I could not agree more, even though Hollywood still seems to be resisting the trend toward digital, just as it once resisted Netflix itself. (Jeff Bewkes of Time Warner famously once called Netflix — in an inexplicable metaphor — the “Albanian Army.” )
Well, now that the big studios and entertainment companies have embraced most of the economics and practices of Netflix, I suppose they are all Albanian.
4 Questions
Michelle A. Williams, the dean of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, answered my questions about Covid.
I’m hosting a big live event, Code 2021, this week in Los Angeles. We require vaccination proof, Covid testing, masking and social distancing, and we’re having as many of our events outside as possible. What else should we keep in mind?
The steps you’ve outlined are all consistent with the advice that we as public health officials have been sharing for many months. I’d add one more recommendation: You should regularly remind participants to stay home if they’re feeling sick. No one wants to miss an event like Code, but if you wake up with a cough, runny nose or fever, the right thing to do is to stay home and avoid the conference crowd, even if you’re vaxxed and masked.
This leads me to an important point. As a nation, we need to dramatically ramp up production and distribution of inexpensive, rapid, at-home tests. These tests are excellent at detecting early infections, which is when a person is generally most contagious. In an ideal world, participants in a large conference like Code would take such a test every morning to verify that they’re free and clear and able to attend in person. Unfortunately, in the U.S., we don’t yet have widespread access to these tests. The Biden administration is moving with urgency to increase availability, which will greatly improve our ability as a society to move back toward normalcy. But for now, most people simply have to follow the advice I just shared: If you’re feeling at all sick, stay home, just in case.
The booster shot is rolling out for certain at-risk populations. Would it be better to use those resources to vaccinate everyone around the world?
