Over at the American Institute for Economic Research, Jeff Tucker notices that in the middle of the Hong Kong Flu pandemic one of the most important cultural gatherings of the 20th century took place without anybody batting an eye.
Stock markets didn’t crash. Congress passed no legislation. The Federal Reserve did nothing. Not a single governor acted to enforce social distancing, curve flattening (even though hundreds of thousands of people were hospitalized), or banning of crowds. No mothers were arrested for taking their kids to other homes. No surfers were arrested. No daycares were shut even though there were more infant deaths with this virus than the one we are experiencing now. There were no suicides, no unemployment, no drug overdoses.Well, no suicides/unemployment/overdoses related to the virus which isn't quite the same thing...in fact, Woodstock alone may have caused more overdoses and unemployment than a shutdown would have...
Now to be fair there are a lot of differences: there was partial immunity to the 1968 pandemic as a result of the 1957 pandemic, though this wasn't well known at the time. By the time of Woodstock in the (late) summer of 1969 the virus was already coming down from the peak: if we have a big outdoor concert next summer it probably won't surprise anybody.
Tucker has been making sport of this: he also recently posted how differently the 1957 pandemic was treated by larger society. The Woodstock article goes into some more detail though, with an extra personal anecdote that made me think of my Pox Party post from last month:
By way of personal recollection, my own mother and father were part of a generation that believed they had developed sophisticated views of viruses. They understood that less vulnerable people getting them not only strengthened immune systems but contributed to disease mitigation by reaching “herd immunity.” They had a whole protocol to make a child feel better about being sick. I got a “sick toy,” unlimited ice cream, Vicks rub on my chest, a humidifier in my room, and so on.
They would constantly congratulate me on building immunity. They did their very best to be happy about my viruses, while doing their best to get me through them.
Bonus AIER COVID coverage: Just like global warming, the mathematical models the experts are using aren't even remotely correct and you're deleted from social media if you point this out.
