Pandemic Musings

I am used to having personal and family “downs” as in “ups and downs” in everyday life. Who has not felt the horrible frustration of the stove not working on Christmas Eve? The car mysteriously refusing to work when running late for an important meeting is another one.  How about the furnace breaking down on the coldest day of the winter? “Why is life so unfair to me” I say to myself, when experiencing these mini tsunamis. “Look at all these people walking around with not a care in the world”. I then give myself a shake. Realizing I have the knowledge and means to fix the issues, I just get to it.

This corona virus is something different. The whole world is unfortunate. There is no one wandering around without a care. Also, we do not have the knowledge and means to fix this yet. “Yet” is the important word to dwell on. Eventually we will have a vaccine to stop it. In the meantime, we are told how to keep ourselves as safe as possible. Government health leaders say we should avoid crowds. We need to remember this new phrase “social isolation”. We should cough into our sleeve, or a tissue that we throw away. Frequent hand washing for as long as it takes to say happy birthday twice is also required. Protocol is changing hourly,  so we have to stay tuned to government health web sites for updates.

I have noticed people getting angry at the way governments are handling the crisis. I overheard a gentleman telling someone, "A friend of mine in Italy was given a 500 dollar ticket for being out on his scooter after curfew, looking for groceries". This gentleman was very angry at the perceived injustice. This may or may not be true, but the problem with it is not the veracity of the story, but the emphasis on the wrong issue. The really important issue is there has been 1800 deaths in Italy as of Monday March 16th. There were actually 368 deaths in just 24 hours. These numbers are per Global News reporting by James MacKenzie. The horror of this does justify some extreme measures.

The world has certainly shifted. Uncertainty does not feel comfortable. Wouldn't it be nice to have a time limit on this virus? In the meantime have patience, stay safe and help flatten the curve.