Covid-19 / SARS-2 : the latest tropical virus that Mankind has activated

- The complete text in English is included in the book "The Congo Archipelago", and in French in a new book to be published soon -

The Covid-19 epidemic is a worldwide event with the same cataclysmic nature as the Spanish Flu of 1918, and perhaps, even, the Financial Crisis of 1929, because its economic and geopolitical consequences through the world will be numerous and gigantic.

The great work of accounting and visualization of the Covid-19 carried out by the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore city, in the United States, indicates 3 132 363 infected people and 217 947 dead in the world, as of April 29, 2020. And if it is the USA that deplores the most deaths with 58 964 people, it is Belgium and especially its capital, Brussels, which have the highest mortality rate per number of inhabitants, with 57 deaths per 100 000 inhabitants, or four times the rate in the USA, for a country with a total population of only 11 million inhabitants. However, it will be necessary to take a step back before building a dashborad reflecting the penetration force of the coronavirus in each country. A dashboard thus expressing the result of the resistance policies developed by the leaders of each country. Because, it must be realized that many countries have a health surveillance and accounting system less effective than Asian countries like South Korea, or European countries like Denmark. And, for example, one must wonder if the Chinese Communist Party really gave the right figures ?

The extraordinary explosion of the epidemic is also an extraordinary explosion of journalistic activity, in all media and on all social networks. For 4 months, TV channels and Radios stations have been doing Breaking News, Flash Top Headlines and Live Update every day, and even every hour. Taking advantage of the fact that billions of people are under "lockdown", almost sequestrated in their homes under the orders of an incessant communication campaign, and real sanctions, Tvs and Radios have swept all other news to capture the attention of citizens with this "Godzilla" Covid-19, this "Armageddon" Covid-19. But, this lockdown time for half of humanity should also be a moment of seeking historical and scientific informations with the goal to understand, and avoid undergoing a repetition of this nightmarish reality. It is clear that every health systems across the world have been overwhelmed by the spread of the Covid-19 / SARS-2 virus. And it is even more evident that the spread of this pandemic has revealed the irresponsible lack of historical and scientific culture of world leaders ; with very rare exceptions.

Because we have to admit that this Covid-19, this SARS number 2, is only the latest to date of the viruses that Humanity has awakened and activated.

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This pandemic is also a huge test - revealing for health systems and for economies. The historical lack of culture and the scientific ignorance of the Western Elites are coming to light. The short-time and frantic search of the highest profitability has jeopardized health care systems. Scientific Academies have not been able to go beyond their routine functioning and challenge the decision-makers. The general lockdown should not be a nice fair, where the Media and Social Networks organize a multitude of games and farandoles of artists to "entertain" the people. This lockdown must be used to make efforts for more education, for more scientific and historical culture, for more performance of citizens towards the understanding of ecosystems and climatic processes. The Covid-19 / SARS-2 episode must be optimized by deeply rethinking biological surveillance and alert networks, such as health response scenarios, of which, at a minimum, the industrial components must be relocated in each country.

In the long term, and structurally, it is necessary to propose new deposits of production and diplomatic agreements so that Human activities loosen their grip on tropical ecosystems, which are not only places of great plant and animal diversity, places of oxygen production and CO2 capture, but which are also vast reservoirs of viruses and bacteria, waiting for Humans come to wake them up.

Just as strategically, the Global invasion underway by a gigantic cattle and poultry population, for the Humans food needs, also accounting a huge space for the viruses reproduction, must be contained, even strongly diminished, and directed towards a trajectory for more quality and for bigger proximity between producers and consumers.

Whether it comes from pangolin, civet, bat, or from a "biological billiard" between these species, the origin external to the animals domesticated by Human of Covid-19 / SARS-2 does not no doubt. Tomorrow, another virus will escape from a tropical biotope that Human activities have attacked. Tomorrow, another virus will manage to recombine with others and will surf on the Earth-scale broth of culture that are industrial plantations and breeding, all going towards more standardization, towards more transport of food goods. Population growth becomes an explosion, irresponsible, and carrying conflicts over resources, promises of wars between peoples. Humans continue to deplete raw materials, from oil to sand, and produce chemical disturbance in soils such as in drinking water. And the great challenge of Global warming is still on the agenda, more powerful, more telluric, as the years go by.

The question that arises, inescapable, rising in urgency, is :

what Anthropocene should Humans build ?

An Anthropocene "Fast and Furious", acid against Nature, and negative against the whole Living World, and where the film of the future will be "Soylent Green" or else "Mad Max" ?

Or an Anthropocene where Humanity will manage to control its corrosive bustling, but also where Humanity will acquire more power to overcome the next trials that "Mother Nature", honest but brutal, will inevitably resurface one day ?