Corona Daily 061: If I Have It, You Have It

Shane Michael, 42, a married man with six children is a resident of Des Moines, capital of Iowa, North America.

On 11 November 2020, he had gone to an eyewear shop to buy a new pair of spectacles. A stranger in the shop approached Shane and said, “Can you pull your mask over your nose?” The CDC guidance on correct mask-wearing requires Americans to put the mask over their nose and mouth and secure it under their chin.

Shane, enraged by this nosey stranger, exchanged words with him. A few minutes later they met in the parking lot.

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From here on, the version of events differs. The name of the other guy was Mark Dinning.  Shane didn’t know it. (After all that happened later, he will never forget that name).

Mark Dinning told police that Shane followed him out of the eyewear shop, and began assaulting him. Both men fell to the ground, with Shane on top. Shane’s left arm hit Mark’s left eye hard, and Mark instinctively bit that arm. In response, Shane hit Mark’s private parts with his knees. Then Shane took down his mask, coughed in Mark’s face, spat on him and said, “If I have it, you have it.”

These are the details in the police report that Mark Dinning filed.

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Shane told the police it was Mark who began the fight. When Shane walked to his car, Mark nudged him and poked his thumb into his stomach. He said he was holding Mark down on the ground in self-defense. Dennis Michael, Shane’s father, said his son has asthma and he was not going to cover his nose and mouth because he can’t breathe.

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Multiple witnesses at the scene of the fight told police Shane was the aggressor. An employee in the eyeware shop described him as a problem. Photo of Mark Dinning’s face, red and badly swollen, and his swollen left eye shut was offered as an exhibit to the court. The following day, Mark had described on his Facebook wall how he had nearly lost his eye.

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Shane was arrested and charged. In February, the prosecutors offered a plea deal. Shane should enter a plea accepting his willful act causing bodily injury. This gets classified as a class D felony. In exchange, the prosecutors would request the court a deferred judgment with Shane on probation for two years.

Shane Michael refused that offer, saying he would prefer to argue the case to a jury. Prosecutors upgraded the charge to an act causing serious injury, a class C felony.

The jury unanimously found Shane guilty. Last week, on 9 June, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison. This particular offence carries a mandatory 10 years sentence, which the judge doesn’t have discretion to reduce once a jury convicts a person.

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Shane’s father said the sentence was not fair. It’s like the other man got a black eye in a bar fight, and now his son will be in prison for ten years. He also complained there was no mask mandate in the state, the source of the fight. Here his son was rather unfortunate. The Iowa governor had issued a mask mandate on 10 November, only one day before the fight.

Shane’s wife, Becky, said they have six children, and she is not sure how she will get by with her husband in prison. “He is my rock, he is my protector. I am lost without him.” She said.

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Out of all the mask-related cases, this case was given the longest sentence.

The lessons from the case: Wear your mask properly if it is a legal requirement in your area. If a stranger points out that the mask should cover your nose rather than chin, politely accept the criticism and pull the mask up immediately. If your instinct gets the better of you and you assault a stranger, accept your guilt, be remorseful, and accept whatever plea the prosecution offers. Also, the more children you have, the more responsible your behavior should be.

Ravi 

Corona Daily 062: Your Next Stay at a *****Star Hotel

With coronavirus retreating and the sun shining, American families are rushing out holidaying. At the beginning of April, over ten million travelers passed through airport security at American airports. People are heading south in particular, to warm weather and lax covid protocols. Hotels in Tampa and Phoenix are almost at full occupancy.

Hotels, including the luxury hotels, are planning a new post-pandemic business model. Pandemic taught them certain things about guest expectations. The new strategy is to improve profits by employing fewer workers. Two big areas are daily room cleaning and breakfast spreads.

In most hotels, whether earmarked for quarantine or not, staff was instructed to minimize their interaction with the hotel guests. Coronavirus-era government health guidelines said, “Guest rooms occupied by the same customer over multiple days should not be cleaned daily, unless requested.” The American hotel association would love to retain them post-pandemic.

If room cleaning were to happen on alternate days instead of every day, the hotel can employ half the housekeeping staff, instantly boosting profit margins. USA conducted a national survey in August 2020 asking frequent travelers a few questions. 86% said they were happy with suspending daily housekeeping. 85% were happy using technology to reduce direct contact with hotel staff. 77% were happy with temporary closing of swimming pool, gym etc. Hotel owners have concluded, perhaps wrongly, that these services are not critical. If customers could live without them during the pandemic, why not later?

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Different options are considered. Frequency will be reduced. An extreme suggestion is to offer it only between check-out and check-in. If you stay for seven days, you will have a clean room on arrival. It will be cleaned only seven days later when you leave. (In USSR times, I have lived in Soviet hotels, where this was common practice. I never thought it would one day become best practice for American hotels).

Marriot hotels would like to move to “opt-in” as opposed to “opt-out” housekeeping services. The default is absence of housekeeping. If you want it, ask for it, and pay for it. The day is not far when you will need to tick the box for “room cleaning” and pay extra when booking a hotel room. (Like food on a domestic flight).

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Breakfast is the other thing that may become a casualty. In the pandemic, hotels sent packed boxes to the rooms, and guests were happy to eat in their rooms. (The word happy is used by the hotel owners). Why spread a table every morning with cornflakes, fruit, juices, cakes, egg dishes, meat slices, cheese and grapes? In a bed and breakfast model, the guests tend to eat more and damage the hotel’s profitability.

Breakfast is another item that may become an opt-in.  

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Marriott, the world’s largest hotel chain has installed “contactless arrival kiosks” at its hotels in New York, Louisiana and Miami. Convenience stores have been replaced by giant vending machines. These contact-free innovations are for the benefit of the guests and their health.

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In America, employment in the hotel industry is still down more than 25%, with more than 500,000 jobs lost in the pandemic. The labour union “Unite Here” estimates that the loss of the practice of daily room cleaning would lose 181,000 cleaning jobs, 39% of all cleaning jobs. They would never come back.

Hilton’s CEO Chris Nassetta said he is focused on reducing labour costs at the chain’s 6,400 hotels. “The work we are doing right now in every one of our brands is about making them higher margin businesses and creating more labour efficiencies. (genteelism for job cuts). When we get out of the crisis, those businesses will be higher margin and require less labour than they did pre-covid.”

The Hilton share price rose by 20% after his speech. CEO Nassetta’s pay package went up from $21 million (2019) to $56 million (2020).

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If you ask me, book an Airbnb the next time you want to book a hotel. You have to clean the place yourself, but that is no longer a shortcoming, is it?

Ravi 

Corona Daily 063: Blood Connects Us All

Tomorrow, 14 June, is World Blood Donor Day, the second one in this pandemic. This day is celebrated annually since 2005 on the birth anniversary of the Austrian biologist Karl Landsteiner. He won the Nobel for his discovery of the blood groups A, B, O and others. This year Rome is the host.

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Last April, most blood drives were cancelled threatening serious blood shortages everywhere. Hospital refrigerators started running out of blood. Schools, corporations and places of worship were shut – these are the places where the major blood donation drives take place. Most people, anywhere in the world, have donated blood the first time in a school. The Red Cross receives 80% of its blood stock from drives at these venues.

Temporary donation centers moved the donor beds six feet apart, added sanitisers, bought thousands of pairs of gloves, but donors and staff were worried about catching the virus. The number of road accident cases dropped, but women were still hemorrhaging during childbirth. In gun cultures, people were still getting shot. And cancer patients needed transfusions.

Only in the USA, every two seconds someone needs blood. And a single donation can save up to three lives. In a year, more than 1.75 million people are diagnosed with cancer for the first time. Many of them need blood, often daily, during chemotherapy. Type O-negative blood, and type AB plasma can be transfused to any patient, but both are in short supply.

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Blood outside our body is a perishable product. Red blood cells last about 42 days, and plasma can be frozen. However, platelets – the tiny cells in blood that help it clot – last only five days. Excluding the collection and transport time, it is effectively three days. This is the reason constant donations and a rolling blood supply is critical.

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In poor countries, 54 % blood transfusions are given to children under 5 years of age. In the rich countries, 75% transfusions are given to patients 60+. On the other hand, because rich countries are ageing, 65+ donors are a big percentage of donors. (In young countries like India, a person above 65 is not eligible to donate.) In America and Europe, this was another reason for the drop in collections. The 65+ donors were told they were vulnerable and shouldn’t leave their houses.

Countries wanted to attract young donors. But due to school closures, organizations like the Red Cross didn’t manage to reach them. It is feared three or four batches of youngsters will miss the experience of donating blood as they step into adulthood.  

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Scientists in many countries including the USA, Korea, Pakistan, China, and France analysed thousands of blood donations for the presence of the coronavirus.  The good news is the researchers uniformly found that the risk of transmission of covid-19 through blood donation is close to zero. Even in the rare cases where donated blood tested positive, transmission through transfusion didn’t happen.

The gap between a vaccine and blood donation varies depending on the country and vaccine, but is usually 14 days. If you have had a covid infection, in India you need to wait for 28 days before donating. With the covid crisis, India has opened an online platform BloodForIndia.

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In the UK, generally speaking a liberal democracy, two men can form a civil union, but may not be able to donate blood. When a British man goes to donate blood, one of the questions on the form is: “have you had sex with another man in the last three months?” If he says yes, he is disqualified.

The law was reformed in 2017. Before that any man who had had sex with another man in the previous 12 months was disqualified.

Tomorrow, on the occasion of World Blood Donor Day, this barrier is removed. Gay and bisexual men with a stable sexual partner and with no sex-transmitted disease or AIDS can donate their blood from tomorrow, without resorting to abstinence.

Ravi 

Corona Daily 064: Choose a Chant

Yesterday, I talked about the impact of empty stadiums on referee decisions and player performance. Players from different sports have shared their experience of playing without fans. The Tokyo Olympics which will start next month may be held without spectators. The organizers are currently studying learnings from the past year.

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Players from mega sports such as baseball and cricket mentioned they could talk directly to the dugout from the mound/pitch. There was no traffic noise from outside the stadium. Their own talk and opponents’ chatter was clearly audible, even whispers.

When the guys hit the ball, it sounded very loud off the bat. The fans in the stands usually dilute that sound.

Preston Tucker of the Kia Tigers said crowd noise often indicated to him the importance of the situation. Players like him realize the big situation moment based on the crowd decibels. Even the silence of the stands can denote a critical moment. (Like during a penalty shootout in football). In empty stadiums, the game was uniformly quiet.

Most players said they missed the feedback from the crowd. After a big strikeout (baseball), a goal (soccer), a wicket or a six (cricket), players are accustomed to instant feedback. It keeps the adrenalin going, particularly in the later phase of the game when players are tired. Fan support is their reserve energy.

A passionate crowd is capable of turning a match around. Star athletes who claim such focus that they never hear the crowd realized it was not so.

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There is now a whole new profession and skill development for creating simulated crowd noise. Sky Sports created a range of custom-tailored, and team specific crowd noises and chants. This was to make the Premier League lively. Now, even when the spectators return, TV viewers will have a choice between the stadium noise, and the simulated crowd sound. There is also a “choose a chant” feature. When England plays Croatia tomorrow at the Wembley stadium, in theory, the Croatian viewers of Sky Sports can choose crowd cheers, jeers and chanting in Croatian.

When Bundesliga went ahead with matches in empty stadiums, a set of skilled operators were watching the games from a studio in Munich. They had at their disposal dozens of carefully selected audio samples, as specific as a rising applause when a team is chasing an equalizing goal, or loud booing for a call overturned by a video review. A clip for every situation, and the job of the operator is to press the right clip at a flash.

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Jean Baudrillard, a French intellectual, had lamented that simulated experiences were replacing real life in postindustrial society. The big sport is now geared towards TV viewership. A man in the stadium watching the live action instinctively waits for action replay, and realizes that it is on offer only at home. (Now, though, some sports offer simultaneous viewing on big screens in stadiums).

Baudrillard describes the media-saturated culture moving towards “hyper-reality”, a state where the simulated is more prominent than the authentic. Where images and copies are considered realer than real life.

The hyper-reality problem has become worse during the pandemic, not only for sport. We can conveniently meet and chat on Zoom. Ballets and orchestras can be watched online. Offices and office life can be made redundant through remote work. Students can procure their degrees without ever visiting a university.

In sitcoms, viewers accept the fake laughing tracks that go off at the opportune moments. But it still makes us a little uncomfortable – we would prefer natural laughter.

If TV viewers start choosing the crowd noise and chants, why have real players? Fantasy sport competitions can be arranged, where the viewer chooses not only the chants, but also the winner. Maybe such competitions are already happening.

Ravi 

Corona Daily 065: Football without Fans

With noticeable delay, Euro 2020, the European football championship begins today. It is likely to have fans in the stadium, though the virus cases scoreboard may change that. For the first time, VAR (video assistant referee) system has been introduced.

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Big sport earns its revenue from TV advertising rather than gate receipts. Historically, spectators at the stadium were critical for most sports. In the pandemic, notwithstanding the risks, football and cricket tournaments were conducted in empty stadiums. Fake pre-taped crowd cheering was added in the mix for the TV viewers. Though the players and devotees of the game were frustrated, researchers were delighted at this unique opportunity.

Among others, studies tried to answer the question: why do home teams tend to win more? One of the suspected causes was the bias of the referee.

Researchers found that with crowds, referees penalize home teams less. Without fans, this bias disappeared. In one experiment, officials were shown past recorded games and asked how they would have ruled. When the crowd noise was on, they were kinder to the home team. When the sound was muted, they were more objective.

One paper published last year found that in the pandemic’s empty stadiums, the home team’s edge vanished. Referees gave similar number of cards for fouls to both sides, and visitors won as often as the hosts. A study commissioned by the Economist analysed 1,534 matches without fans in 2020. The total number of cards received by the home team went up from 46% pre-pandemic to 50%. (You may think this is close, but 46% for the home team meant 54% for the visitors).

Other than cards, in normal times, home teams received more injury time. When home teams were leading, injury time became shorter.

An earlier Italian research (in 2007, Italy had banned spectators for their behavior) noted that the same referees officiating in a game between the same two teams at the same venue behaved dramatically differently when spectators were present versus when no one was watching.

It is not because referees are biased or corrupt, but because they are human. They get carried away by the crowd pressure, often without realizing it.

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The latest Economist mentions another study that is even more interesting.

Fabrizio Colella, an economics graduate student researched the impact of racism on players with and without fans. (I wonder why many football researchers are Italian). For each player in Serie A, the top tier of Italian football, Fabrizio compiled individual performance scores for the last two years. The performance was rated on the scale of one to ten, taking into account many aspects including goals and assists. He classified over 500 players into white and non-white. For each of these players, he compared how they fared, on average, when performing before fans and in empty stadiums.

On average, white players scored worse without fans than in packed stadiums. The non-white players’ performance metric improved significantly. The researcher built a mathematical model to look for other variables, such as player’s nationality or the quality of the team. However, the only thing that stood out was skin colour. It seems the racial chants that are common in football stadiums affect the black players more than the white players. In fact, the study found that the effect was greater for the darkest-skinned players than for brown or olive-skinned ones.

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This month, Romelu Lakaku, a striker in the Belgium team said that racism in football right now is at an all-time high. Euro 2020 that starts today will bring back the fans to the stadiums and inevitably racial abuse as well.

The Video assistant referee may be able to reduce the bias of the on-field referee. But no solution is in sight for the football hooligans and their racist chanting.

Ravi 

Corona Daily 066: I Must Work to Eat

12 June is the “World Day against Child Labour”. Two distressing reports were released today in advance. One is an 87-page report by UNICEF and the other a 69-page report by the Human Rights Watch. The second report, “I must work to eat”, focuses on child labour in Ghana, Uganda and Nepal.

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Almost all the Nepalese children interviewed said their families’ income nosedived or was completely lost in the pandemic. Asim, 12, said his father was a barber but couldn’t work. Maimun, 13, is the son of farmers. They had to throw away the tomato and cauliflower crop because there was nowhere to sell them. Rupa, 14, said both her parents lost work. They drank a lot and fought with each other about money.

Rajesh, 14, said, “I was so desperate (to study online) but we didn’t have money to buy a phone.” Nepal’s Ministry of Education worked to develop remote learning options, but two-thirds of Nepali children were unable to access them. 

Amir, 14, said, “There was nothing to do at home since school shut down. And with everybody at home, we started to run out of food quickly. I decided to go to work because what else was I going to do?”

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The children interviewed worked in brick kilns, carpet factories, in construction, as mechanics, rickshaw drivers, carpenters, and as street vendors selling tea, balloons, masks and other goodies. Most of them worked for more than eight hours daily, some more than twelve hours. Children reported fatigue, dizziness; pain in the back, legs, knees, hands, fingers and eyes from carrying heavy loads, repetitive motions and sitting for extended periods.

Some children described work that was hazardous. In Uganda and Ghana, children carried heavy bags of ore at gold mining sites, crushed the ore with hammers, breathed in dust and fume from processing machines, and handled toxic mercury to extract gold from the ore. At stone quarries, some children reported injuries from flying stones, including sharp particles that got into their eyes. Children showed the interviewers their injuries.

Most were paid very little, at times nothing. A 12 year old boy from Ghana said he worked 11 hours a day carting fish to market, but was paid only 2-3 cedis per day ($0.34-$0.52). “On many days, I go very hungry”, he told the researchers.

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The UNICEF report tells us the scale of the problem. One in every ten children is subjected to labour, some are enslaved or worse (prostitution, pornography, used in armed conflict, drug trafficking). Worldwide 160 million children (aged 5-17) are engaged in child labour, 79 million of them performing dangerous work. The figure includes 97 million boys, and 63 million girls. However, the work done by girls at home is neither paid for nor counted.

The United Nations planned to eradicate child labour by 2025. Unfortunately, since 2016, the progress had stopped. Pandemic has aggravated the situation. Asia and Latin America saw some progress in the last decade, however in sub-Saharan Africa, the picture has become increasingly worse.

Contrary to what we think, most children (72%) work within their family unit. This includes hazardous work, though ‘family’ is usually understood as a safe work environment. 25% of the youngest children (5-11) and 50% of teenagers in family-based set-up end up harming their health, safety or morals.

The agricultural sector accounts for the largest share (70%). Employing child labour on farms is taken for granted in many rural areas.

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Now in the second year of the pandemic, with global lockdowns, school closures, loss of jobs, economic disruptions, and shrinking national budgets, many families and children themselves are left without a choice.

Formal schooling not only educates, it keeps a child engaged and away from illegal labour. Opening schools must be the first priority of any country.

Offering economic assistance to poor families by cash transfer or free food is another necessary measure. However, many governments in Asia and Africa are themselves running out of resources.

The G7 meet begins tomorrow. To get rid of the coronavirus, G7 may decide to assist poor countries with vaccines. Will the group ever think of helping them to eradicate child labour?  

Ravi 

Corona Daily 067: The State of New Jersey vs Josephina Brito-Fernandez

Following are the facts of the case.

Josephina Brito-Fernandez, 49, is a home health aide. This is a versatile job that combines qualified nursing with cooking and cleaning. Originally from the Dominican Republic, she is a legal permanent resident of the USA, living in New Jersey with her husband and five children. She speaks only Spanish, her knowledge of English is less than basic.

She had been working for a family of five that included an 80-year old lady. Josephina bathed, fed, cooked and cleaned for the family. For the services, she earned $11 an hour from a staffing agency.

On 16 April 2020, Josephina was tested for covid-19. At the beginning of the pandemic, everyone who was tested was given brochures in English and Spanish. Later when detectives interrogated her, Josephina admitted not reading them, although she can read Spanish. Between the test and the result, the brochure required her to go into isolation. She didn’t.

On 17 April, she came back to the house. The in-house video recording shows she cared for her elderly patient by feeding her, giving her a sponge bath, and taking her vital signs. The same video confirms she was wearing neither PPE nor mask inside the house. Her staffing agency said they expected the staff to wear PPE.

After a few days, the 80-year old lady contracted the covid-19 virus, and was hospitalized. The other four members of the house tested positive as well. The old lady died in the hospital.

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On a complaint filed by the sister of the old lady, police detectives investigated the matter. When probed by them, Josephina acknowledged she understood covid-19 was a serious illness, and that elderly patients were at an increased risk.

On 14 May 2020, Josephina was charged with five criminal counts. The first accusation was that she had knowingly engaged in conduct which created a substantial risk of death. The other four counts related to the other four members of the family, who tested positive, and recovered without hospitalization. Here she was accused of serious bodily injury to four people by visiting victims in their own residence one day after being tested for covid-19.

Her acts were considered felonies, not misdemeanors. In the USA, felony is a serious offence that is punishable by death or imprisonment longer than a year.

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At around the same time when Josephina was charged, the co-owners of a nearby New Jersey gym staged a protest live on Fox News. All the protesters were unmasked. In the live telecast, police told the unmasked crowd they were violating the law, and then said “good day” to them. Later, the gym owners received a misdemeanor ticket.

In the same month, President Trump refused to wear a mask, and encouraged his admirers to follow suit. Months later, in a superspreader event organized in the White House Rose Garden, most attendees were sat without masks very close to one another. The video recording of that event is available.

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There is no mention of whether Josephina had tested positive. Her crime was to visit the family between the test and the result. Felony charges allow the State to deport legal residents. Josephina spent nine months in a terrified state, with the prospect of imprisonment followed by deportation. Though her lawyer felt the prosecution case was weak; the risk was too high for a non-white, non-citizen woman. Juries are unpredictable, or rather predictable when the defendant is poor and black or Hispanic.

A compromise was reached with the prosecution, whereby Josephina would permanently lose her licence to work. Had she been convicted, she would have lost it anyway. She is put on probation in lieu of imprisonment. As an offender, she is ordered to follow a set of conditions set by the court, under the supervision of a probation officer. If she breaks any rules, she will be sent to prison.

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This is the only known case in the civilized world where suspicion of virus transmission became a serious criminal offence.

Ravi 

Corona Daily 068: Tomorrow’s Breakfast will be More Expensive

Last week, the United Nations issued the latest Food Price Index. Food and Agriculture organization (FAO) is UN’s specialized arm that deals with global food security. Its motto is “Let there be bread (fiat panis)”

The report analyses food prices into five groups. (a) Cereals (b) Vegetable Oils (c) Dairy products (d) Meat (e) Sugar.

Overall food prices in May 2021 were nearly 40% higher than a year ago. Rising every month during the pandemic, the price index was the highest since September 2011.

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Among the cereals, international maize prices rose most dramatically, 90% more than a year ago, and reaching their highest since January 2013. USA may be able to maintain its production, but Brazil’s weather is predicted to result in a heavy maize shortfall. Wheat prices, despite a good crop in EU and America, grew by almost 30% in a year.

Vegetable oil price inflation is driven by rising palm, soy and rapeseed oil prices. Palm oil inventories are low, thanks to the slow production in Southeast Asia. Soybean oil is becoming more expensive because in addition to food, it is now used as biodiesel.

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Dairy products also became almost 30% more expensive. Skim milk powder was the inflation leader. You may want to replace cheese with butter in your sandwich. Cheese became dearer due to lower supplies from the EU. Butter prices fell on increased exports from New Zealand.

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Cereal prices usually push meat prices higher, because animals consume a lot of vegetarian food. Meat prices have been growing for the past eight months, and are 10% higher than in May 2020. The closures of slaughterhouses during the early months, and general slowdown in production of bovine and ovine meats have shifted demand to poultry and pig meats in certain countries. As Europe and North America come out of the pandemic, and start eating out, the demand will grow further.

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Sugar prices have remained relatively calm, growing only in the past two months, and reaching the highest level since March 2017. Brazil is the world’s largest sugar exporter. Prolonged dry weather has affected the crop development. Brazilian Real became stronger (because USD became weaker), hampering exports. Fortunately, Indian sugar exports have shot up capping the international sugar prices.

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Food prices are rocketing globally. The World Bank estimates pandemic has added 120 million ‘new poor’, those below the extreme poverty line ($1.90 a day). In Nigeria, food inflation rose to 23% in March. In Indonesia, tofu costs 30% more than a year ago. In Lebanon, with half the country below the poverty line, food is five times more expensive than in 2019. In Russia, food prices rose 7.7% in 2020, forcing Putin to order his ministers to check inflation. In the UK, 10% people used food banks.   

As if this was not enough, an American survey of 4,000 consumers shows a boom in unhealthy eating. During the pandemic, Americans increased their consumption of junk snacks, desserts and sugary drinks. A 2007-2009 survey of 60,000 Americans had concluded: “dietary quality plummeted along with the economy.”

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Other than the laws of supply and demand, two factors contribute to the global food pricing. One is climate change. With global warming, drier and hotter weather, food production is projected to be affected. With population growth, the next big threat is food insecurity.

Oil price is the other key factor. On 20 April 2020, crude oil futures dropped below $zero for the first time in history. By October 2020, it had recovered to $35. Today, at $70, it is already double that. In the previous global food crisis a decade ago, oil prices were close to $150 a barrel.

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Why is the issue of Food prices important? Because beyond a certain point, they cause riots and social unrest. In 2008, the food price spike had started bread riots. Bahrain, Yemen, Jordan, Egypt and Morocco saw food demonstrations. Food prices played a major role in the Arab Spring, the political uprising three years later.

To resolve the food price crisis, the world can’t wait till the end of the pandemic.

Ravi 

Corona Daily 069: Why Did We Become Unfit So Quickly?

In 1987, I was a student volunteer in Austria. Our group was building a house 110 km from Vienna. On a free day, I had borrowed the camp organiser’s bicycle and was gleefully riding it through Austria’s breathtaking landscape. It was a hill of some sort, and I immensely enjoyed going down at a speed more appropriate for a motorbike. When I started my return journey, I realized what uphill meant. (The bicycle had no gears). After a brief struggle, I got off and walked all the way up, dragging the bicycle alongside. I took twenty minutes to go down, and four hours to climb up the same distance.

Stock markets offer similar rides. If the $100 share you hold goes down by 50%, its value becomes $50. If it then goes up by 50%, the value becomes only $75. To restore the original $100, the share must shoot up by 100%.

Going down is easy and fast. Climbing up is difficult and slow. In the pandemic, everybody’s fitness level has gone down. Recently, two professors at Anglia Ruskin University - Dan Gordon (Cardio respiratory exercise physiology) and Justin Roberts (Health and exercise nutrition) analysed the speed at which we become unfit.

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How do we increase our fitness? By doing something more than our body is used to. The body takes stress, then adapts to it, leading to higher fitness. When a marathon runner’s weekly mileage goes gradually from 10 km to 80km, at every level they feel fitter. Fitness is the greatest reward for such craziness.

VO, max is one of the modern measures of fitness. (V=volume, O=oxygen, M=maximum). It measures the amount of oxygen a person can use during exercise. The higher it is the better. The average untrained healthy male has a VOmax of 35-40. This value exceeds 80 for elite marathon runners, racing cyclists or Olympic skiers.

Fitness is an outcome of a combination of exercise, diet, rest and sleep. It requires hard work and commitment. Losing it through de-training happens rapidly.

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The professors took the case of a marathon runner running regularly, about 90 km per week, for 15 years. If he stopped training completely, as happened to many runners during strict lockdowns, the fitness levels came down within weeks. When training was stopped, in the first four weeks, VO2 Max declined by 10%. It continued to go down, at a slower rate over a longer period.

For average people engaged in some sort of fitness training, VO2 max falls sharply and in eight weeks they go back to pre-training levels. In other words, the effect of all that exercise in the past may be wiped out. (Sounds scary).

The reason is the reductions in blood and plasma volumes by 12% in the first four weeks. This happens because we no longer put the stress we used to on heart and muscle during exercise.

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Talking about strength, for an average person, 12 weeks without training causes a significant decrease in the amount of weight we can lift. (Ask me, with my gym closed; I have gone for 64 weeks without weight training). Fortunately, research shows that you retain some of the strength you gained before you stopped training.

When we don’t work our muscles hard, they become lazy, many muscle fibers decrease, resulting in the inability to lift as many weights as we could pre-pandemic. After just two weeks of no weight training, number of muscle fibers goes down by 13%.

When the lockdowns forced us to reduce or stop our exercise, we started losing our fitness levels within 48 hours. But it took two to three weeks for us to feel the effects on cardiovascular fitness and around 6-10 weeks for strength fitness. The professors say that the rates of de-training for men, women and older athletes were similar.

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The lesson is to keep doing some exercise, any exercise, which is permitted. And when eventually gyms and swimming pools open up, and roads welcome marathoners and cyclists, we will need to put in a lot more effort to regain our pre-pandemic fitness level.

Ravi 

Corona Daily 070: Professor Van Ranst in Hiding

Marc Van Ranst, 55, the chief virologist of Belgium, is hiding with his family in a “safe house” in a secret place.

On 17 May, Jurgen Conings, a military shooting instructor, stole a rocket launcher, machine gun and other ammunition before disappearing. The ex-soldier had served in Afghanistan. Before he made himself AWOL (Absent Without Official Leave), he wrote a letter to his girlfriend. In it, he said “I could no longer live in a society where politicians and virologists have taken everything away from us.” Conings, known for his far-right leanings, is a man of action. On twitter he posted: “Who has Van Ranst’s address?”

It transpired that the heavily armed Conings was waiting on professor Ranst’s street, right in front of his house on 18 May. He had waited for the epidemiologist to return from his work. That day, fortunately, the professor had returned home early, and was with his family.

Belgian authorities now admit Conings was already on a terrorism watch list because of his extremist messaging. It was a mistake to allow such a man access to a weapons store.

Earlier this week, Facebook shut down a 45,000 member support group for Conings. However, such groups now use the Telegram app, which wants to grab market share from WhatsApp and Messenger. Telegram is lenient, and known for its encrypted messages.

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This week, 250 police officers and 150 army men have been combing the Hoge Kempen national park near the Dutch border. The German and the Dutch police are supporting the action. Two helicopters, armored carriers and heavy vehicles are deployed for this national manhunt.

On 4 June, a magistrate has launched an investigation for attempted murder, terrorism and possession of weapons.

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While Marc Ranst faces a lockdown triggered by a terrorist, Japp Van Dissel, his Dutch counterpart is the victim of a hate campaign that claimed he was a pedophile. Professor Dissel was not threatened by a gunman, but by two women.

A 54 year old woman shared the professor’s home address on Telegram and urged followers to “bring bricks on his birthday”. The woman was arrested, tried, and sentenced to eight weeks in prison.

Another lady, a 53 year old, circulated a vicious video stating that Van Dissel was a pedophile. She was given six weeks.

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Each democratic country has a leading epidemiologist since the beginning of the pandemic. Names like Dr Fauci in the USA or Dr Neil Ferguson in the UK are known internationally. As experts, they appear on television, in some countries on a daily basis, and explain the situation and measures taken. They are as prominent as the country’s leaders.

In fact, I would say the presence of the chief epidemiologist is a measure of the nation’s democracy. An authoritarian political leader doesn’t like to create another power center. If you struggle to name the chief epidemiologist in your country, you can assume democracy is absent or in danger.

In civilized nations, prominent epidemiologists have been villainised. They are accused of being responsible for lockdowns, masks, isolation, travel restrictions and business closures. Bild, the well known German newspaper, blamed professor Drosten, Germany’s chief epidemiologist, for closure of schools and kindergartens. Dr Fauci faces rants, criticisms, accusations and death threats. In some cases, frustrated people who have lost their jobs may vent their anger. A Belgian chef had asked on his Facebook wall if anyone could put a bullet in Van Ranst for his scaremongering. His restaurant was shut as a result of the lockdown announced by Ranst. Next day, though, the chef apologized for his emotional outbreak.

Most epidemiologists worldwide have been provided with police protection. The situation with Professor Van Ranst is an extreme one where a trained sniper is out to kill him, and Belgium is on an unprecedented manhunt.

For the sake of science and humanity, we have to hope the terrorist is arrested and that professor Ranst and his family can return to a reasonably normal life. If virologists are subjected to constant death threats, who would want to take up that job when the next virus pops up?

Ravi