FOR sure we can improve in myriads of ways how we are coping with coronavirus disease (Covid-19). But I am not going to add to the ensuing confusion because the need really is to simplify; and we are all new at this and will just have to learn as we go along. Thus, I simply thank now all frontliners and their backers, public and private, for what I am sure is their darn best under the circumstances.
Covid-19 has exposed the fragility of life today. Nuclear bombs can blast us to kingdom come at any moment. If and when they do there would not be a next time around to do things differently. Covid-19, at least, gives us a look-see into our fragile world without taking away the chance to change our ways.
Technological progress far from taking away from that fragility is even adding to it. We enjoy seeing it happen in the movies but we move on to function like we don’t realize how a virtual virus can create untold havoc to life on earth.
Covid-19 does not confirm what has been said about the few rich being unable to prevent the desperate poor from rising up to claim their right to equal access to the basics and amenities of life. But it is telling us that the poor might not have to rise in arms after all. A virus, virtual or real, might do it for them.
Consider this predicament. The best defense against Covid-19 is a robust immune system, good nutrition, hygiene and sanitation, and social distancing. No problem for the rich. But the 18 million low-income households (cf. RA11469) do not have running water and cannot afford soap when their money does not even buy them half-way decent meals daily. And just how exactly do you do social distancing in their one-room shacks?
The poor, not seniors per se, are the most vulnerable. They have the pre-condition of a weak immune system and they cannot afford basic anti-virus defenses. The question now is how the rest of Philippine society can protect itself from fifty some million probable Covid-19 carriers. (18 million households at three to a household is a staggering 54 million).
We can be safe only if we are all equally safe. We can be equally safe only if we all have equal access to good nutrition, hygiene and sanitation, decent housing, and professional health services. What is putting us on a self-destruct mode is inequality. This is humanity’s greatest sin, treating others as inferior because of race, religion or financial condition.
We will probably survive this crisis but maybe not the next big one unless we work to establish a socio-economic system that promotes the good of the bigger number. Honestly, I am not optimistic knowing the greed and insensitivity of the political elite that maintain our current oppressive system.
(To be continued)