By Laurie Baron, Ph.D.
SAN DIEGO — The World Health Organization employs Greek letters instead of people’s names or places to label new variants of Covid-19. It does so to avoid derogatory terms like the ones coined by Donald Trump who called Covid the China virus and the Kung Flu. Frankly, I wish the WHO had retaliated against him and dubbed Covid Donald’s Disease
Greek letters were used for variants of lesser concern before Delta and Omicron emerged. The WHO even skipped over Nu and Xi so the public wouldn’t confuse Nu with new (or perhaps the Yiddish nu which would have been construed by Jews as minimizing the severity of that variant). The WHO omitted Xi ostensibly to avert insulting Xi Jinping, but actually to not give Trump any sense of vindication.
Yet the organization’s efforts to deflect criticism have not been entirely successful. Many cats hissed when the WHO called a variant Mu. Catherine Zeta-Jones and her husband Michael Douglas sued the WHO for libel when it referred to a prior variant as Zeta. The practice of designating Greek letters infuriates college fraternities which want potential pledges to know that the only health risk their houses pose is being hazed to death.
The Who runs certain risk if it continues naming future variants with Greek letters. Pi undoubtably will anger mathematicians and bakers just as Rho is bound to upset the members of crew teams, particularly the coxswain (though if someone called me a coxswain, I’d be enraged). And then there’s Chi. Does the WHO really want to contend with indignant Chicagoans bearing weapons as they storm WHO headquarters? Perhaps the WHO should just number the variants which provides an infinite supply of innocuous integers.
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Baron is professor emeritus of history at San Diego State University. He may be contacted via lawrence.baron@sdjewishworld.com. San Diego Jewish World points out to new readers that this column is satire, and nothing herein should be taken literally.