Money Over Lives: America's Deadly Pandemic Policy
Money Over Lives: America's Deadly Pandemic Policy
Coronavirus is killing Americans at much higher rates than citizens of other wealthy nations. Blame the capitalist criminals of the ruling parties.
As the Omicron wave continues to take thousands of lives each day, the NY Times reports that COVID-19 is “killing Americans at far higher rates than people in other wealthy nations.” According to the Times, “Since Dec. 1, the share of Americans who have been killed by the coronavirus is at least 63 percent higher than in any of these other large, wealthy nations.”
Democratic propaganda calls this a “pandemic of the unvaccinated” to conceal the Biden administration’s horribly inadequate vaccine-only strategy and its reckless claim that the pandemic would end by July 4th, 2021. Republican propaganda frames this as an issue of personal liberty, discouraging vaccines, masks, and other mitigation measures — thus killing more people. Beyond the spin, the truth is more sinister:
In America, this is a pandemic of poverty and capitalism, with both ruling parties responsible for hundreds of thousands of preventable coronavirus deaths.
Consider this statistic buried in the NY Times article above: “Surveys suggest that the poorest Americans are the likeliest to remain unvaccinated, putting them at greater risk of dying from Covid.” Contrast that with the fact that the obscene wealth of the world’s 10 richest men DOUBLED during the pandemic.
At every level and at every step, the United States has prioritized capital over human lives. Trump, Biden, and their respective parties have been abject failures at protecting working class Americans, while they’ve been wildly successful at serving the ultra-rich and powerful. This approach has killed people.
Signs of the duopoly’s callous and deadly pandemic policy are everywhere. In a mask-off moment, Connecticut’s (Democratic) Governor Ned Lamont, who has stubbornly refused to allow schools a temporary remote learning option, recently called Omicron a “little mini-surge.” How is that different from an anti-vaxxer minimizing the virus?
And it’s not just domestic policy where the U.S. has valued money over lives. POLITICO reporter Myah Ward writes, “with no coherent plan to vaccinate the world, especially the Southern Hemisphere or the Global South, we’ve allowed new variants of concern to emerge.” VICE reports that “open-source vaccines got more funding from Tito’s Vodka than the government.”
The countless victims of the U.S. government’s atrocious pandemic policy — the vast majority of whom come from vulnerable populations — are unlikely to see justice. Mass death is acceptable in America. So is a mass disabling event like long COVID. The ruling class never pays a price for preserving this monstrous system. Capitalist criminals are running the show, and that won’t change anytime soon.
UPDATE (2/3/22)
POLITICO reports that Team Biden is preparing for another “mission accomplished” moment on COVID-19:
The preparations are designed to capitalize on a break in the monthslong Covid-19 surge, with officials anticipating a spring lull that could boost the nation’s mood and lift President Joe Biden’s approval ratings at a critical moment for his party.
Biden and his top health officials have already begun hinting at an impending “new normal,” in a conscious messaging shift meant to get people comfortable with a scenario where the virus remains widespread yet at more manageable levels.