Recommended by Ricochet Members Created with Sketch. Covid-19 in TN: A Spike in Suicides

Lois Lane
By Lois Lane
Lois Lane Coolidge
I married Super Man.
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34 COMMENTS
 

I understand that Covid-19 is a deadly virus, and we need to take it very seriously. However, the blunt approach of shutting the entire country down is deadly as well, and that fact has to be recognized. To illustrate what I mean in real time, I point to Knox County in Eastern Tennessee where all the students have been sent home from University of Tennesse, and the world has essentially been shut down like everywhere else outside of the business that still buzzes inside various Walmarts and Krogers.

This is not the epicenter of Covid-19 in the Volunteer State. That is Nashville, a city that clearly annoyed Mother Nature in some way because she started gut-punching the poor capital way back when this virus still had something to do with Wuhan. The vast majority of the state’s almost 2,000 Covid-positive patients live in or around Nashville, which has never had time to recover from the slashes made to its belly by tornadoes.

Knoxville is further east, nestled near the Great Smoky Mountains, a relatively small city known for being a college town. Knox County has currently identified a total of 41 Covid-19 cases, and no one wants that number to go any higher, so self-isolation is the name of the game. But that is only part of the story of how people are interacting with this pandemic.

One should also be aware that during just this past week in which the strategy has been one of isolation and economic shutdown, local officials dealt with nine suicides in Knox county, eight of which occurred in a window of 48 hours. To put this in perspective, in 2019, there were only 83 suicides in Knox County for the entire year. 

Of course, we do not know why these people felt such despair that they took such drastic measures, but we should look at that number and consider what it might mean as it happens at this moment, especially since only seven people have died in the entire state of Tennessee of Covid-19.

I don’t have the answers about what the government should do here, but I also don’t think despair at this moment is irrational or without consequence. I would simply like to know that all the ramifications of various policies are being as seriously considered as containment of the pandemic itself. Everything that we do has the potential to thrust darkness into the lives of others.

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  1. Jon1979 Lincoln
    Jon1979

    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret (View Comment):

    Jon1979 (View Comment):

    Ralphie (View Comment):

    As someone said, this is a virus with a public relation promotion. I understand it is serious, that those getting ill can get very ill fast and recovery takes time. But we are gettting some data that is showing who the most vulnerable are, and that should help us adjust our tactics.

    Sometimes no one knows why someone killed themselves, but it seems to come from a feeling of despair and abandonment; a loneliness even in the midst others. It is a horrifying thing for families to deal with. Hopefully, this is not a pattern here or anywhere.

    SNIP

    (And on a side note to that, the $1,200 payment people are going to get is going to be a short-term, small-scale test of progressives’ idea of giving people a guaranteed income, without trying to give them an actual job to go to. It’s not a lot of money, but it will be interesting to see how many people don’t use the money for what it’s intended, which is to make ends meet until the COVID-19 shutdowns come to an end.)

    What? Can I parse this last statement of yours in a manner that makes any sense at all?

    So the $ 1200 in your view is going to be used by people who get it, to what? To no longer pay their rent or house payment? To no longer buy food for the kids and spouse? Just where are you getting this idea? Please explain. I keep getting this on sites where Old Guard Republicans fear for the Union because God bless ’em, some inner paranoia is telling them that somehow somewhere, someone who filed a 1040 for 2018 is gonna spend it on Cheetos and crack cocaine.

    Shame on you! Big feckin! Shame!

    My point is people with a lot of free time find ways to fill it, and not necessarily good ones. If the current restrictions extend through spring, let’s see if some use the money for recreational purposes.

    • #31
    • April 7, 2020, at 6:06 PM PDT
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  2. The Reticulator Member
    The Reticulator

    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret (View Comment):

    What? Can I parse this last statement of yours in a manner that makes any sense at all?

    So the $ 1200 in your view is going to be used by people who get it, to what? To no longer pay their rent or house payment? To no longer buy food for the kids and spouse? Just where are you getting this idea? Please explain. I keep getting this on sites where Old Guard Republicans fear for the Union because God bless ’em, some inner paranoia is telling them that somehow somewhere, someone who filed a 1040 for 2018 is gonna spend it on Cheetos and crack cocaine.

    Shame on you! Big feckin! Shame!

    Some of us might contribute it to the Trump re-election campaign.

    • #32
    • April 7, 2020, at 9:13 PM PDT
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  3. CarolJoy, Thread Hijacker Coolidge
    CarolJoy, Thread Hijacker

    Jon1979 (View Comment):

    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret (View Comment):

    Jon1979 (View Comment):

    Ralphie (View Comment):

    As someone said, this is a virus with a public relation promotion. I understand it is serious, that those getting ill can get very ill fast and recovery takes time. But we are gettting some data that is showing who the most vulnerable are, and that should help us adjust our tactics.

    Sometimes no one knows why someone killed themselves, but it seems to come from a feeling of despair and abandonment; a loneliness even in the midst others. SNIP Hopefully, this is not a pattern here or anywhere.

    SNIP

    (And on a side note to that, the $1,200 payment people are going to get is going to be a short-term, small-scale test of progressives’ idea of giving people a guaranteed income, SNIPIt’s not a lot of money, but it will be interesting to see how many people don’t use the money for what it’s intended, which is to make ends meet until the COVID-19 shutdowns come to an end.)

    What? Can I parse this last statement of yours in a manner that makes any sense at all?

    So the $ 1200 in your view is going to be used by people who get it, to what? To no longer pay their rent or house payment? To no longer buy food for the kids and spouse? SNIP I keep getting this on sites where Old Guard Republicans fear for the Union because God bless ’em, some inner paranoia is telling them that somehow somewhere, someone who filed a 1040 for 2018 is gonna spend it on Cheetos and crack cocaine.

    Shame on you! Big feckin! Shame!

    My point is people with a lot of free time find ways to fill it, and not necessarily good ones. If the current restrictions extend through spring, let’s see if some use the money for recreational purposes.

    So what? If they spend the money on a recreational activity, the money will help out the guy who is the guide at the white water rafting center. Is that so bad?

    Why is it always about some rinky dink individual & not the power houses? The 535 people who are our Congress critters got 50 million to divvy up. No one in the Center seems that upset about that. I simply cannot figure this out. Is it virtue signalling. “I myself always spend money wisely.” Is this a simple case of being better off than others and pointing the fact out. “These lesser mortals might not use the money in the superior manner that I would.” Also it is not just you: I went over to The Federalist and there was the same smirky type comment inside a treatise on which programs and people for whom the massive 2.2 trillion dollar CARE act was going to provide.

    And it is not the people’s fault we are stuck at home twiddling our thumbs!

    • #33
    • April 7, 2020, at 9:42 PM PDT
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  4. Jon1979 Lincoln
    Jon1979

    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret (View Comment):

    Jon1979 (View Comment):

    CarolJoy, Above Top Secret (View Comment):

    Jon1979 (View Comment):

     

    (And on a side note to that, the $1,200 payment people are going to get is going to be a short-term, small-scale test of progressives’ idea of giving people a guaranteed income, SNIPIt’s not a lot of money, but it will be interesting to see how many people don’t use the money for what it’s intended, which is to make ends meet until the COVID-19 shutdowns come to an end.)

    What? Can I parse this last statement of yours in a manner that makes any sense at all?

    So the $ 1200 in your view is going to be used by people who get it, to what? To no longer pay their rent or house payment? To no longer buy food for the kids and spouse? SNIP I keep getting this on sites where Old Guard Republicans fear for the Union because God bless ’em, some inner paranoia is telling them that somehow somewhere, someone who filed a 1040 for 2018 is gonna spend it on Cheetos and crack cocaine.

    Shame on you! Big feckin! Shame!

    My point is people with a lot of free time find ways to fill it, and not necessarily good ones. If the current restrictions extend through spring, let’s see if some use the money for recreational purposes.

    So what? If they spend the money on a recreational activity, the money will help out the guy who is the guide at the white water rafting center. Is that so bad?

    I probably should have put the word ‘recreational’ in quotes, since what I mean is people with nothing to do and no place to go under the current safe-distancing/shelter-in-place related shutdowns may find a way to bide their time is via recreational drug use. Which was the analogy I was making in a hypothetical future where people don’t have jobs, but are given a guaranteed income by the federal government. Where does the money go?

     

    • #34
    • April 7, 2020, at 10:09 PM PDT
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