait in line to make essential purchases at Walmart.
We've made progress but it's wishful thinking to believe this virus is going to magically disappear. That's not going to happen. But we will be able to manage the virus and its seriousness, thanks to modern medicine and the availability of vaccines.
Remember, COVID-19's goal is the same as ours: to survive. To do that, it needs us. So while we may be tired of COVID-19, COVID-19 is not tired of us.
Get your shots.
Elijah Jones is a proud Hattiesburg native who enjoys writing. Email him at edjhubtown@aol.com.
