I have an answer as to why, inexplicably, people are stocking up on toilet paper. They are waiting hundreds deep in lines to empty the rolls from store shelves.
First, we have to remember that humans are wired for mimicry. “Monkey see, monkey do.” We even have “mirroring” systems of neurons that fire off when we are observing another human, thereby creating memory patterns that allow us to learn by watching others. This propensity to imitate other human beings has great utility. It also can flip us into lemming mode.
You know, when a small, furry mammal follows the butt of the lemming in front over a cliff?
Why are those lemmings running in the first place? Well, they are fleeing a perceived threat. Some animals fight when threatened. Some freeze. Lemmings flee. The first lemming to run in a particular direction creates a high probability that the observing lemmings will follow. Over a cliff, sometimes. Bummer if you end up imitating an idiot, right?
So early on in the current hysteria of fear, fanned by the incessant intrusion of omni-channeled information through every digital medium available, someone had to have observed another person stocking up on toilet paper. They followed suit. Others observed. And so on.
The irony is that the toilet-paper-buying craze is spreading in much the same way as the virus we’re all freaked out about.
Imagine the logic, if there was one: a person feels at risk of being cut off from resources, and the resource they prioritize above food and water is being able to comfortably cleanse themselves after a bowel movement. They won’t actually need to, of course, because they didn’t get food instead.
So let’s agree, there is no logic involved in this behavior. People are, as my Chief says, simply scared shitless.
What are we scared of? Well, we might be thinking this virus could be the pestilence that wipes out a good segment of the world’s human population. We don’t know. We also haven’t been looking at the facts and applying logic. Humans aren’t good at that when they are afraid. And the “facts” are pretty hard to understand anyway; who do you believe? But here are some pretty firm facts.
The objective risk of this virus is much less than many other daily threats to our lives that we have learned to live with so comfortably, we no longer even think about the real risks they represent.
In 2019, the CDC says 14,000 people died in this country from the flu, with 250,000 hospitalized. And that’s with vaccines that are between 45-55% effective this season. The total number of people who experienced the flu infection has been in the millions.
In 2019, 38,000 people died in car accidents in the U.S.
In China, the canary in the COVID19 coal mine, the CDC says there have been just about 81,000 confirmed cases (not the full number of infections, of course), and just under 3,200 deaths. The rate of infection has slowed sufficiently to allow life to begin returning to normal, after two months or so. There are about 1,400,000,000 people in China.
But we’re buying up dozens of rolls of toilet paper. It’s just like when they told kids to hide under wooden desks in case of a nuclear attack. Apparently, doing something nonsensical calms our fears.
Yes, some people will die from this infection. Many of them senior citizens. Who will not make it out of this life alive anyway. The people in assisted living or nursing homes are going to die of something. If it’s not an infection, it will be a stroke. If it’s not a stroke, it will be cancer. If it’s not cancer, it’s Alzheimer’s. In fact 20-25% of deaths in nursing homes are caused by a variety of infections, according to a number of longitudinal studies. Now COVID19 will contribute to that, as one more infectious source.
Yes, we should be concerned about this new virus. We should have been better at caring for ourselves and our fellow humans anyway, in how we prevented transmission of contagion in general. Good reminders. I’m certainly going to change my ways.
Yes, people will become seriously ill and some will die. Just like other existential threats that we face every single day. Yes, we should do what we can to slow the pace of infection, so that our healthcare systems are not overwhelmed.
But we are all going to get exposed to this virus, if we haven’t already. Just like many other broadly distributed pathogens. The large majority of us will get ill to some degree, get over it and go back to our regular activities.
I think we’d all calm down a bit if the daily news feed wasn’t continually in our face with dire warnings. Or if our leaders could keep their stories straight, and connected to reality.
I just keep thinking about Londoners during the Blitz of World War II. Every day they could be the landing pad for a bomb or a rocket. Daily, they walked to work, fed the cat, made dinner, sat on a pile of rubble with their afternoon tea.
Let’s get a grip.