Engineer: (Walks into the container office) Gozie, have you heard the latest?
Me: No sir, tell me.
Engineer: Ah! Trump has approved Chloroquine for the
treatment of Covid-19. (basking in euphoria of hope.)
Me: (wondering when it became Trump’s duty to
approve drugs, I shrugged and said) Oh really? Must be nice.
Engineer: Yes oh! As we speak I’ve asked my wife to go
and stock up on chloroquine. She has also bought facemasks, clinical hand
gloves, vitamin C and other natural supplements.
Me: Wow! Safe to say you’re fully ready if this
becomes an outbreak in Nigeria.
Engineer: Yes oh! We have to stay woke.
Me: Yeah! In all, just try to stay alive.
In
recent weeks, the whole world has been grappling with the outbreak of the novel
coronavirus, which started in Wuhan China last year and has since spread to
over 170 countries, prompting the World Health Organization to declare it a
global pandemic on the 11th of March, 2020.
When
the virus was still domiciled in China, a lot of people and indeed world
leaders didn’t take the outbreak seriously. President Trump even called it a “Hoax”,
a word which he had also used to describe climate change, a phenomenon which a
lot of scientist from all over the world have been working on for decades.
Across
the globe, schools are shut, religious and social gatherings with large crowds
are being banned, sports and musical concerts are getting suspended, postponed
and in some cases cancelled altogether. The pandemic has forced us to adapt and
adopt new ways of life. Kids are now being home schooled, with a lot of people working
from home, and business meetings are now being held online over video conference
calls. Thankfully we’ve had the underlying technology tools and platforms to
backup these ways of life we’re now being forced to adopt while staying at
home.
Just
3 weeks ago, the world was puzzled as to why Africa seemed to have little to no
COVID-19 cases reported. A continent known for its poor healthcare systems,
which leaves its people largely vulnerable to all sorts of sicknesses and diseases,
all of a sudden, appeared to have been immune to a virus that has ravaged
leading economies in Asia, Europe and America and has stretched their
healthcare services beyond capacity.
According
to Africa Centre for Disease Control (Africa CDC) data, as of today, there are
over 4,700 confirmed COVID-19 cases, 146 deaths and 335 recoveries in 46
countries in Africa. South Africa is leading the pack with over 1,200 cases, 2
deaths, and 31 recoveries. Nigeria has 131 confirmed cases, 2 deaths and 3
recoveries. Africa is indeed, not immune to the virus and is faced with a
serious healthcare crisis with far damning consequences if urgent and drastic
measures are not taken to contain and curb the spread of this deadly virus that
is ravaging mankind and threatening human existence.
Faced
with the possibility of a potential outbreak, Federal and State governments
have resorted to imposing extreme prevention and containment measures like,
shutting down airports and closing all land and sea borders, preventing people
from going in or out the states. Our government, by reason of those draconian
measures, think they are ahead of the curve, but quite frankly, they are not. Being
ahead of the curve would mean having good health care systems in place, with
motivated healthcare personnel and adequate medical supplies to handle a
possible outbreak whilst hoping that scientists and pharmaceutical companies
can develop antiviral treatments and ultimately a vaccine before long.
As
nations with seemingly good healthcare systems around the world are getting
overwhelmed by the astronomical rise in the number of new cases daily, and are
running out of much needed medical equipment and supplies with factories and
borders shutdown, there are fears of a looming global economic meltdown as more
countries are faced with possible economic recession. More so, there is
widespread anxiety that if these lock downs are allowed to persist for a long
time with no government support in terms of food and other essential supplies,
a lot more people may suffer from hunger than the virus itself.
The lock downs will avail us with enough time for retrospection and realignment of
priorities. For decades our political
class have sought medical care abroad, sometimes utilizing public funds while
neglecting the nations healthcare system, leaving many hospitals in ruins. With
the current reality of nations shutting their borders to foreigners, our elites
have been left with no choice than to seek help in the hospitals and medical
facilities they refused to equip and build. Hopefully at the end of this all,
we will learn to look within and fix our country’s healthcare system, which is
lying in a critical state and in dire need of life support. At the end of the
day, we have nowhere else to call home.
With
misinformation spreading even faster than the virus itself, more people have
been exposed to falsehoods about coronavirus, than there are people infected
with the virus. As The New Yorker
Magazine Editor, David Remnick put it; “Misinformation
is a pathogen. It can cost lives.” With so much yet to be known about the
new virus and no confirmed cure yet, it’s easy to fall victim of misinformation.
As epidemiologists and other public health scientist and leaders around the
world are trying to answer those questions and come up with policies to curb
the spread of this virus, I would implore everyone to stay calm as a lot of
people are actually recovering daily. Let us make responsibility go viral this
period by listening to the authorities and staying home, washing our hands
regularly, keeping our social distance and practicing respiratory hygiene.
Together
we can stop the virus. Stay Home! Stay Safe!! Save Lives!!!
