I've avoided this post like the plague because it's almost impossible to talk about it without getting into politics or condemning people for their actions or inactions but nothing happens right now without first saying the word Covid. It's so intertwined in our lives. The news is all about Covid. Standing in lines to enter stores and the only topic of discussion is Covid. It's overwhelming.
It's no secret that I've been totally focused on this house renovation and the only outings for the Eplett household is for groceries, medical appointments and material acquisition for the renovations. That's it. My wife Pat is terrified that I may pick up Covid on one of my outings and bring it home and give it to her. Pat's health is temperamental at best. She had cancer 32 years ago and the radiation , chemotherapy and hormone treatments really took a toll. It gave her life but it also took some of her abilities to ward off general health issues. So she's terrified that I may give it to her and it would probably take her life.
When I go out "shopping" I tell her that I, of all the people she knows am probably the best prepared to deal with Covid since all of my training at the nuclear plant dealing with radiation. 8 weeks of training to be a Nuclear Energy Worker and another 8 weeks of training to be a Nuclear Energy Worker Supervisor. This morning we learned that our Prime Minister of Canada will be putting the entire country in to lock down for the next 28 days and as I see it, it's too late. The Covid is "out of the box". This will help control the spread, but I think there's little to no hope for a reversal in Covid cases going up. Our only hope now is to protect the population from the virus by vaccinating them to minimize the infection of Covid. It certainly won't help spreading it around and polluting the world.
Covid is very much like radiation. It needs to be contained and controlled in order for human sustainability. It's life threatening for most. Can you imagine what would happen if we ran nuclear power plants with no containment and allowed workers to open up systems and work on systems with no radioactive controls in place? Sure you can. You're living in it right now with Covid !! The lack of initial training for the average person. No oversite on protection of people out and about living in the environment. Lack of testing of people out and about allowing contaminated people to contaminate other parts of the world. This is just like what would happen if we opened the doors to the nuclear reactor building and allowed anyone to enter and leave the Reactor Building without monitoring for contamination.
The 4 key principals when working with radiation are
Time- Limit the time of exposure to the radioactive source. In this case with Covid, limit your time out and about in areas of possible Covid contamination.
Distance- Maximize the distance from the contamination. In this case, assume everything and everybody is infected with Covid. Look around you and assume that everything you see is contaminated and that the air that you breathe is contaminated and stay as far away from these sources of contamination as possible.
Shielding Protect yourself from possible airborne contamination. Wear a mask and for God sake wear it properly over your nose!!! How many times I see people out and about with masks on their face and not covering their nose stuns me. If I was out monitoring staff in the Nuclear plant and they weren't wearing their protective gear properly, I'd have to fire their asses to save them from themselves and protect me from the law. As a member of the general populous right now all I want to do is kick some asses for not wearing their masks properly. They're Idiots !! I can't even open my mouth and tell them off without repercussions so I just give them the hairy eyeball and shake my head. They get it but don't care.
Last but not least Decay Radiation is an emission from an atom to become a stable atom. The emission can come in a few forms but the bottom line is that once an atom has given up its "radiation" it becomes stable and is no longer radioactive. In the case of Covid, if we minimize whatever is the source of food for the virus, it will die off (Decay). I've asked everyone and anyone who might have the knowledge on what this virus sustains itself on and even the experts don't know. This fundamental astounds me. All our efforts to date wearing masks, washing hands, limiting exposure have been to control the spread until we can protect ourselves from the virus. We've done a remarkable job doing so considering that there's been no formal training for everyone like we do in the Nuclear plants.
The next step is vaccination to protect everyone from the virus. This will only protect you from the deadly effects of the virus. It will not prevent you from spreading the virus around. Protection is key here but it's not the end as far as I'm concerned. We need to eradicate this virus from the planet if that's at all possible. How in God's name can we do that if we don't have any idea how this virus sustains itself? Is it temperature sensitive? Does it feed on organics? Does it need water? What allows it to live and what stop gap can we put in place to reduce its growth? No one can answer these questions for me and that's key in my mind if we are going to come out on top and continue to rule this planet.
Stay safe everyone and try to enjoy the Holidays in which ever way you celebrate this time of year.
cheers,
KB
