Coronavirus: Is Ancient Rome's Warning Pertinent?

Kyle Harper claims that the ancient Roman world's Antonine Plague has an urgent warning for us in the Coronavirus age (February 15/17). The same could be said of the Middle Ages' Black Death (aka the Great Plague) and, more recently, of the Spanish Flu of 1918.

On the other hand, the only message from the pandemics of 2009, 2002, 1968, and 1957 — when no measures were taken and the virus vanished when (and because) the populations gained immunity — would be quite different: Do not overreact. In fact, do not act at all.

While the "vicious pestilence … killed as many as 2,000 Romans a day," I do not believe there is any city in any country of the world in the 2020s where the streets are filled with (rotting?) corpses and with ill and disfigured people collapsing on the sidewalk as they cough up black vomit. 

In fact, we are regularly told that the average age of the the dead is something between 75 and 82, depending on the country, with most of those occurring in nursing homes amongst seniors already suffering from other illnesses.

As can be confirmed by the likes of Tom Hanks, Madonna, Greta Thunberg, Prince Charles, Emmanuel Macron, and Donald Trump, the vast majority of infected are back on their feet after a week or two, if not less (in Boris Johnson's case, after a stay at the hospital).

In that case, I don't see the need for cafés, restaurants, and stores to remain closed, for absurd lockdowns to continue, or for our leaders to otherwise continue in their fixation for destroying jobs and careers as well as the entire economy.

Since the mass hysteria has been partly due to the desire to wreck the West's economies in order to ensure Trump's defeat in the November elections (see Governor Andrew Cuomo's recent remarks) — is that a conspiracy theory? also: doesn't that theoretically make the critics of Trump as bad as, if not even worse than, Trump himself? — I see no reason for the blue states and for the rest of the world's nations not to emulate, say, Florida and re-open up their economies.? By all means, continue to provide help for the elderly and let the infected self-quarantine. The VIPs mentioned above were able to do so, all on their own, so maybe there is a lesson here as well: the common citizen is an adult citizen sensible enough to be expected to act responsibly in the matter.

In short: Offer the elderly, and those with weak immune systems, quarantine, and break the chains of the rest of the population.

• Related: Here Are the 7 Basic Points about Covid-19 that You Need to Know

• Also (thanks to Damian): Let's Review 50 Years of Dire Climate Forecasts and What Actually Happened

Incidentally, the bio of the writer reads as follows:

Dr. Harper is a classics professor whose research analyzes the ancient Roman world and how it was affected by disease, climate change, slavery and other cultural and societal developments.

Affected by "Climate change"?! As in global warming? And as in the new ice age? And that, in which era? In… "the ancient Roman world"?!

So now we have climate change, global warming, and/or the new ice age around the birth of Christ? And, presumably, in all eras throughout human history?! Count on a bio to unearth an admission that the greens' entire mass hysteria has little to nothing to do with man-made emissions of the 20th century — unless, of course, you are speaking about the Tenth Legion's legendary SUVs and the Emperor Nero's notorious orgies in his Gulfstream jet.