Our past is not necessarily our future

Shannon Bohrer

(5/2020) How we solve our problems is related to our past. Our world has historically been very stable, so when problems occur, we rely on our experiences. Our perspective of a stable world allows us to make sense of our surroundings including our environment. Historically, we know how things worked so that became our model for survival. You could call this instinctive evolutionary survival. Our past experiences even with abnormal weather, heat and cold, storms, floods and even illnesses created our models for dealing with our current problems. We literally look backwards, for blueprints or models of how to deal with issues.

However, as humans our behavior has impacted our environment which has resulted in some unintended consequences, changing our world. The earth is warming; we have polluted the earth including every continent and every ocean. The changes to our world will also change the future. Simultaneously, we are so interconnected that when someone sneezes in Asia someone feels it in America. When dealing with current environmental and health issues, we will continue to look backward using our historical models, but we also need to look forward.

An example of a current problem that is related to our changing environment is flooding. We have flood maps, which explain where floods exist, so we don’t build on ground that we know will be flooded. The maps were made with historical flooding data, looking to our past, where flooding has occurred before. The problem is that we are now experiencing flooding in areas that are not on the maps. When an area experiences a once in a thousand year flood, three years in a row, that is a clue. Instead of just using historical data to predict future environmental problems, we need to predict the future with the use of data, which itself must be predicted. That may be easier to say than to accomplish.

Another example of a current problem that is also related to our changing environment is; how do we control global health issues, like the Coronavirus. The historical answer is simple; we develop a test to determine if someone is infected, we then isolate those infected, we then develop a vaccine and then everyone is vaccinated. That is part of our model for how we make sense of our world and our model for survival. After all, a worldwide illness is something we have already experienced. History tells us that testing and isolation worked before, but is that the best direction going forward?

We have a long history of world health problems that include the "Black Plague" that killed an estimated 400 million people.[ The estimated deaths reduced the European population by 45 to 50 percent. The plague has never been eliminated, but it has been checked with better hygiene practices. At that time the only remedy was isolation, which did work for about half of the European population.

In the recent past, we experienced the 1918 influenza pandemic. This was the H1NI virus, with estimated deaths worldwide as least 50 million people. The estimated deaths accounted for about 3 percent of the world population, significantly less than the "Black Plague," as a percentage.

A form of the H1N1 called the AH1N1, appeared in 2009. The newer or different version killed an estimated 150,000 to 575,000 people worldwide. With better vaccines, hygiene practices and quarantine usages, the death rates were lower. What was unusual was that most of the deaths were in people under the age of 65. Genetic analysis of the virus told us that it had been around for over 30 years. It is believed that a large number of people over 65 had developed some immunity because of previous exposure.

Even when we apply our current models of vaccine and quarantine, the problems are rarely eliminated. Our experiences with the annual flu that affects millions and results in 12,000 to 50,000 deaths each year. Obviously even with vaccines and quarantines the problems still exist and people will still die.

Using models that we developed from past experiences to solve our problems has merit with a history of good outcomes. Without past data, the flood maps that we used for so long would not have existed. Without the traditional vaccines for the flu, the deaths would be significantly higher. So using historical information for current problems has been successful, but we also need to look forward. Our world and environment has changed faster than some of our models, so we also need to use projected facts and science to anticipate future problems.

A large clue of potential future problems occurred in 2016, when anthrax killed more than 2000 reindeer in Siberia. The outbreak occurred when a frozen reindeer carcass infected with anthrax, thawed out and exposed the surrounding environment. The carcass had been frozen in permafrost for 75 years, but thawed because of unusually warm weather. While we know that anthrax exists and was more of an historical problem than today, will it make a return and be a recurring problem.

The outbreak of anthrax because of warming temperatures was just one clue. Another clue was discovered in 2015, when a giant virus, believed to be 30,000 years old, was also found in the permafrost in Siberia. "A giant virus, also known as a girus, is a very large virus, some of which are larger than typical bacteria." The giant virus was not a danger to humans; at least this one was not. However, how many other known and/or unknown viruses and/or pathogens exist that is dormant.

As our world warms, we should expect more extreme weather and more extreme illnesses, even more pandemics. The coronavirus that we are currently dealing with is just one of many that the world has already experienced. Prior coronaviruses include SARS in 2003 and MERS in 2012. To deal with numerous viruses and pathogens, some of which we have never experienced, maybe we should return to having some type of world surveillance and guidelines to deal with emerging threats. If we know that a problem exist in one part of the world, we need some warning to prepare. This would be similar to having weather stations and satellites to warn us of severe weather problems. We should also return to having an office in the National Security Council that plans and coordinates response to future pandemics. I say return to because both the world surveillance program and the NSC coordinator for pandemics were eliminated two years ago by our "Very Stable Genius."

We don’t know how long Covid-19 will last or end, but we should expect a Covid-20 or 21 to emerge, we just don’t know when.

"Thinking about the future is fundamentally important to
dealing with the challenges of today" - Jamais Cascio