# What lessons should we have learned from Covid? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 6, 2022, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543 "2022-03-06T01:02:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2022, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/21 "2022-03-06T20:36:44Z")
> [@agzem](#): > > We learned that mask mandates and lockdowns are ineffective at ending pandemics. Actually we already knew that **before** Covid but we have had to re-learn those things. And your evidence of this is a study from before the pandemic? I think there might be slightly more information available out there now. Like, from last year’s flu season. Oh, wait, there wasn’t a flu season last year. > [@Lancia](#): > > Disagree. The technology for distance learning (Zoom, Edgenuity/Canvas/similar LMS systems, Google Drive) have been in place for many years and numerous universities have utilized them with significant success. > > The problem wasn’t the technology, it was the students. What works in a university generally does not work in middle school. Or grade school. Or even high school. You can view it as the people not being a good match for the technology, or you can view it as the technology not being a good match for the people. I prefer the latter view, as technology problems are a lot more solvable than people problems. And we were, in fact, well on the road to solving that problem. And it’s not just a matter of improving Zoom, Google Classroom, and the like. It was also a matter of us teachers learning how to better use those tools. Techniques are also part of technology. ---
**Author:** ![Bonum\_Legatum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bonum_legatum/32/6183_2.png) [@Bonum\_Legatum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bonum_Legatum)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2022, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/22 "2022-03-06T22:11:28Z")
Bad information on social media is just as deadly as the worst of viruses. There must be a stronger way to combat this. The regular news sources MUST be called out for making a statement in the “headline”, then leaving all the caveats buried in the story - if they mention them at all. How often did I see “CDC says…” but there were a lot of caveats to that pronouncement. Lest we forget: Praise to all of the people who could not quarantine at home, but had to go out and keep groceries on the shelves, keep utilities going, keep patrolling the streets and protecting against fires. I’m going to go out on a limb and forecast a future event where we will say “We should have known.” It takes a long time to come back from an emergency, tornado, flood, or virus. Don’t rush to proclaiming normalcy. Emergency rooms, nurses, and other medical personnel are just coming down from a spike. Now people are relaxing their guard and states are dropping mask mandates, etc. But are the resources prepared for another spike? Have the personnel been given the necessary respite? (How about all those people who have been turned away for other necessary surgery/medical treatment?) ---
**Author:** ![Jay\_Z](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Jay\_Z](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jay_Z)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2022, 7:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/23 "2022-03-07T07:12:41Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > You can view it as the people not being a good match for the technology, or you can view it as the technology not being a good match for the people. I prefer the latter view, as technology problems are a lot more solvable than people problems. And we were, in fact, well on the road to solving that problem Disagree. I have grade school kids. At the end of remote learning performance was actually declining from its peak, which was never that of in person learning. This was primarily due to teachers and students checking out of a failed process. It wasn’t something tech could solve. ---
**Author:** ![Esprise\_Me](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/esprise_me/32/2947_2.png) [@Esprise\_Me](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esprise_Me)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/24 "2022-03-09T05:54:44Z")
Not directly related to the pandemic, but… I hope the Great Resignation, fueled in large part by the pandemic and its second-order consequences, teaches us that you can only fuck over your employees so much before the whole house of cards comes down. We’ve got tons of qualified people who are unemployed, and the rest of us are working ourselves to death because a 40-hour work week apparently isn’t an option anymore. We’ve made a concerted effort as a society to compel employers to treat their employees equally regardless of their membership in a protected class, but the efforts to keep them from simply treating everyone equally like shit seem to have fallen by the wayside. May I live to see the death of “the customer is always right,” and the birth of “thanks Karen; you go ahead and take your business elsewhere.” A girl can dream. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/25 "2022-03-09T13:04:50Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > I’ve heard that some schools may not have snow days any longer but instead do virtual learning. That might not work out so well. I’m sure many had to create specialized space for this. And by then it’s going to revert back to whatever it was. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/26 "2022-03-09T13:32:04Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > Don’t politicize a pandemic. Trust the science. Be responsible. Don’t be selfish. Don’t trust loons. Kinda,yes. But people are people so I think the lesson has to be: _“People will politicize a pandemic regardless. A significant number won’t trust the science, won’t be responsible, will be selfish and will take their cues from loons. Have a plan **that will work in spite of this** because you won’t change them.”_ I thought it was interesting reading advice from pandemicists who had extensive experience in the social/political side of pandemics, mostly from having worked in Africa. The people problems experienced by us in the West were old news to them - they’d seen it all before. ---
**Author:** ![Tfletch1](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tfletch1/32/5340_2.png) [@Tfletch1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tfletch1)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/27 "2022-03-09T13:47:28Z")
> [@agzem](#): > > We learned that mask mandates and lockdowns are ineffective at ending pandemics. Actually we already knew that **before** Covid but we have had to re-learn those things. This is not true and your cite is from a rightwing source. ---
**Author:** ![jjakucyk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3d9bf3/32.png) [@jjakucyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjakucyk)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/28 "2022-03-09T14:31:14Z")
The lesson is, we’re not going to learn shit, we were fighting the same stupid battles in 2020 as we were in 1917. So like @Princhester said, we need plans “that will work in spite of this.” The problems with social media misinformation were just an acceleration of already endemic issues. I think the one big difference is that 2020 exposed the fragility of hyper-globalized trade and JIT manufacturing, but I have doubts that much is going to change on that front. ---
**Author:** ![Llama\_Llogophile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@Llama\_Llogophile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Llama_Llogophile)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/29 "2022-03-09T15:11:19Z")
We learned that many people are selfish pricks who can’t be bothered to take the slightest action (mask wearing) to help other people, and that they’ll consider any call to do so governmental overreach. Furthermore, these are the very same people, IMHO, who eagerly accepted things like the Patriot Act and the creation of the TSA after 9/11, when our freedoms were much more severely (and permanently) limited. Which is to say, we have learned nothing. Except maybe that there will always be a percentage of assholes who can be counted upon to do the wrong thing. ---
**Author:** ![enipla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/54ee81/32.png) [@enipla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/enipla)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/30 "2022-03-09T17:13:31Z")
> [@Llama\_Llogophile](#): > > Which is to say, we have learned nothing. Except maybe that there will always be a percentage of assholes who can be counted upon to do the wrong thing. Bingo. And now we have truck convoys fighting what is common sense. Knowledge is being fought on many fronts. ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/31 "2022-03-09T17:28:04Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > Covid required the most modest and easiest of measures: Just wear a mask, keep distance and get vaccinated. But even this, the lightest of burdens, was considered intolerable and too much by half of America. Absolutely this. We’ve learned that if you ask the public to unite and follow simple precautions in the name of the greater good that there is a huge percentage of people that will go out of their way to go against the grain simply for the fact that someone else is trying to tell them what to do. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2022, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/32 "2022-03-09T17:51:35Z")
I cannot imagine Americans transported to the UK during The Blitz agreeing to cooperate with blackouts . . . hell I imagine bonfires would have been the thing to do to stick it to ‘The Man’. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2022, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/33 "2022-03-10T07:06:20Z")
I don’t agree because I think that the anti-vax/mask crowd are very much anecdotal people - if they can’t see it, and it isn’t directly affecting them, it doesn’t concern them. When the drone of bombers was overhead and the bombs were going off in earshot, they would have been scurrying for cover same as everyone else. I think this also works in reverse in that it’s hard to feel justified taking extreme action _against_ anti-vax/mask people because the threat they represent is so invisible and indirect. But the same was not true in the Blitz - people starting bonfires would have been lynched. Invisibly transmitted viruses exploit the limitations of human thought perfectly. ---
**Author:** ![Dr\_Paprika](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr_paprika/32/3042_2.png) [@Dr\_Paprika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr_Paprika)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2022, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543/34 "2022-03-10T14:45:32Z")
I mostly agree with this. But Covid is “invisible and indirect” mainly if you want it to be. It is not like a missile. But also, it is not like it was not on the news, in public discussion or did not affect people you know. If you work in a hospital, it is not so invisible nor indirect. But I get, and substantially agree with you. I just do not want to fully dismiss personal stubbornness, believing selective news and social media opinions, or lack of communal consideration. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-lessons-should-we-have-learned-from-covid/960543.md?page=1)