
Are Pandemics Good for the Environment? - anthrocurious
https://www.sapiens.org/archaeology/covid-19-environment/
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Justsignedup
short answer: no

longer answer: while there is a short term gain from the pendemic, with less
humans driving, flying, cruising, etc. HOWEVER this is not a good thing. This
is a small blip in the overall global warming fight, we need to reduce
emissions by A LOT over a long period of time. To trully see the benefits we
need a deadly pandemic (maybe even more deadly than COVI-19 to scare people
enough) to be happening yearly, making tourism and such a thing most people
avoid.

If this will permanently destroy the cruise industry, and slow down flights
for multiple years, this would be great. But it most likely won't. So while we
may have received a momentary pause because factories are shut down, we might
see things like china removing emission regulation in an effort to make up for
lost manufacturing.

This must not stall the global warming debates and policies.

~~~
seesawtron
I am not sure if you read the article at all.

(i) The article points out there can be some long term gains as well as has
been seen in the past, for example, with self-empowerment of labour class.
Currently this is seen, as the author points out, with polls showing
governments keep to work together more in future for Green New Deal. Another
example would be society as a whole being more supportive of fundamental
scientific research; Companies adapting to new ways to work-from-home (Twitter
made news recently allowing employess to WFH forever even after the pandemic
ends) and so on.

(ii) The author argues against the ecofascism ideology giving examples why it
is bad which is against your idea that a deadlier pandemic will help. Why
would end of tourism industry be good for the environment? Tourism industry in
a lot of cases helps sustain the habitat for wildlife (see sources in the
article).

(iii) Was it US or China that pulled out of the Green New Deal earlier this
year? We do not know what the future will bring but we can already see which
global economic power is currently handling the crisis better.

So short answer: Maybe.

------
mensetmanusman
Air: Yes Humans: No Water: Yes Animals: Yes Sun: No Stars: No ISS: No

