Enjoy Your ‘Coronavacation’
Everything is canceled, except hoarding, panic, and politics.
by Robert Stacy McCain
March 16, 2020, 12:03 AM
My 19-year-old son’s university canceled on-campus classes for the rest of the semester, so he booked a $49 flight to Florida, where he’s doing his coursework online and babysitting his nephews. My 17-year-old daughter is out of school for at least the next two weeks, and she informs me that her friends on social media are calling this holiday their “coronavacation.†Whether or not school cancellations will do much to halt the spread of Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) is a matter of speculation, but officials everywhere seem to have decided to err on the side of caution. Thus all Americans are affected by this disease, directly or indirectly, without regard to whether we ever actually were at any risk.
Blame the media, but also blame the tort lawyers. Imagine you were a university president, and suddenly cable TV news networks are warning of a deadly pandemic, with some experts offering estimates of millions of infections. The president announces a White House Task Force, and it seems as if we are on the verge of a virus-induced apocalypse. Other universities begin announcing that they will suspend classes, and what are you going to do, Mr. University President? Even if you are skeptical about the worst-case scenarios being discussed 24/7 on CNN, there is the problem of liability. See, if you don’t close your campus and even one of your students comes down with this disease, you might face a multimillion-dollar lawsuit, charging you with negligence for failing to take precautions.
Speaking of precautions, how much toilet paper do you have? The most inexplicable reaction to this disease has been The Great T.P. Stampede of 2020. When it was first reported that fear-stricken mobs were descending on Costco and Walmart to make mass purchases of toilet paper, my wife was mystified. “Does this virus cause diarrhea or something?†No, it’s a flu-like respiratory ailment, but fear is not rational, and so the mad rush to acquire stockpiles of toilet paper has become the subject of comical Facebook memes. One meme shows a nurse telling a patient, “Your COVID-19 test came back positive.†The patient replies: “That can’t be correct. I have more than 300 rolls of toilet paper.â€
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https://spectator.org/enjoy-your-coronavacation/
