We’ve had five new cases of Covid-19 in Wallowa County in the last five days. That brings us to 34 total—not many in a county of 7,000 souls and thousands or hundreds of thousands of tourists this summer. But one a day would be 140 in Portland, twice what they had yesterday.
I guess what it means is that Wallowa County is no longer on the sidelines, that this surge of the virus has us in the middle of things. It tells us that we are not immune, that merely living or visiting here is not enough, that we, like the rest of the world, must take precautions around this disease. One a day for 20 days or 100 days would make us a news item, shake our 7,000 souls, and send tourists to other places.
The “rest of the world” is not a flippant phrase. From college fraternities in Eugene and East Lansing to world cities in Italy and India—and now rural places like ours—Covid-19 drops like spot flames from the big fire, seemingly where it pleases.
Including the White House. Say what you will about President Trump’s own talk about the virus, a bevy of chauffeurs, chefs, pilots, advisors, health officials and doctors have worked hard to make sure the virus would not get to the president and his family. But it did. And how will that affect the machinery of government and the upcoming election?
There are stories of success. New Zealand has been zealous and mostly successful in keeping Covid-19 at bay. Every day a new school or college pops up with its prescription for operating “normally” in abnormal times: yesterday Cornell, and before that Colby College, St. Olaf’s and Northeastern University.
But this bug—no, not a bug, but an invasion of RNA that hijacks cells in our bodies and uses them to replicate itself and pursue its own aggrandizement—is a persistent thing that will be with us for awhile.
And like spot fires and other random acts of the universe, we don’t know what the news of the next day will be. Or what message that news will carry to Joseph, Oregon.
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