I regret to inform you that Omicron, which is to always be pronounced in a menacing, reverberated voice, has spread outside of California. In fact, it appears that this case actually confirms the virus is present in at least three states.
A Minnesota man has been found to have had the Omicron variant. The CDC is rushing to investigate, while members of the press are trumpeting this as big news in typically hysterical fashion.
It appears this man got the virus from a highly international convention in New York, which would confirm the Omicron variant is already spreading there as well. He then came back, tested positive in Minnesota, and has now fully recovered. That puts his experience in line with the reports out of South Africa that infection from Omicron is relatively mild.
That’s not to say no one will ever die from it, as I’m sure some with certain pre-existing conditions will, but there is hope that as COVID-19 continues to mutate, that it will follow the path of prior viruses. That usually means becoming more transmissible but less deadly. If that turns out to be the case, then letting Omicron become the predominant variant could actually be a preferable path.
Of course, Dr. Anthony Fauci disagrees because if COVID-19 dissipates as a large threat while becoming more and more endemic (i.e. like the flu), he goes back to being a nobody who doesn’t get put on TV every Sunday, and he can’t have that.
Regardless, put me in the camp of saying “who cares?” to this news of an Omicron infection in Minnesota. There is no reality where we can stop the spread of these variants. No amount of travel bans, no amount of lockdowns, and no amount of mandates will do anything but slightly delay the inevitable. Given that fact, why should I care that Omicron begins to spread? And at some point in the future, another variant will no doubt begin to spread, too.
The solution here is not more hysteria and the CDC wasting resources to run around the country tracking down Omicron cases. The solution is to work like crazy to approve therapeutics that can truly deal with a virus that is airborne and is already endemic. Pfizer’s new COVID treatment pill is a very promising prospect, and it’s necessary because the coronavirus is not going away. You can’t just keep shooting people up with more and more vaccine boosters. We have to learn to live with this virus — because we don’t have a choice.
Yet, the federal government, including Joe Biden as its leader, continues to obsess over measures that simply don’t provide any real, practical benefit. I still contend they are doing so not because they genuinely think it will make a difference, but because they want the cover provided by being able to say they “did something.” When all your failures can be blamed on the pandemic, it’s paramount that you pretend to be fighting the pandemic. That’s a coward’s way to lead, though.
True leaders make tough decisions. They don’t keep doing the same things over and over again that haven’t worked in the past. Of course, Joe Biden is not a true leader, so I might as well be talking to a wall.