Wait and see approach speaks volumes

WHEN the people are scared it is the job of the government to placate them. It can do this in any number of ways; through words of consolation, fervent tubthumping, lies, a stern talking to. Whatever. So long as the people go to bed at night free of fear and worry, that’s all that matters.

Obviously, it helps when you have a government elected by the people, and even more so when it’s on active, regular duty.

Sadly we, the people, have neither of those things at the moment. Yet that shouldn’t mean that, during times of crisis, we are left to flounder, no-one to look after us, not even those we so wish to see relegated to the margins.

Whether we are in the midst of a crisis is a matter for debate. It depends on who you listen to. I read an article last week which said 20,000 Irish people could die from the coronavirus. I read another which said it’ll be gone by the summer. I, like you, have read a lot of articles.

And I’ve had no choice. Because the only way of assessing the potential fallout of COVID-19’s arrival on our shores is to read the words of these medical professionals, biologists, unnamed GPs and various, dubious authorities, all written with good intentions, but all widely varying in tone, timbre and intent.

Accompanying these articles have been occasional tidbits, morsels of advice begrudgingly thrown our way by a Taoiseach and a Health Minister who’d much rather, at this stage, hand the responsibility over to someone else.

I don’t expect Leo Varadkar and Simon

Harris to have all the answers, I don’t expect a Churchillian speech about fighting COVID-19 from the sofa, from the sanctity of our living-rooms, until it slinks back from whence it came, defeated and dejected, but a bit of leadership wouldn’t go astray.

Instead there’s been plenty of humming, a fair amount of hawing, the few statements they have made peppered with ifs, buts and maybes. Rather than tackle the inevitable spread of the disease, stop it in its tracks, those in power appear content to just ‘wait and see’, to wait until people start dying, until the numbers infected goes into the thousands, before making a decision.

Until that happens, until we suffer our first loss of life, their chief concern is the health of our economy.

Why else would they prevaricate over the St Patrick’s Day parades? The cancellation of flights to and from the worst affected regions? Is it the case that a handful of casualties are worth it if we can preserve the massive annual cash-cow that is the day of our patron saint?

That’s what it comes down to. A game of Russian Roulette. In Wuhan, where the coronavirus originated, it took almost 600 cases before some form of lockdown was enacted. In Italy more than 200 people died before its government decided to take action.

What’s our figure? How many people will needlessly die before someone in authority decides something has to be done?

And while I’m loathe to scaremonger, to add another layer to the panic permeating our society, for many of the people living in this country the next few weeks will be a matter of life and death.

On a personal level I would hope if I were infected I would overcome COVID-19. But I couldn’t say the same for at least two members of my family, two people whom I care about deeply.

They are already living in self-isolation, terrified to step outside their door lest they come into contact with a carrier, obsessively washing their hands and coughing into their elbows despite not seeing a living soul for days.

We are constantly being reminded that we are an ageing population, and it’s true, the most recent census figures show that 19.1% of us are aged 65 or older. Something else we are often reminded of is how a society can be judged on how it treats its most vulnerable people, e.g. the elderly.

Right now we are treating these vulnerable people as if they are wholly expendable, a demographic which can afford to take a few losses, absorb a few blows.

And when those losses occur, when someone finally decides enough is enough and proper preventative measures are put in place, remember the number, the amount of deaths it took for that decision to be made.