The pandemic induced social distancing has become wearisome. It is getting downright annoying. The weariness and annoyance causes a continuum of boredom which in turn makes people anxious and angry. The newspapers and the news media bombard its readers and listeners with clamor from people and business leaders who are wanting to junk the social distancing rules and get back, as much as possible, to normal. The clamor repeats the mantra that the activities they want to do are not harmful, only slightly harmful and, in any event, not nearly as harmful as other activities which are permitted.
After nearly a year of curtailed business, leisure and social activities due to a pandemic many businesses and persons are thoroughly sick of the socially distancing limitations. And many businesses are going broke which causes its employees to lose their jobs. These times are far from the best of times for everyone. Even though a vaccine, which promises to end the pandemic, has been developed, many people are fed up with restrictions and are clamoring for relief and a few are simply ignoring the limitations. Pandemic fatigue has set in, unreason reigns. But the people and businesses clamoring for relief and to be permitted to pursue their aims, with fewer, if not, any restrictions, make those claims based on faulty reasoning. Their claims are touted based on a fallacy. The fallacy is that if one prohibited activity which has an infection rate equal to or even less than a permitted activity, then the prohibited activity should also be permitted.
Thus we have airline managers claiming that airline travel is as safe as going to the grocery store. We have pastors claiming that worship activities do not spread infection anymore than people working in a food processing plant. Bar and restaurant owners claim that serving patrons is no more dangerous for their patrons than family gatherings and, in any event, they can arrange their environment to minimize the risk. What it all comes down to is that all claimants for relief wish to be treated the same as others. Being treated the same as others is only fair and we all desire to be treated fairly. To put it simply, the claimants say: If others can do it, we should be able to do it too. What we want to do is no worse than what they do. It’s only fair that if they can do it we should be able to do it too!. No doubt, some of the more irrational and vehement demands for relief because it’s only fair, cause the public health officials to self-censure and permit what they otherwise would not. Thus the pandemonium continues unabated, making the administration of sensible public health rules difficult and retarding the progress against the virus that would be made if we all just did what the scientists, medical experts and public health officials tell us what we should do.
Contagion preventions measures are not, and cannot, be based on what is fair to everyone. If one can do it, we all can do it, is the road to disaster. The sad reality is that the way to stop a contagion of a community spread virus is to end the community. If no human has contact with any other human that would kill the virus as it would have no hosts. Of course, that is an impossible measure to take. The next best measure is to limit contact between humans as much as possible and is acceptable. Therefore the solution is to devise rules that limit contact between humans as much as possible and are yet acceptable. For example, even though going to a grocery store may be a more contagious activity than travel in an airplane, banning people from purchasing groceries would be universally condemned and ignored, whereas banning air travel would be no hardship to most and condemned by only a few.
Therefore our political leaders and our public health officials can only ban those activities for which a ban is politically and socially acceptable. The inevitable result is that restaurant and bar owners cannot be treated the same as owners of grocery stores. Travellers across borders will not be treated the same as cross border truck drivers, even if, it can shown that truck driver bring in more infection than casual travellers.
The contagion preventive measures must be based on what is essential and what is politically and socially acceptable. The more essential an activity is, the more likely that it needs to be carried on regardless of an even higher infection rate than other activities. The less essential an activity is, the more likely it will be banned, regardless of an even lower infection rate than other activities. By now it is clear that food processing plants, due to its environment, have high infection rates amongst its employees. Those rates are much higher than infection rates at religious worship services. But banning food processing will affect the physical well being of all the population whereas banning religious worship services affect only the spiritual well being and, then, only of it adherents. No one wants that food processing should be banned and religious worship service permitted because the infection rate at religious worship services is far less than the rate at food processing plants. Everyone agrees that banning religious worship services is more acceptable than banning food processing. The basis for that agreement rests on the fact that food processing is much more essential to human welfare than religious worship services. To ban food processing can starve you and starve everyone. To ban religious worship services, although they are uplifting and enlightening and a fundamental freedom, their absence will not kill you.
Even though a banned activity has a lower infection rate than a permitted activity, if it is not essential, it should not be permitted. If a food processing plant with an infection rate of five out of one hundred is permitted and the religious worship services with a rate of only 1 out of a hundred is also permitted because its rate is much lower than that of the food processing plant, the infection rate of both activities will be six out of two hundred. Whereas, if the religious worship services were banned the infection rate would still be only five out of two hundred. The point is, that public health policies are based on the criteria that contact between humans are to be minimized as much as possible. That aim has to be tempered with permitting those contacts that continue essential services and provide essential products. Ideally, there should be no contact at all. But for all to stay alive, the essential life-saving services have to be provided and essential life-saving products have to be delivered. It follows that essential services have to be provided and the essential products have to be delivered regardless of the high infection rates of those activities. And the services and products that are not essential to survival need not be provided or delivered regardless of their minimal infection rates.
If we look at the public health directives from the point of view what its real aims are, instead of insisting on fair treatment and the same treatment as everyone else, we would more effectively defeat the pandemic. But more to the point, if we judged the restrictions on the same criteria on which they are imposed, we would spare our selves anxiety and anger. Judge the measures on how essential they are and not on whether or not they are as fair to some as to others.