How long until the Biden Administration finally suspends flights from South Asia, which is having a huge breakout of some new Covid variant? Justin Trudeau’s Canadian government suspended flights from India and Pakistan on Friday.
Here in the U.S., in contrast, the Covid problem looks pretty good. Early in April there were fears of a 4th wave, but the big outbreak in Michigan didn’t move south, as spring and vaccinations (51% of adults, including children, have had at least one dose) improved matters. The last week has seen reported cases fall steadily in the U.S.
Even Michigan, which has been America’s Sore Thumb all spring, is finally getting better.
A distinctive feature of this pandemic is that most of the time you are either winning or losing, and since the middle of April, the U.S. has been winning again. Combined with the sizable (although strangely mysterious) percent of people who have had Covid already, the vaccination campaign makes it look like herd immunity isn’t too many months off.
So shooting ourselves in the foot by importing a big outbreak of the new South Asian mutant would be pretty stupid. As we’ve seen over the last year, you need borders somewhere, and a good place for a border is the, you know, border.
