During this latest surge of the Omicron strain of coronavirus, I’m beginning to think this little bug has staying power.
If you’re of a certain age, you’ve had your childhood case of Measles back in the 1950s. For that matter you survived the German Measles, Chicken Pox and Mumps! You heard your mother pleading with you not to scratch itchy pustules as she ministered to your fevers and spread Vicks Vapo rub all over your chest. And when you recovered, she’d whip up an ugly tasting eggnog out of raw eggs.
Lucky for us, we were the generation of the Polio vaccine. We knew children in wheelchairs because of Polio, but we were the test subjects for a worldwide Polio vaccine. I dutifully lined up at Sacred Heart School to suck on my first sugar cube. We all had a Smallpox vaccine scar on our arms. Around that time, smallpox was completely eradicated by a strong public health response.
But this time, something is different. Just as researchers miraculously create a coronavirus vaccine in record time, the virus shifts into a different gear. And this time, an uneducated, anti-science cult of the misinformed disdains vaccines. So we are left with its every day presence, and its death counts are everywhere.
To escape from the constant undercurrent of anxiety, my reading habits have changed. I want my bedside tableau of books to reflect a happier time; or at least something non-controversial. Like say animals – I picked up Susan Orlean’s On Animals because I thought it would be happy and light. I was wrong. With a journalist’s eye, she delves into the myriad ways in which humans have historically used and abused animals.
I thought On Animals would be perfect to read before bed because it’s a series of short essays. Orlean has a splendid way with similes, making each animal chapter sing. Poor Willy the Orca (actually Keiko the actor whale with a wilted fin) is portrayed as a victim of circumstance who swims to Norway to panhandle tourists! But it was the noble rabbit that caught my attention and elevated my stress level.
“The most recent essay… takes up outbreaks of hemorrhagic disease among rabbits, a timely issue. Orlean effectively explores the conundrum surrounding the fact that some rabbits die during the vaccine production process that protects other domestic rabbits — and wild rabbits remain unprotected altogether.”
https://www.npr.org/2021/10/12/1043293943/book-review-susan-orlean-on-animals
Granted one rabbit must die to save 10,000. Still, the population of wild rabbits may be extinguished forever by an Ebola-like virus. And the problem is those little bunnies are stoic. They never let on that they don’t feel well, they just keel over and die! We once bought a lop-eared rabbit for the Bride at the Monmouth County NJ Fair from a 4-H tent. Bob built a large elevated enclosure in our yard for the rabbit, who managed to escape eventually.
Orlean tells us that rabbit meat was commonplace on American tables before the cattle industry ramped up after WWII. And of course, Bugs Bunny signaled the end of rabbit farming in the states. But this particular rabbit virus causes a disease, myxomatosis, that was first detected when pet rabbits started dying.
“Myxomatosis is a severe, usually fatal, viral disease. In some countries, it has been used as a way of reducing the number of wild rabbits. It first reached the UK in the 1950s and decimated the wild rabbit population at the time. The disease remains a risk today, to both wild and pet rabbits. The acute form can kill a rabbit within 10 days and the chronic form within two weeks, although some rabbits do survive this.”
https://www.bluecross.org.uk/advice/rabbit/myxomatosis
Our pillow talk has turned a dark corner. Last night, I told Bob all about those poor rabbits and followed it up with a summation of the BBC article I’d read about an elephant virus with a mortality rate of 85%. “Oh, and did you hear they found coronavirus in white-tailed deer?”
Bob turned to me and said, “Maybe we should talk about something other than plagues.”
MountainMornings 