BARRY SHEERMAN We can defeat this virus with our tough love
THE Prime Minister has told us that most of us should now be working from home and in this I believe he is right.
This is vital in order to prevent this killer virus from spreading further and faster and infecting so many people that our health service will be overwhelmed.
We must start a new regime in which we avoid our fellow human beings!
What we are being asked to do is tough, really tough. We humans are social animals to our very core. We are gregarious. We enjoy each other’s company and love family and work gettogethers, weddings, baptisms and parties.
The brutal truth is that if we truly love our families, particularly the older or less fit members, we must make the really tough sacrifice of not mixing with them or other people for a considerable amount of time.
We don’t just have to listen to the doctors, scientists and hordes of top experts to know this is right. We just have to look at how this deadly virus has infected and killed so many folk in so many countries.
The countries decimated by this virus aren’t just far away places like China, Korea or Iran; they are our close neighbours such as Italy and Spain.
While we watch the stream of information brought to us by the media we can see not only how the virus was brought to these countries, but also we are made keenly aware of its speed and momentum as it infects and kills more and more people.
We can also learn from countries that were infected earlier than us, how we slow the rate of infection down and reduce the spread to the older and more vulnerable members of our communities.
Failing to be disciplined enough and reluctance to deploy this really tough love will result in not just a rise in the numbers of infections and deaths we see every day on the media.
It means the loss of much loved members of our families, mums and dads, uncles and aunts, grandmas and grandpas! Young people feel immortal but they are also becoming very seriously ill and some are dying.
Cruelly, as we have seen in other parts of the world, the infection and death rate will be felt the most in the least advantaged members of our community.
There is still time for everyone, whether they live in the towns or the countryside to come together and with an iron will and determination defeat this enemy.
But this will not happen if we do not all support each other in maintaining the distances between us in the long days and weeks ahead.
We must learn the hard lesson of being forced to shun close family and friends and temporarily forgo the hugs, the handshakes and even the kisses that are an integral part of family and friendship. We can do this together. I know it will be hard. I have been in isolation myself for the past 10 days and it feels like 10 weeks.
I am desperately missing my children and grandchildren, but by all supporting each other we can overcome this virus and save so many lives.