A short thread on what it feels like to be in NY right now: Yesterday is when I understood what our friends in Italy were trying to tell us a few ago, about the intensity of so much loss in such a short time. (1/n)
In the last six days, six people I am close to have lost someone to COVID-19. A dear friend lost both his aged parents 3 days apart. A young colleague lost her mother. Another lost her father-in-law. A cousin told of his two best friends each losing their mothers. (2/n)
I have participated in my first virtual funeral and first virtual shiva, and have another one tonight. (3/n)
Consider this: In the NYC metro area, we have roughly 15,000 dead from COVID-19 out of about 15 million people. who live here. That is just 0.1 percent. And yet it feels like the Angel of Death is stalking our streets. (4/n)
When I hear people elsewhere in the US talking about a death rate of 1 or 2 percent being an acceptable cost, because we can't bear the economic pain, I want to shake them by the throat. Losing just a tenth or twentieth of that level is already a horror. (5/n)
But I know facts don't change people's minds. Hearing that this was a pandemic that spread exponentially didn't change enough minds soon enough. So here we are. (6/n)
Like those good people in Italy who tried to warn us a few weeks ago, all I can say to the rest of America is, try to hold firm on the #lockdown. And where that's not happening because of how we are ruled by fools, get ready. (7/end)
