During this period of worldwide pandemic having its’ origin in a Chinese metropolitan area known to include a sensitive bioresearch laboratory, in case you were concerned about having to work from home, staying separated from your relatives, being furloughed from your job without pay while your management collects or defers their salary and bonuses, conduct weddings or funerals from a distance, standing 6 ft apart even in Wyoming’s back country, or finding any kind of disinfectant, toilet paper, paper towels, face masks or sanitary gloves in any store, it might be helpful to put this Global Viral Pandemic in perspective:

To wit, consider the following chart, using data from the website Worldometers:

Caption: Here's how about 16 million people died recently.

Note I’m not trying to minimize the severity of the current SARS-COVID-19 Pandemic, despite the temptation to compare it to the 2009-2010 H1N1 “Swine Flu” pandemic which “the CDC estimated that from April 12, 2009 to April 10, 2010, there were 60.8 million H1N1 cases, with 274,304 hospitalizations and 12,469 deaths in the U.S. alone” [source], and took at least 6 months before then-President Obama declared a National Emergency (in October, 2009): The COVID-19 virus is transmitted through the air, can survive for hours / days on common surfaces, attacks specific age groups, and can result in death rapidly.

However, keep in mind that life entails risk, death is inevitable, and (as Ben Franklin is purported to have said) “Those who would give up essential liberty, to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” And, the question isn’t if the world will survive, because it surely will: The question is “What kind of a world will we be forced to accept once this situation has subsided?”

Stay safe, stay healthy, be rational, don’t panic, and…Thanks for reading!