Day 1158, Innumeracy 

 

We have a problem, innumeracy,

A mathematical deficiency.

When you cannot read a graph or a chart,

That’s numerical illiteracy.

 

When you cannot read a graph or a chart,

That fact does not mean that you are not smart,

But don’t understand the language of math.

Your education skipped over that part.

 

You don’t understand the language of math,

The flow rates of faucets filling your bath,

A virus that spreads exponentially,

Pandemics and timing of viral wrath.

 

A virus that spreads exponentially,

Like 2, 4, 8, 16, sequentially,

Spreads through the country with increasing speed,

Until it is spreading torrentially.

 

Spread through the country with increasing speed,

Something that only the numerate heed,

Means that the nation’s response will be slow

And we won’t make the pandemic recede.

 

And, if the nation’s response is too slow,

For non-immune hosts where virus may grow,

Who go on spreading it each time they sneeze,

Millions of folks may be laid six feet low.

 

If you’re spreading virus each time you sneeze,

Ignoring our expert scientists’ pleas,

Don’t comprehend how to flatten a curve,

Then innumeracy promotes disease.