It’s 5:00 am and I’m up early with the thoughts of the current COVID 19 pandemic. Yes after so many months I’m not jaded and I’m still concerned. Here me out...Frankly, I’m shocked at how many have died from it, how many are still suffering from complications and how many of us are still alive. All of it matters but it’s this last fact that I want to highlight first....Just how many of us have survived in spite of it all.
Something happened during the pandemic that prevented the complete annihilation of the human race. As mentioned in another post, (on another blog) I’m pretty sure I caught the virus early on before testing was available and while folks in the Western world were still trying to figure it out.
Flash forward 9 months later and we are right back to where we started; record numbers of surging Covid19 cases. In spite of mandatory mask wearing culture, hand washing and sanitization campaigns, there is a resurgence.
Early on in the pandemic; something difficult was asked of us in Canada and much of the world. People were sent home from work, businesses were asked to close, other essential businesses were asked to limit indoor capacity, physicians were doing mostly phone consultations, we were asked to shop for essentials once a week with only one family member assigned to that chore, we were asked to drastically limit attendees at important public gatherings like funerals and weddings and the list goes on.
With all of these restrictions in place, we were able to reduce the number of active cases and have a less restricted summer; an opportunity to enjoy the outdoors again and enjoy some of the freedoms and privileges that we once could, pre Covid; as best as we could.
As someone who previously suffered from childhood respiratory issues, I survived Covid 19 in the early days with the help of prayer, resting at home, hydrating and taking medications to treat myself symptom by symptom. This was before the self isolation and quarantine campaigns.
By now we have all heard of people in our network who have caught, survived or succumbed to it (Covid 19).
Covid19 is not a figment of our collective imaginations - it’s real. It’s also why I’m making a plea to the reasonable among us to keep doing the difficult things being asked of us in order to curb the virus this Christmas. Once again, we all must play our part.
The major urban centres in Canada, specially Ontario, have entered lockdown mode. We are being asked to limit our holiday festivities immediately to just those we live with...not those who visit every day and who we’re accustomed to seeing regularly but to those who actually sleep under the same roof every night.
Here me out...this is hard. It means no big extended family dinners. No mass opening of presents under the Christmas tree. No extended family group pictures in holiday Pyjamas or whatever the tradition is.
It’s also not good enough to convince yourself that everyone in your social circle is safe. That is an assumption because there is just no way to track everyone’s interactions when they go to and from your house. Even if they don’t leave their house they are still interacting with packages received from couriers and delivery partners. Also there is no way to predict how each person’s immune system will respond to contracting the virus.
I know it’s the holiday season and it’s been a long, rough and weird year. We all want to let our guard down and just be happy and merry with family and friends. However, let’s consider the after effects of a non social distanced Christmas.
Halloween/Thanksgiving holiday season showed us that the virus thrives when we come together because quite frankly we can’t eat and feast through masks. Imagine how disastrous a non restricted Christmas could be.
You may be young and strong enough to survive Covid 19 if you contract it but imagine you or your family needing medical care and being unable to get help because the hospitals are at full capacity. Imagine health care workers having to be working overtime and fatigued because there are only so many hours in the day and there is no cheating sleep? Think about it.
The in person group festivities and smiling group pics for the Gram/Facebook/YouTube/TikTok (any social media) pales in importance.
Also consider that in addition to you choosing not to do the difficult things, you could be influencing the decision of others in your social network to consciously or subconsciously not social distance this Christmas.
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