Such efforts are easy to dismiss as blame-laying, but it’s important for us to take careful stock of recent decisions, and the more gargantuan the effect, the more attention we should pay.  So, put this on the list:

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently reported a shortage of liquid amoxicillin, which is typically prescribed to children.

The FDA listed an increased demand for the antibiotic as the primary reason for the shortage. While the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) lists amoxicillin as a “first-line” therapy for most pediatric bacterial infections, there are alternatives that can be used instead.

We kept children isolated and then masked for more than a year.  We shut down large parts of the economy.  Both shortages of supplies and reduced natural immune responses were predictable consequences of that action.