5 million or taking notice

How will we remember the massive loss of the pandemic in 76 years?

On the first day of November 2021, the New York Times published that the known Covid-19 death toll has passed 5 million. Though I am acutely aware of the personal toll of the pandemic, seeing that number flash across my phone screen was sufficient to stop me in my tracks. The number of Covid-19 deaths is approaching uncomfortably on another number that I have been thinking about a lot since the beginning of the pandemic, and because it’s Holocaust Education week, that number is worth talking about. 

When the death toll in the United States reached 100,000 in the summer of 2020, it was surreal. But I couldn’t stop myself from thinking that 100,000 people died, and we noticed. Perhaps, we only noticed because we have Facebook, and Twitter, and CNN, but when Covid-19 outbreaks happened in abattoirs and Amazon warehouses, we noticed. At the time of writing this, 5 million people have died, and we have noticed. Seventy-six years ago, 6 million Jews disappeared, and we barely noticed. While there was no internet in 1945 and global news arrived at a much slower pace, the reality remains. 

It is not entirely true that when 6 million Jews were forced into ghettos and death camps, no one noticed. In some places such as Vilna, Lithuania where at least half the population was Jewish, and in major cities like Budapest and Vienna, the sudden absence of the Jewish community could not have gone unobserved - least of all by those who took over their homes, businesses, and art collections. It is equally untrue that we have all noticed the death of 5 million people to a global pandemic. While some families and communities have been ravaged, others have been left untouched. 

The pandemic is by no means a Holocaust. A virus is not the same as a targeted extermination attempt. This should in no way be taken to be a comparison between what happened in the Holocaust and what is happening now. This is about numbers. It is about the ways we notice, and fail to notice numbers.

According to the most recent statistics, 20% of Canadian students had not heard of the Holocaust or were not sure what it was. Not only did the world fail to take notice from 1939-1945, when at least they had the possible excuse that many people disappeared during the war, but we are failing to take notice today that this happened, and that the Jewish community has never fully recovered what was lost in language and culture and lives. And we need to notice. Young people need to be aware not only that 6 million people were systematically murdered for the mere fact of being Jewish, but that millions were complicit by both their action and inaction.

Between March 2020 and November 2021, 5 million people have died of Covid-19; we - the world - have experienced a collective loss akin to 9/11 every day for over a year and a half. How will we take notice of this moment in 76 years? 

As business and borders reopen, the intensity we have lived with is beginning to fade. Our awareness of case numbers, once so acute, is going the way of celebrities who we Google every few months to see if their death rumours are a hoax. The questions around culpability for the pandemic, be it the Wuhan lab, President Bolsonaro, or Qanon, are disappearing from our collective interest. Covid-19 deaths and case counts no longer featured on the home page of every major newspaper website. 

When 6 million Jews died, the world averted its gaze. Recognition did not come until liberation, and the Nuremberg and Eichmann trials, respectively. Seventy-six years later, we continue to fail to remember. As Antisemitism in the West continues to rise, the world has failed to notice. The lesson we keep forgetting is that price of Jewish lives and Jewish lived experiences is somewhere below equal. When we fail to take notice of the numbers, we are incapable of changing that.   

Today, 5 million people have died from Covid-19, and the world has noticed. We have felt their absence at our dinner tables, on our stages, and in our classrooms. We have all been impacted by shutdowns and stay-home orders. We have long awaited the day when life will get back to normal, and despite Covid-19 still being very much a reality, that day seems to be coming. 

We are standing at a crossroads. We have taken notice of the deaths of 5 million people. We have changed our routines: worn masks, washed our hands, and stayed away. As we move forward, we need to continue being aware of the ways this moment in time has shaped our communities. We need to remember the lessons that we are learning so we can carry them forward.

In 76 years, we will be the ones to have borne witness to the ways that a virus can overturn life as we know it. We have borne witness to the ways that misinformation and poor preparation needlessly cost us lives. We must take notice of what we have experienced so that in 76 years, we have not forgotten the 5 million.