Gosh, I hope the world is past the halfway point in this plague. Maybe it is time to start thinking about both national and local Covid-19 memorials. I understand a generous scholarship fund or a national prize for research might be more practical, but I am talking about a real monument.
Is this a worthy idea? If so, what form might it take.?
Thinking about the United States only, I like the idea of a hundred thousand of something. (Assuming we decide we have lost 100.000 Americans to this cruel disease.) How about 100,000 uniquely colored bricks in the wall of a hospital? How about 100,000 cobbles on the bridge to Arlington?
It seems sad & remarkable there is only one memorial to the 1919 epidemic. Or perhaps this is just a silly old-fashioned idea.
Your thoughts?
White crosses on the White House lawn.
I don’t think the world is past the halfway point in this plague, eh.
No big memorials; just better procedures going forward would be a fitting tribute IMO.
So the next time you put Republicans in power they can ignore those too?
How about universal healthcare, as a memorial? A permanently funded pandemic response program?
Expanding on this a little, how about a saner, cleaner, and more resilient society that won’t be as €>%#¥ vulnerable next time.
Plus a statue in a park somewhere.
I don’t know that it’s particularly remarkable; traditionally, we have memorials to people who died in wars, disasters, and other extraordinary events like terrorist attacks, not people who died of natural causes. You can make a case for a pandemic being an epic natural disaster by modern-day standards – and I’m certainly not saying there’s anything wrong with wanting a memorial – but I think to anyone with a 1918 mindset, dying of flu would have been firmly in the “natural causes” category, and epidemic disease in general was not an extraordinary event. Sad, but not the type of thing one builds monuments to commemorate.