Women know what’s essential, so why are only men in charge?
HAVE you noticed something quite striking about the small group of people now making the most crucial decisions here on Covid-19? Drs Tony Holohan, Philip Nolan and Ronan Glynn, HSE chief Paul Reid, Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Tánaiste Leo Varadkar, Green Party leader Eamon Ryan and Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly – yep, they’re all men.
Despite the fact that females constitute 51% of the population, we are entirely unrepresented in the decision-making which will affect all of our lives for the foreseeable future, and which, I reckon, will have a greater day-to-day impact on women’s tasks and duties than those of men.
We are, after all, most likely to be the ones standing in the endless supermarket queues as the tougher restrictions kick in. If panic-buying begins again, we’ll be the ones expected to produce bales of toilet rolls and bags of pasta like rabbits from magicians’ top hats. And we are almost certainly the ones who’ll have to try to make sure that Christmas happens in households all over the country this year.
Only a bunch of men could possibly talk, with straight faces, about ‘saving Christmas’ while at the same time even considering the closure of ‘non- essential retail outlets’. Unless they’re expecting Santa and his elves to sort everybody’s shopping, planning, decorating and gift-buying, then they need to realise that there’s simply no such thing as a ‘non- essential retail outlet’ at this time of year.
If you’re the one responsible for everybody’s Christmas then, once Halloween is over, you have to get cracking on the ‘to- do’ lists or they just won’t get done in time. Only a bunch of men could imagine that Christmas could be ‘ saved’ with just a couple of weeks to go: all it would mean is longer queues, bigger crowds, more stress and far more opportunities for a virus that just loves crowds, queues and stressed-out, fatigued shoppers.
Enforcing
Not only i s the closure of clothes shops, shoe shops, department stores, charity shops, jewellers, book shops, homewares, electrical and hardware stores a huge blow to those businesses that are just about getting back on their feet, it is also desperately unfair. These retailers have, almost without exception, been enforcing the strictest mask-wearing, sanitising and distancing policies since they were finally allowed to reopen at the end of summer.
They’ve been turning shoppers away to adhere to their strict admission policies, with smaller shops admitting no more than three or four customers at a time. Changing rooms have been closed down, which must have i mpacted on turnover, and they’ve been vigilant, for the most part, about demanding mask-wearing and insisting that everyone sanitise their hands.
If there are outbreaks of the disease linked to ‘non-essential retailers’, then they certainly didn’t feature in the trail of disaster left by that reckless fellow who managed to infect 56 people here after he failed to isolate following a trip abroad recently. He passed the virus on through socialising with a group of friends, some of whom then went on to infect others at house parties, family gatherings and even sports events: nobody, so far as I can see, contracted it by trying on a pair of shoes or buying a book.
An endless cycle of lockdown measures, such as we’re enduri ng, i s not the way t hat other countries successfully tackled the virus.
Vietnam, Taiwan and New Zealand, have had all of 67 coronavirus deaths between them, out of a combined population of 124million.
Rugby internationals are going ahead in New Zealand now. And Wuhan, in China, the epicentre of the virus, has been back to normal, which has included huge outdoor events drawing thousands of people, for months.
Imposed
Writing in The Lancet recently Professor Devi Sridhar of the University of Edinburgh identified the three key planks of their strategies. They imposed strict border controls to prevent the importation of the virus and issued strong public health guidance on face coverings, distancing and the benefits of open spaces and good ventilation.
Most importantly, they implemented robust testing, tracing and isolating systems, where test results were returned within 24 hours. By contrast, when we had a scare in my family, the tests were booked on Monday, carried out on Tuesday, and the results were back by Thursday – that seemed pretty quick, but it’s not nearly quick enough.
Those countries also saw strict a dherence to t he 1 4 - day quarantine rule, and there’s no way a passenger returning from overseas, like our wanderi ng s uper- s preader, c ould have i nfected 56 people in New Zealand.
Testing, tracing, airport checks and more ICU beds: these are the proven keys to fighting the virus. Lockdowns, shuttered shops, panic buying and lengthy queues – all they will achieve is more fatigue, less compliance and greater frustration in a population that has, to date, been offered no hope of an end in sight.