Another Monday Message Board. Post comments on any topic. Civil discussion and no coarse language please. Side discussions and idees fixes to the sandpits, please.
I’m now using Substack as a blogging platform, and for my monthly email newsletter. For the moment, I’ll post both at this blog and on Substack. You can also follow me on Mastodon here.
John Quiggin 
What happened to the old person’s friend, pneumonia? At least the old had only one friend waiting. Just like age and pneumonia covid cancelled now waits for all.
In Australia the killer covid plague is currently third in line behind heart failure and cancer for cause of death. However, in killing off the retired demographic, those economic units of low value, covid rendered unseen is not a thing. Covid is not a thing as those economic units are a health and welfare cost to the state, to the taxpayer, and to the corporate taxpayer. Covid is not a thing as the old economic units also drag on business and state by spending less with increasing age. Covid is not a thing, for at death the old useless feeders’ savings pass beneficially to younger big spending consumers. Yet covid can be a thing, for the fascist-like corporate state values working economic units:
Long Covid at Work: A Manager’s Guide – Harvard Business Review – May 07, 2024
https://hbr.org/2024/05/long-covid-at-work-a-managers-guide
“…There is encouraging clinical and research momentum for long Covid and related conditions. In a congressional meeting in January, U.S. senators on both sides of the aisle called for more funding to support medical research. Advocates from multiple organizations associated with chronic illnesses, including long Covid and ME/CFS, are lobbying to create a new government office to support a coordinated approach to researching these illnesses. And scientists are actively studying long Covid mechanisms and trying to identify potential treatments…
…When we fail to offer sufficient support, we’re not just failing people with these illnesses — we’re failing society, all of us. We’re depriving our economy of the expertise, experience, and perspectives of millions, and we’re failing to create systems where all talent can thrive. Providing the right accommodations for (working) people with chronic illnesses is a human and economic imperative.”
Welfare economists, a misnomer if there ever was one. have often talked about useful economic units. By inference, anyone who does not make the grade is NOT useful. This idea that the person is only of value if they have economic value, is a tad myopic.
The older generation provides social benefits that far outweigh their money cost to society. Apart from the emotional support they give their children, older people also give insights that may take a lifetime to acquire. Look at the generation just passed that went through two world wars and the Great Depression. How valuable were their insights into survival in such circumstances.?By the way they also survived the flu epidemic of the 1920s without vaccines.
Then there is the older people passing on information about ancestry. This may be done verbally or through DNA checks. For many in younger generations, their own identity is tied up with family links to the past.
Before we write off older people, let’s remember one thing. We will all be members of an older generation. What we do to our elderly will be observed, and may be copied, by the generations below us.