Coronavirus – Once in Generation Pandemic
The world is in a once a generation pandemic event with the Covid19 coronavirus. Our collective memory hardly lasts more than a generation. The Spanish flu we are all told is the closest to what the world is experiencing now.
When we are faced with such overwhelming crisis as now with the Covid-19 coronavirus epidemic many interests come to play. The Conspiracy “Theorists”, the “experts” and all those interests that seek dominance for dominance sake. It’s a war against an unseen enemy.
We have heard of people giving advice to the public which they themselves did not follow both in the UK and the US. In the UK, Scotland had the Chief Medical Officer resign as a result [a very British tradition]. The North American cases are highlighted by the likes of Fox News. Brings to question how much they believe in the advice they were giving to others.
We are all experiencing to varying degrees wartime scenarios without armed conflicts. We are at an extreme change-point now. Draconian measures are being proposed in most places with civil liberties restricted in the face of the pandemic.
The Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic has placed everyone, everywhere in a siege situation with many groups recognising the opportunities presented. This has brought out the best and the worst in society. Everyone’s out there with an agenda. As usual the most vulnerable casualty is mental health.
I am yet to establish for myself what ended the Spanish flu. What I am told is it ended when those infected had either died or recovered. No one has yet confirmed beyond a shadow of death that a vaccine was the reason.
Parallels exist in the responses of the time and now. A form of social distancing was applied in different locations. The response of church and worship groups were similar to today’s. Professionals across different interest groups try with varying degrees of success to bury bad news in this pandemic for a generation.
As in all crises where draconian measures are unavoidable, there have been various groups taking advantage of the measures. More importantly, fears have been raised on the potential for abuse of these measures.
The best form of discipline is self discipline. The measures that last are the ones that people agree to enforce themselves. If greater hygiene habits are formed from this pandemic the world would have resolved a lot of issues.
Ebola was more deadly, but Covid-19 is far more contagious than any epidemic before. It took two years for the affected regions to return to normal. This is much too long a time for the economies of the world to sustain.
Interestingly, we do not hear of any activity in the conflict zones prior to March 2020. This throws sharply into focus the futility of war.
While Africa has the lowest death rate in the world, those of African descent are reported to have the highest mortality rate of the communities outside Africa. There are those crying foul at these reports. It is worth noting the different lifestyles of Africans at home as opposed to those in its diaspora
Scientists in South Korea are now reporting that coronavirus Covid-19 cannot be caught twice. This draws the hope that herd immunity is a way out of the crisis as the recovery rate is running at just above 30% worldwide but above 70 % in the US. . Interestingly New York’s Governor released statistics showing that an overwhelming majority of the State’s Covid19 cases were overwhelmingly from people at home in the lockdown.
The way this current pandemic has developed has shown how interconnected we all are. Even the most remote areas of the earth have been affected to some degree.
The lockdown measures imposed have revealed to people the amount of non-essential activities that are in our societies. It presents the opportunities to change drasically the lifestyle and economies of all nations.
Coronavirus is a word we are not about to forget for a very long time!
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