Dr. David Macpherson: Covid-19 the weapon in anonymous homicide
Share this post:
Here’s a game you might play. It might have come from the mind of Stephen King. Except it’s real and works like this.
You’ve received an invitation to a party — it has come almost at a perfect time. It seems like forever since you’ve been able to sit with friends or people you love, share a drink or two, eat a meal together, grill some burgers. Just be with a group of people you care about.
You don’t want to talk politics with them. You just want to laugh a little, hear your crazy uncle tell some old stories, marvel at how much your friends’ kids have grown, argue whether going for it on fourth down rather than kicking the field goal was the right call. Have a little fun for a few hours on Saturday night.
But wait, how is that a game?
Here’s the twist. If you go to the party, you’ll increase the chance that someone you don’t know will die. Your fun won’t guarantee they’ll die — the one party you attend might not cause the death of anyone. But chances are that if people attend a few or a hundred or so parties, one of those parties will cause someone to die. Their death won’t be quick — it will be slow and painful, a slow drowning.
The partygoers who caused the death won’t know the person who dies. Nor will those who attended a party that didn’t kill someone know their party was safe. And neither the victim nor their family will know who caused the death. It’s all anonymous — anonymous homicide. The death won’t be investigated by the police or even thought of as a crime.
The main question is whether you’d play this game. If you knew that the chances you would kill someone by attending the party were one in 10, would you go? One in 100? One in 1,000? One in a million?
I’m guessing most of us would choose not to play at all.
Up to this past week, it appeared all of us would have to play this game for a long, long time. But now it seems likely that the game ends in a few months, likely spring or summer of next year. The game won’t last forever — you just have to wait a little longer.
So far, I haven’t created anything that isn’t real. What if a month or so after the party, you got a letter informing you who you murdered. “We’re sorry to inform you that the get-together you attended on Thanksgiving caused the death of (INSERT NAME HERE) on Christmas Day. The deceased family members thought you should be aware.” You might be able to shake that off after a time. But I think it would be hard.
I’ve focused on one type of behavior that promotes spread of covid-19. Similar reasoning applies to wearing a mask and washing your hands.
We’ve come a long way in this pandemic and it’s looking like we can control it in a few months. But for now, we have to remain vigilant. Don’t blow it off by committing anonymous homicide.
David Macpherson, M.D., M.P.H., is a retired physician living in Upper Burrell.