As I am writing this, something that I never thought would be the case has become the case. The United States has overtaken China in total number of coronavirus cases. Today is March 30th, and the stark differences of the handling of the outbreak in China as compared to the United States is the clear reason as to why the US numbers just keep skyrocketing. According to the WHO’s daily coronavirus statistics reports the United States currently has 122,653 total cases, and 19,332 “new” cases. The WHO defines a “new” case as one occurring within the last 24 hours. Meanwhile China currently has a total of 82,447 cases, just 106 of those being “new” cases. Now, to me, something about the handling of this virus in the US seems very off, because China has more than three times as many people as the US does, and yet, they have far fewer cases than we do. Yes, don’t get me wrong, China still has a lot of cases, currently they rank third in the world for most cases behind Italy, and the US. However, in a country in which the outbreak began, and that has over 1 billion people, keeping the case count that low is quite impressive to me. Our two countries have taken very different approaches to this catastrophe. China and president Xi have taken a hardcore approach, locking down everything they could as soon as they could to keep everyone indoors and got the necessary testing out as often and as numerous as they could. Meanwhile president Trump has said things like the virus was a hoax, and he along with many lawmakers have not taken this virus seriously, and as a result, we not only have overtaken China, we are the world leaders in coronavirus cases. The WHO daily situation reports can be found here
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I saw some news online late this evening about something terrible. People who do not have any form of identification papers available for healthcare workers are not eligible to receive tests for the corona virus in Lebanon. Timour Azhari of Aljazeera came out with the topic in question yesterday, stating that the state-run healthcare system has implementations in place such that only those undocumented workers/people who are in need of ’emergency care’ were the only people in this situation who had the possibility to obtain professional care. Denying healthcare to those who would potentially need the care due to COVID-19 is downright deplorable, regardless of the circumstances.
It doesn’t help either that COVID-19 is only getting worse; the doubletime for the illness seems to be just under a week. In America (a far more advanced culture/society compared to Lebanon and many other MENA nationstates) we have the most cases of this terrible illness by a longshot; we have over 140k compromised patients compared to Lebanon’s roughly 440 compromised patients. At this point, it’s hard to say that we have a better healthcare system than they do, given our poor response time and late lack of mobility from our leaders in D.C. I can’t believe I just said that, but i’m starting to think it’s true. You know what makes it worse? Lebanon ratified the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which guarantees “the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health”, including the “prevention, treatment and control of epidemic, endemic, occupational and other diseases” (in Azhari’s words, 2019). We still have to pay for simple coverage! That gets a big yikes from me…
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/03/undocumented-struggle-access-coronavirus-tests-lebanon-200328114859620.html
I finished rereading Excerpts from Chuang Tzu, which talks about Daoism. I am thoroughly confused about what i just read. To my knowledge, the idea of Daoism/Taoism is simply being (is that it, because i hope it is). There is nothing else to it; it just seems like everything is just being.
“Do you know what all things agree in calling right?”
“How would I know that?” said Wang Ni.
“Do you know that you don’t know it?”
“How would I know that?”
“Then do things know nothing?”
This was one of many confusing parts to this reading. Here is how I understand this part (feel free to correct me if my interpretation isn’t right). Say for example, there is a mountain. I call it a mountain, and someone else calls a different thing. We all understand that a mountain is a mountain is a mountain, but that someone else and me both understand that the mountain is in fact a mountain.
Another general bigger picture idea that I may or may not have been able to garner from the reading is that Dao kinda has to do with something like a never ending journey in a sense; always learning about the world around us. Because if you stop learning, you stop understanding how the world functions and is.
Since my theme for blogs this week has been news in the Middle East and Corona Virus in the Middle East. I figured that it would be appropriate for me to write about what I’m reading from their news compared to what I’m experiencing in my own home.
While reading news about the Middle East it’s very easy to tell that the virus there is taking control of the entire region, with it’s statistics rapidly approaching those of Italy. The US is also exponentially climbing in number infected as well as number dead, this number just surpassed over 2,000 people today.
Of course not on the same level as the Middle East, but definitely similarly, Indianapolis simply does not have enough tests to test people who aren’t high risk. As I am a healthy 19 year old, I have been presumed positive by the state, and asked to self quarantine for 2 weeks. My mother can’t even get tested yet, and she has Lupus which puts her at a very high risk of being a fatality from this disease.
This though just doesn’t even touch the fact that many people, such as in Lebanon like we talked about earlier. Just aren’t even being communicated with simply because of documentation. I just found it interesting to compare what’s happening in my house, to what I can access on the news.
‘Man’s nature is evil; goodness is the result of conscious activity.’ This is the first line from Hsun Tzu’s Man’s Nature is Evil. I strongly agree with this philosopher such that people without a modicum of knowledge of ‘Good vs Evil’ when left unchecked will always act in their own self interest/s. He masterfully uses the analogy of ‘warped wood’ on the first page of the PDF to liken that to how people act. I thought about his argument along the following lines as well; to do good, you must know good.
I think my beliefs link up with his especially well starting on the next page, where he criticizes the belief of Mencius such that people are able to learn because they are inherently good natured. Tsu makes what i believe to be a strong distinction between nature and the idea of ‘conscious activity’ (the idea of using effort to think about something). People are not born knowing what is good or evil, they are taught these ideas by ‘sages’ or other people in their lives.
In recent times, we’ve seen evil nature from people in our own community. A week ago I had seen a middle age women pull up her truck in front of a store to load up several boxes of toilet paper and disinfectant wipes. People were jeering at her because she and her husband in the truck didn’t give a rip about others; regardless of the store’s ‘1 per person policy’. Crisis seems to bring the most out of people i find; i was really too young to see it with 9/11, but I can see it with this pandemic. It allows us to see who’s a man/women of the people, who are trying to just get by, and those trying to profit/gain from this terrible situation. Extremes bring out extremes, but the worst part of all this is that we haven’t even started to flatten the infection curve!
If Confucius was alive today, i am 100% positive that he would have a field day talking upon numerous aspects of our society (for me, i think he would be talking about COVID-19, and how [still] many young people aren’t taking it seriously). Re-reading Analects of Confucius (posted by Dr. McGrath) this morning helped me understand new things that I would otherwise not have picked up on in our first discussions over it.
[7:21] The master never discussed strange phenomena, physical exploits, disorder or ghost stories. I can’t think of any better applications better suited for this than the current executive office, who has spread a great deal of misinformation and helped create more disorder. We have often seen conspiracy theories pushed out to push a political agenda that also try to change the public’s opinion on the state of affairs nationally. Doing so has already led to huge repercussions not only in society, but (in my opinion) more so for our economy. I could write an entire post on this opinion, but it wouldn’t change the borderline recession we’re in.
This also falls in line with the following: [8:9] The Master said: “You might force people act according a certain principle, but you won’t be able to force them to understand it.” The current administration also seems dead set on returning to our recently abandoned way of life just because the economy attention. This idea of forcing us back into our old way of life so suddenly is incredibly dangerous and shows a clear lack of awareness for the current state of things in regards to the pandemic we face.
For better or for worse, COVID19 has inspired me to revisit things we’ve covered in the past, and in doing so has helped me find clarity in some of the topics we’ve talked about. Hopefully sooner rather than later however, i hope this pandemic becomes an afterthought, but I imagine that it would take years (unfortunately) to reach that point…
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Being Undocumented in Lebanon
I recently read an article about the Corona Virus in Lebanon and how it’s being handled. Quite frankly it was tough to read, whilst reading through it it wasn’t hard to be able to see that the government is struggling to figure out what they need to do to combat the virus.
As nerves continue to rise in Lebanon the hospitals are now turning away undocumented people of Lebanon with no test at all, or requesting a ridiculous price for the test. The effect of this is leaving many people afraid and untested, possibly fearful for their lives. In some cases this isn’t even their fault, as an awful practice in Lebanon is for abusive migrant employers to take their employee’s documents when they begin work to discourage them from leaving their post. It’s a sad, but interesting situation happening in Lebanon.
All of the information presented was given by Aljazeera, I’m not claiming any as my own simply analyzing and discussing it.
The coronavirus has caused difficulties around the world, and in Lebanon, it is no different. Undocumented immigrants are struggling to get access to coronavirus tests. Many migrant workers do not have identification because they have had to escape abusive employers. It is common for these employers to confiscate passports and IDs. Due to this problem, undocumented immigrants are sent away from hospitals or forced to pay extremely high amounts to get tested. It is also difficult for these immigrants because they are often living in poverty, often in close quarters with many people. Lebanon has 417 cases of the coronavirus and eight deaths. While these numbers are significantly lower than many parts of the world, the cases cannot be accurate especially if undocumented immigrants are not able to get tests. The spread will also increase if these immigrants continue to be turned away. Although this sounds appalling, undocumented immigrants in the United States might face some of the same fears as the immigrants in Lebanon. They might face retributions if they attempt to get tested, and this could continue the spread in the United States.
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Aslan Chapter 2: Rise of Muhammad
This chapter revolves more around the rise of Muhammad. I find this fascinating as I never learned too much about Muhammad, or how he became the prophet that he is. The reading states that there was a dominance in Mecca at the end of the fourth century by “an ambitious young Arab named Qusayy who had managed to gain control of the Kaaba by united a number of feuding clans under his rule” (Aslan, 32). It appeared that these clans were comprised of extended families, and some of these family clans merged based on their political beliefs and intermarriage alliances.
There is an interesting debate about the trade that went on in Mecca. Some people believe that Mecca was an International trading ground and others view the opposite that it rarely attracted much trade at all. However, both sides do agree that whatever trade did go on in Mecca, it was due to the importance and significance of the Kaaba. However, there was a problem in Mecca that the wealth had destroyed the tribal ethic and the egalitarianism was swept away. It also weakened the structure of the tribes and could not protect the community.
This article gets back into Muhammad’s life as he was basically rescued and later married a wealthy female merchant named Khadija. She also had hired him for work. The marriage “paved the way for Muhammad’s acceptance at the highest levels of Meccan society and thoroughly initiated him into the religious-economic system of the city” (Aslan, 37). From having little to no family, Muhammad almost had no chance of being accepted by society until this marriage. This shows that almost anything can happen to anyone at any time, even if the odds seem stacked against it. Another fascinating story was of Muhammad’s “burning bush” revelation about a spirit forcing him to recite words that revealed how he knew he became a prophet. This revelation helped spread the word of God and other right and wrong morals, and the people who had wrong morals or who believed in injustice were punished by God. This caused a backlash with the Quraysh, and they boycotted his clan. His clan moved to Yathrib for Muhammad to spread his wisdom. This chapter sheds incredible light on how Muhammad came from nothing and rose to become this prophet.
While browsing for news that would be interesting to write about I found one article that was more than interesting. The COVID-19 virus is actually starting to slow down the war in Iraq. Iraqi parliament actually requested the US to withdrawal completely from the area, and while the US did deny this request they are pulling plenty of troops out of the country. Iraq is in a lot of distress right now, they actually don’t have any labs in country that can test for the corona virus so for the most part these tests have to be flown out to German military bases to be tested.
While the US is pulling many of its troops out of the country it is making some uneasy, as a lot of places in Iraq don’t even have the water necessary to hydrate it’s people to combat COVID-19. The country is surely weakening, and I for one would be curious about what a terrorist group would try to take advantage of in a time like this.
Even though none of this information was mine, credit can be given to the Haaretz News Website. I think it’s important for all of us to be educated on situations like these. In America our worst problem currently is not having enough tests to get people tested. Just imagine if we didn’t have enough water.