Saturday, March 28, 2020

When Will They Ever Learn?


Human beings are flawed. Two of our most glaring weaknesses are our collective short term memory and our inability to think long term. Alan Freeman writes:

It’s unbelievable how quickly human memory fades. The Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 was horrific, killing tens of millions across the globe. But it quickly receded from collective memory, overwhelmed by the loss and grief that had resulted from the First World War and the need to rebuild society. And within two decades, there was another world war. The Spanish Flu became a relic, its lessons forgotten except by some historians or epidemiologists. 
More recently, outbreaks like SARS in 2003 and Ebola a few years ago grabbed headlines, then faded. Politicians who had vowed big changes moved on and their successors were preoccupied with other pressing issues. Public health officials may have continued to make their case for better preparation, but it became harder to convince the public of the immediacy of the danger.

And, when we try to plan for the future, we plan for the last disaster:

As with war, the next conflict is never the same as the last one. The financial crisis this time is completely different, sparked by a societal crisis, not the fundamental soundness of the financial system. Some of the reforms from post-2008 will help but many are irrelevant.
In her 2017 annual report as Ontario auditor-general, Bonnie Lysyk reported that the province’s health ministry had a stockpile of 26,000 pallets of supplies for medical emergencies, including respirators, face shields and needles that had been purchased at a cost of $45 million, presumably after the SARS outbreak. Eighty per cent of the supplies had reached their expiry date.
The report said that the vast majority of these supplies hadn’t been used in the health care system before expiry because the budget “only allowed for storage and not for management of them.” But the ministry didn’t even throw out these supplies. It was continuing to store them at a cost of $3 million a year. How that was cheaper than using the supplies is my big question.
What’s interesting here is that the auditor-general saw this solely as a waste of money and didn’t deal with the fact that the stockpile, which had been created for a reason, had become essentially useless.
So instead of creating a system for a stockpile to deal with emergencies, with constant renewal of the supplies to make sure nothing went to waste and updating them to make sure it was current, the stockpile was regarded as a one-time event that was easily forgotten.

Those two faults -- short memories and the inability to genuinely deal with the future -- are abundantly on display once again.

The old folk song, Where Have All The Flowers Gone? asks the eternal question, "When Will They Ever Learn?"


Image: You Tube

12 comments:

Rural said...

It is but common sense to cycle supplies kept for emergencies through the system Owen, but then that attribute is also in short supply in governments and bureaucracies.

Owen Gray said...

We were told that this was going to happen, Rural. Another one of our weaknesses is that we're not good listeners.

Anonymous said...

We also have a group of people committed to the idea that government doesn't work to improve the lives of citizens. When elected, as they currently are in Ontario, they go about proving themselves right through mismanagement and incompetence. These people work on behalf of the 0.1% to ensure that people don't get the idea that incresding taxes on the rich would provide a better standard of living for everyone else. They are backed by an army of thinktanks and media hacks who work hard to create social divisions to distract people and prevent them from seeing what's going on. They are creating a neo-feudal society in which some people receive incredible wealth at the expense of everyone else's standard of living and health.

The good thing about pandemics is that they tend to rip the cover off this scam. People find themselves out of work with government aid standing between them and relentless creditors like the banks. They start noticing that the 0.1% are more interested in restarting their profit-taking than in saving the lives of the elderly. And, with any luck, the 0.1% doom themselves as they did in Edgar Allan Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death." I have great hope that this pandemic will leave society stronger than it was.

Cap

Lorne said...

As retired teachers, Owen, we are all familiar with the inattentive student. Time of all of us to take a good look in the mirror, eh?

Owen Gray said...

I share your hope, Cap. This crisis is also an opportunity.

Owen Gray said...

We like to think that most of us are good students, Lorne. Situations like this remind us that -- as a species -- we have a lot to learn.

John B. said...

Though you seem to be unhappy with the service we provide, we've taken your suggestion under advisement; but we're unsure of which co-ordinator should keep it on file. We're much too busy being confused now so, because your concerns are important to us, we'd ask that you remind us next time.

Thanks.

Owen Gray said...

"Your call is important to us. That's why we're keeping you on hold, John"

The Disaffected Lib said...

There's a flaw in human nature that is sometimes called "creeping normalcy." Yuval Noah Harari believes its a trait that we've had since our days as hunter-gatherers. Whatever is current is normal. Even circumstances and events from our near past are either forgotten or lose their relevance. Yes there was a horrible influenza pandemic in 1918-1919 but what has that to do with me. Sure there were outbreaks of SARS and MERS in the last two decades but that's not part of my life. We are creatures of the here and now, barely capable of embracing the near future and quite disinclined to dwell on the past until the past cycles into our lives again. Jared Diamond uses the term "landscape amnesia" to describe the situation in which the landscape changes, due to something like a shopping mall being constructed that obstructs what had been a beautiful vista. At first we grumble but, in relatively short order, we accept what is as normal and let what had been slip from our consciousness.

Owen Gray said...

Some people call it "adaptability," Mound. Daniel Partick Moynihan called it "defining deviancy down." The difference between the two concepts depends on whether or not we are inspired by our better or by our darker angels.

the salamander said...

.. 'the trouble with normal is it always gets worse'..
Saddle up Owen.. we ride the winds of change

Owen Gray said...

We're caught in a whirlwind, sal. It's gonna be a rough ride.