How to help coronavirus kill

Looking at the fatality statistics around the world, one might think that Covid-19 is doing a good killing job without any outside assistance.

However, as far as Moscow’s mayor is concerned, there’s no limit to excellence. And fair enough, he must feel that the city is grossly overpopulated.

When I left Russia in 1973, Moscow’s population was a meagre seven million. Today it stands at a whopping 12 to 15 million, depending on who’s counting. Just think of providing enough residences and municipal services for that human beehive – not an easy problem by any means.

Hence Mayor Sobyanin, while publicly bemoaning the human cost of the pandemic, must secretly see it as more of a solution than a problem. Anyone wishing to contest this hypothesis should look at his actions, not listen to his words.

Since Muscovites aren’t the most obedient people in the world, their compliance with the lockdown is less than perfect. That’s why the mayor introduced a tracking system, whereby anyone wishing to leave home has to download a digital code.

That may be granted or denied, depending on how valid that person’s reasons are for going walkabout. Those who satisfy the authorities on that score download their code and rush to the nearest tube station.

Alas, the new system makes the Moscow underground as hard to enter as a top secret defence installation.

Everyone wishing to avail himself of that conveyance must produce his digitalised pass and also his internal passport. The policemen at the door scrutinise both documents and check the digital code on their computer.

As a result, the average waiting time at the entrance is 30 to 40 minutes. As you can see on the photograph above, the social distancing in the crowd outside is somewhat less than the requisite two metres.

That way a single carrier of Covid-19 can infect hundreds before catching his train, thereby striking a most satisfying blow for population control. And that’s not all.

Those Muscovites who have their own cars naturally turn to them as a healthier form of transport. If in my day such lucky individuals were about as rare as private jet owners are in London, today’s Moscow boasts some 3.5 million privately owned cars.

Since the city is ill-equipped to handle such volume of vehicular traffic, even some billionaires prefer to travel on the plebeian tube: the social cachet isn’t quite the same, but at least one gets to one’s destination quickly.

Now what do you reckon happens to traffic when even the plebs have to turn to their cars? Correct. It gets much worse.

In fact, one can easily spend an hour in traffic jams anywhere in Moscow. That’s bad enough even for regular drivers, but all they risk is tardiness and perhaps some hypertension. Alas, some of the vehicles stuck next to them are ambulances, and for them an hour’s delay may well be a matter of life or death.

That’s a population-control double whammy: Muscovites catch the virus at the entrance to the tube. Then those who find themselves in ambulances can’t get to hospital. Job done.

So spare a thought for them next time you bitch about the way coronavirus is handled in London, Paris or New York. Thing can be a hell of a lot worse.