Corona Not Flu!

The title is a play on a Ramones song, "Carbona Not Glue" that I hope you remember. If not,
here it is: The Ramones: Carbona Not Glue
Anyway, it's been a crazy roller coaster week, not only because of much personal busy-ness but the ever changing line up of democratic presidential hopefuls and that pesky "novel" virus. The stock market gone hay wire, people are dying (not good!) and our government is dropping the ball, as usual.
One week truly feels like a year. Here's an instructive and complicated anecdote: Last week, it was mentioned that a young woman who works in the office of the auction house (where I have worked for 14 years (!!!)) was off on another trip. Not paying too much heed, I casually inquired as to where she had gone. The answer was, "Washington State and Seattle." I was struck later that night, as we listened to the nightly news, that Washington State was being implicated in a couple of unexpected Corona virus cases. A day later, one person had died and a few more cases were diagnosed. I began to wonder if her trip had been a good idea and what was going to transpire when she returned. I asked our general manager- who just happens to be the young woman's mother- what her daughter was up to in Washington.*
Her mother (our equivalent of a HR person along with other hats) gave a perplexed laugh and shrugged and said, "Maybe I shouldn't have let her go. Maybe I'm not a good mother! Hahahaha."
 I became concerned.
Yes, perhaps the media likes to inflate the next enormous or tragic story but this particular issue has some teeth. F'rinstance, "they" (health care providers, epidemiologists and the like) aren't even sure exactly how where virus this came from or how it has spread so quickly . And we know there is no cure, and that it seems to be popping up all over the place... and worst of all is that we don't seem to be doing anything to effectively contain it here! The Orange Menace has proclaimed it "shut down" and "under control" and has incorrectly stated that "a vaccine is just around the corner" (in reality, a year to 18 months away!) He also "had a hunch" that few people would fall ill and that "many
people will have a mild case and even go to work". NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!                                                                                                    
I became increasingly alarmed when I was greeted with the morning news that 11 people in Washington state had died as a result. I expressed my concern to Bob and he agreed that I had a right to feel uncomfortable about working next to a person who had traveled to the very region that's Ground Zero. I shared concern with two of my co-workers and approached my boss. I guess I made it clear that I wasn't being alarmist and that many of us are older than 60 and are in a high risk age group, even if we tend to be pretty healthy. (My boss is well into his 70's and has had a nasty respiratory infection for several weeks: I don't think he'd be smart of mix in a possible cross-pollination with Covid 19!)

 
Fortunately, he was responsive and went to talk to our general manager about having her daughter "self-quarantine" for a week or ten days. It still remains to be seen whether she will have the self restraint to stay home and check herself for symptoms. I am already preparing for my response if I go to work on Tuesday and she's there. But hell, her father as well as her mother work with us and won't they bring germs to work, even if she resists coming in? Stay tuned!

* And I'm not being judgemental, but this young woman is in her 20's, not considering her own- or anyone else's mortality! and probably being age-appropriately irresponsible. She comes back from her trips with tales of binge drinking and the like. I think I'm trying to get across the thought that her life is probably a seething petri dish!