Page 46 - IMCJ April 2020
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BACKTALK



            Thinning the Herd

            Bill Benda, MD, Associate Editor






               I had been thinking about composing this particular   tipping point, and she now finds it to be time, in stock
            piece for over a decade, and was going to entitle it “The   market terms, for a “correction.”  Nothing necessarily new
            Editorial I Never Had the Courage to Write.”  But I simply   - it’s happened before, usually in the form of a plague of
            never found the courage to write it.  However, Covid-19   some kind, but as there are more of us she is going to be a
            has changed this, as it has changed so many once politically   bit more aggressive.
            correct  behaviors,  and  likely  will  change  many  more   Anyway,  that  is  my  theory.  Humanity  is  simply
            before  it  is  done  with  us.  Today  is  April  5th,  and  our   another herd to be thinned from time to time, and this is
            current situation is likely quite different now then it will be   one such time. Presumably this will not be at the meteor/
            when  you  are  reading  this.  As  I  type,  New  York  is   dinosaur level, at least not yet, perhaps because Mother
            recruiting medical students and dermatologists to help in   Nature  actually  possesses  some  strange  affection  for  us,
            overflowing  and  understaffed  emergency  departments   and hopes we might see the error of our arrogant ways and
            and intensive care units, and here in South Florida we are   manage to make better choices (personally, I am not as
            watching the viral tide hit our now-deserted beaches like a   hopeful, but I am merely a pathogen without the wisdom
            tsunami. I have a clear view of the front lines, and things   of eternity to draw from).
            are not looking good.                                The question is, will we ever come to accept the truth
               Our  hospital  beds  are  pretty  much  empty,  as  all   about  our  place  on  this  planet?  Deprived  of  our  frontal
            elective  surgeries  and  procedures  have  been  cancelled,   cortex  and  opposable  thumbs,  we  become  slow,  clumsy,
            except for the ICUs, which are packed with patients on or   hair and toothless creatures who can’t see in the dark; in
            soon to be on ventilators. The latest news is that a husband   other words, food.  Other animals are far more intrinsically
            and his wife of 53 years just died six minutes apart, and the   intelligent.  “In  a  world  older  and  more  complete  than
            saddest part of this whole thing is that people have to die   ours,”  says  Henry  Beston,  “they  move  finished  and
            alone, as families are not allowed in, nurses cannot stay to   complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost
            hold a hand, and there is not even an uncovered human   or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear.”  We
            face to see for the final time.  It’s a mess.    are only at the top of the chain because we have created
               So  what  on  earth  is  going  on  here?  How  is  our   technology, but technology is not part of Nature’s plan.  If
            advanced medical system, our technology, our renowned   it was, she would have created it.
            computational capacity failing us?                   So we are a part of Nature; she is not a part of us.  We
               I think I know, and here is where political correctness   have become spoiled, recalcitrant children, used to getting
            heads out the window.  We find ourselves here because we   our way through bullying the planet and its creatures.  But
            humans,  not  Corona  or  Clostridia  or  Cholera,  are  the   bullies  stop  when  someone  larger  stands  up  to  them.
            actual  pathogens  on  this  planet.  We  propagate   Enter Corona.
            uncontrollably and exponentially, injecting our industrial   Here is how I imagine a conversation between humans
            genetic code into our host to force creation of more of our   and Mother Nature went about six months ago:
            kind, stripping away vital organs and connective matrix,
            and leaving nothing behind but our toxic waste. I’m sorry   Humans: “Yeah, well whatever.  We’re in charge now.
            to say it, but we have met the virus, and it is us.  What are you going to do about it?”
               You see, we weren’t in Mother Nature’s plan, at least
            not  like  this.  She  spent  billions  of  years  perfecting  her   Mother Nature:  “Here, hold my beer . . .”
            balance of life and death, often cruel, but infallible in her
            symbiosis  of  predator  and  prey,  growth  and  decay.  She
            even  tolerated  us  for  a  few  million  years,  as  long  as  we
            followed her rules.  But a few millennia ago we ate from
            the tree of technological knowledge, and began to force
            our  own  flawed  intentions  and  desires  into  her  master
            plan.  She let us play god for a while, as long as she could
            continue  to  process  our  waste  and  regenerate  her
            atmosphere.  But the past hundred years or so became the


       44   Integrative Medicine • Vol. 19, No. 2 • April 2020                                  Benda—BackTalk
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