Covid-19 Supply Chain Safety Tips

March 24, 2020 Wild Salmon Cove Fisheries News Politics Seafood
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I see it every day.

It’s worrisome,
but expected.

One of the most challenging parts of a journey for almost everyone in almost every venture, is the last mile, whether it’s about getting your fish to market fresh, or avoiding being infected with Covid-19.

Most of us do great out of the gate, but half-way through a long race many let down their guard, and all their hard work hits the wall!

Pacing yourself and paying careful attention to details defines winners, whether it is a seafood supply chain or Covid-19.

Regarding coronavirus, the general public has been thrown even further off balance because last month most of us thought this pesky virus would blow through in a couple of weeks and we’d all be back to normal in no time. We know now that two months plus is more realistic, and obviously more if we get hit like Italy. Bulldozing your way through this global pandemic is foolhardy and irresponsible.

Covid-19 is a life changer for all of us young and old, personally and in business.

Natural selection is going viral at warp speed.

It’s not the fittest who will survive though, it’s the one who is the most flexible and who can react the fastest to a constantly changing scenario. In the case of fisheries, it’s all about finding better solutions for overfishing and ocean pollution.

In the case of Covid-19 it’s about ramping up our health care infrastructure so it can handle overload in case we hit critical mass – we need more “last mile” ventilators to handle the burst.

Being flexible is of paramount importance.

Funny thing about viruses, you can do one hundred things right, but one small mistake can immediately place you at ground zero. There are no do-overs and “let’s try it again” scenarios that will UN-infect you.

Most of us are conscientious and following advice from scientists and political leaders. Unfortunately, there is a lot of info floating around making it hard to identify what is true, and what might be “deadly myth” masquerading as common sense.

For example, most people still don’t understand that the real danger is not that you touched the Covid-19 virus with your hand. It’s that you transferred the virus from your hand to an open part of your body, like your eyes, nose, or mouth.

Touching Covid-19 won’t harm you directly.

The last metaphoric mile to your nose however, is a different story.

If you’re curious about who is confused about Covid-19, all you have to do is look at the COMMENT sections in news media. People ask questions that by now everyone should know. For example, many still compare Covid-19 to measles. Granted, they are both viruses and close in appearance, but only until you get to the last mile. The measles virus is smaller physically than Covid-19, but both viruses when coughed or sneezed float in the air, albeit for different lengths of time. Air suspension means that when you step into an elevator, if someone who is Covid-19 positive sneezed in that confined space a few minutes earlier, the virus could still be floating in the air you breathe as you ride to your floor. It’s even possible that a person’s regular breathing, without a cough or sneeze, could infect you. Too many people are myopically focused on not touching elevator buttons with your finger, which is a good advice of course, but we also need to be concerned about what we breathe.

Confined spaces are one reason it’s dangerous to fly.

The measles virus is relatively small compared to Covid-19 that is made up of larger drops of vapor, or worse, mucus that spews out even when you talk normally. It can land within a meter or two radius. Covid-19 can live outside the body for hours or even days depending on the surface and ambient temperature. Fecal matter also carries great risk. Washroom taps and door handles at home or in public areas are serious danger zones.

The overarching challenge is that scientists still argue about how long measles and Covid-19 float in the air. Measles is a smaller airborne mass, consequently, it floats longer, up to half an hour on average, plus, because it is so small it more easily sticks to clothes. Cross-contamination is a bit different between the two viruses, but when you’re talking about a potentially fatal illness, are you going to argue whether the virus was airborne for ten minutes, or for half an hour? You have no idea if the last person who exited the elevator one minute before you coughed into the air that you’re now inhaling. You did everything great for the last two weeks, but at the last mile, you lose. What floor sir?

If you’re able, it’s safer to take the stairs simply because it has considerably more air volume, but again it depends on you or your stairwell. That’s where common sense comes into play. There often is no perfectly right answer. Lowering your odds is your best bet, but nothing is guaranteed.

Here’s another example; You obey all the rules that scientists and doctors are promoting, and you only go to the grocers when you truly need something … not because you’re out of ice cream. You shop carefully at off-peak times, wipe the handle of your shopping cart or basket with alcohol-based sanitizer, wear and use gloves properly, you don’t over-handle products, especially fruits and vegetables, you keep your distance from other shoppers, and you breathe a huge sigh of relief when you get home.

Relieved, you start to unpack your groceries in your kitchen, proud of yourself that you traversed without incident the risky trip to the market, but as you’re putting your groceries away you realize that the little reusable veggie bag you placed your hand-picked tomatoes in, is now sitting on your counter. Less than twenty minutes earlier, the bag was sitting in a well-used shopping basket and then on the belt for the cashier.

Not only do you not know how many people actually handled your tomatoes – customers or staff, you don’t know if any of these people, who might have been infected, coughed on, or touched the cashier’s belt where thousands of shoppers converge. Not everyone buys tomatoes, but almost everyone checks out, so how careful you are in this high traffic area is critical.

If your food containers, bags or boxes, jars, or egg cartons rested on the cashier’s belt it would be risky to place it on your kitchen counter where you prepare food.

Food doesn’t normally carry viruses, but the bag could be contaminated as well as the box it came in.

Unlike birthday presents, effort counts for nothing – zero, zip, nada. It’s all about being effective, so err on the side of caution and pay careful attention to the little details all along the supply chain.

Here’s one more tip, if you wear glasses, make sure they fit snug so you don’t have to touch your face a hundred times a day to push them back up on your nose. Oh yeah, wash your eye glasses daily too, along with your phone, credit cards and cash.

It’s the last mile, or millimeter that will kill you.

Maurice Cardinal has been a fisheries marketing and communications advisor and writer in British Columbia for almost a decade and has worked with leading organisations, NGOs, and governments in Canada and abroad.

Business as Un-Usual

March 19, 2020 Wild Salmon Cove Fisheries News Politics Seafood
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It doesn’t matter if you’re pushing or pulling the leading edge, being 1st is still often the most enviable position even when waging war against a deadly virus.

Being 1st is important, but being right is critical too.

In business, being first with the right solution, or at least “close to the right” solution puts you in a league with companies like Amazon, Microsoft, and Apple.

That truism has never been so significant as it is now, as “we” the global collective, battle coronavirus – Covid-19.

Being 1st in business or virus does two basic things;

1/ It sets a precedent and establishes
early crowd/market control.

2/ It makes you look smart and helps you survive.

Political pandemic posturing has the PR perception protocol painted all over it!

Perception is often nine tenths of the law, and experienced leaders know it. You have to win, or at least look like you’re winning each step along the way.

On March 18, 2020, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced he would close the Canada/US border to all traffic except commercial flow. He made that drastic and difficult decision because our friends in the US now hold risk considerably greater than Canada’s, although that could change at any moment  and for unexplained reasons. So far though, Canada has moved far beyond the effort the USA is exhibiting.  

Here’s how it breaks down today, from WorldOMeters.Info;

The USA has 11,355 Total Cases, Canada has 800. The USA has had 171 Deaths, Canada, 10. In the USA Total cases per million population is 34, in Canada 21. USA population is 327 million, Canada, 38 million.

Not that anyone is counting except Canadians and President Trump … Canada is obviously protecting its citizens better than the USA, which means our neighbors next door are a significant risk. Statistically, it’s more dangerous to be in the presence of a US citizen than it is a Canadian, and that fact is important when you share such an open-style border.

The USA has always been a welcomed and trusted friend to Canadians, but of late, The Donald has jeopardized a relationship that, for the most part in the past has been extraordinarily great. Today however, not so great.

We’ll still gladly share a drink with Americans at “Happy Hour” but when it comes down to life and death, we’re calling out our friends south of the border. Please stay on your side of the table until you have your house in order. Also, please tell Elon Musk that his government’s rules apply to him too. Musk has been forced to shut his factory down by the local sheriff. Musk claimed that building cars is an essential service. Turns out, it’s not. Who knew?

Canada no longer trusts that the USA is making the right decisions to protect its citizens under Trump leadership, so we’ve had to distance ourselves for the safety of Canadian residents.

As you can see by the numbers above, compared to the USA, Canada and it’s political leaders have done the right things at the right time. We’ve protected our citizens the best way possible considering these dangerous times, while the US has fumbled and put us all at heightened risk.

No one wants to repeat the tragic mistakes made by Italy. Consequently, watching the Americans stumble is puzzling in the face of the large volume of information provided by WHO – the World Health Organization.

Canadians love you guys below the 49th, but we need you to keep your distance because you’re not operating on compassion. Instead, you’re playing a short game of greed when the entire world needs a long view of survival.

The only way we are going to flatten the global pandemic growth curve is by all working together.

If you cheat, you’ll get caught and die, and increase the risk of infecting us all. Canadians are historically NICE, but don’t mistake our heightened sense of humanity for stupidity.

It is Canada who wanted the U.S. border closed, so our prime minister closed it.

Oddly, being first, also means that if it happens, you want to be the first individual in your community to contract an active case of Covid-19 because you’ll be first in line for scarce ventilators that will very likely be necessary for your survival. It also means you’ll have a bed in a hospital and you won’t have to suffer and maybe even die at home, alone. It’s where people who cheat the system end up regardless of their personal wealth, except of course for the obscenely wealthy who already own a respirator for each person in their family – it’s the modern day BOMB SHELTER. Just for the record, your respirator would also be more effective if it were attached to a hospital, but that’s a minor hurdle when you’re wealthy, and especially if the wing carries your family name.

Being first often means you’ll have the best chance of survival whether it’s a virus or business.

On the Canadian fisheries side, being first to embrace the transition of open-net pens inland and out of the ocean means you will have the best access to funds, leadership, and opportunity. It means you will play a greater role in establishing the long term rules of engagement and competition.

Being second means you’ll have to follow the rules established by your competitor.

Being second also means you won’t get the ventilator, and that your risk of dying increases exponentially.

Being second means that the guy in first place, has the ear of the government, and being on the inside gives them overwhelming leverage to enact new legislation and to capitalize on new ways of thinking ahead of the crowd. Smart companies know this, the rest, not so much.

Effectively managing the crowd in business and politics means you have influence over a group that is “collectively dumb”, but individually, very smart. The collective dumb panic-buy and horde toilet paper, the smart manage their priorities responsibly and make decision based on what is good for the team. Smart players have a strong and often influential voice through social media. This ain’t Kansas Dorothy and not the old news media days where mainstream news irresponsibly reported whatever worked for their advertisers. Twitter and such levels the playing field in real time.

Life is changing exponentially at the frantic speed of a mutating virus – look to Italy where 475 recently died in one single day. 

Although technology now makes things possible that we never even dreamed of a few years ago, it turns out that INTUITION is still the best indicator of whether or not you will follow the advice of health professionals. Psychologists report that the higher your sense of intuition, which is tied directly to empathy, the more likely you are to manage Covid-19 responsibly.

Technology makes it possible to communicate with the crowd efficiently so that we can isolate ourselves from a new breed of virus, a novel virus that kills without prejudice.

Technology also makes it possible to mimic an ocean-like environment in a land-based RAS IMTA facility.

In all of history, humanity has never been able to do either of these things, and for different reasons, it’s scary. Change is always daunting because it’s predicated on the unknown, and the unknown carries risk.

A quote, often mistakenly attributed directly to Charles Darwin is not about physical strength as many erroneously believe. It’s reflective of how one-celled creatures proliferate … “It is not the strongest that survive, or the most intelligent, but the one with the greatest capacity for change.” 

The more that a virus adapts, the faster it will grow, and so far Covid-19 meets all these markers.

Consequently, Canadians also need to adapt to survive.

It’s not about being strong. It’s about being flexible, and fast.

Canada does a good job, but we still do not test enough for Covid-19. The rate we do however is increasing rapidly. Without testing we have no idea who is a carrier. It’s like playing Whack-A-Mole in the dark.

Prime Minister Trudeau announced an $82 billion dollar aid package that covers a wide variety of people and companies. If anyone at this stage, continues to expend energy in an effort to undermine our political leaders, your names and companies are duly noted. In order to move quickly we need cooperation from everyone – even if you didn’t vote for the current politicians, or even if you didn’t vote at all. Unless you can PROVE your allegations, bad mouthing leaders in charge does nothing to help our world cause, so for your sake and all humanity, grow up.

The internet has a long shelf life.

No one is interested in your opinionated political bias or armchair quarterbacking. Unless you have a positive contribution for a COVID-19 SOLUTION, keep partisan trolling to yourself for the next few months. The rest of us are looking for solutions. You’re either with us, or against us.

There’s no middle ground with Coronavirus.

You either have it, or you avoid it.

If you have it, phone your doctor and get in line for a respirator. Your life might depend on it.

As a society in these trying times, it’s not about how much money we throw at it, or the best deal we make to horde vaccines, it’s about working together to effectively manage this monster.

We can go back to fighting with each other later.

Maurice Cardinal has been a fisheries marketing and communications advisor and writer in British Columbia for almost a decade and has worked with leading organisations, NGOs, and governments in Canada and abroad.