Riding out the pandemic: To each his own
IN his recent televised public address, President Duterte told us not to worry about the pandemic. The government is not without a backup plan, he said, as he threatened to take over hotel establishments if and when the crisis overwhelmed the country’s health facilities.
But what has been happening in the last 13 months has unfortunately confirmed what many of us were suspecting all along: the government is ill-equipped to deal with this serious health crisis. The prevention aspect has been deficient since the government’s focus seems to be on preparing death beds, instead of averting the likelihood of majority of the populace catching the deadly coronavirus.
His government has been doing everything it could, Duterte further said, touting the creation of the Interagency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases as a major achievement. But with over 9,000 people getting the bug each day, has the agency delivered? Despite imposing different and interminable stages of suffocating lockdowns, the IATF has done little to contain the pandemic.
The lockdown slowed down businesses and has practically punished the poor, many of whom were left without livelihood. They have been forced to cramp themselves in their respective shanties no bigger than 15 square meters with rodents and roaches as company. And when community pantries sprouted, formed by well-meaning pro-poor organizations to offer some relief to the unemployed and downtrodden, this administration —as confirmed by no less than Lt. Gen. Antonio Parlade Jr., spokesman of the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conf lict (Ntf-elcac)— was quick to red-tag their organizers.
I don’t know if the government has realized by now that putting all of its marbles on vaccine procurement to contain the disease is not a good idea. With the vaccine shortage, Duterte could only mumble: “There is nothing we can do.” The government has not learned from the successes of Vietnam, New Zealand, and other countries that have weathered the pandemic even prior to their respective citizens getting the much-needed jabs. While waiting for the vaccine, the government has closed its ears on well-meaning recommendations on the prevention aspect of the disease from concerned health experts and the opposition. Instead, Duterte, et al., hurled profanities at them and treated them as virtual saboteurs.
With the pandemic taking center stage, other deadly diseases have been practically neglected. Health experts warn of a surge in more endemic infectious disease, which are not being properly addressed because of Covid-19.
Placing the country’s deliverance from the pandemic solely on the vaccine’s availability is alarming and shortsighted. Health policy experts at Duke University in North Carolina estimate that the US could have around 300 million excess Covid-19 shots by end-july of this year, but it is unlikely that it would share its excess stock in the near-term, despite calls for it to apportion doses more widely to address the stark inequality around global vaccine distribution.
CNN reported that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said the US won’t share shots more broadly until the country is more confident in its own supplies: “The US is the biggest financial donor to the global vaccine-sharing scheme COVAX, but the country has been tight-fisted with the actual vaccines it has in huge supply, while many others have none at all. Three-quarters of the world’s vaccines actually administered have been in just 10 nations, which together account for under half the world’s population.”
According to Duke University health experts Dr. Krishna Udayakumar and Dr. Mark Mcclellan, “The world ’s wealthiest nations have locked up much of the near-term supply. At the current rate vaccines are being administered, 92 of the world’s poorest countries won’t vaccinate 60 percent of their populations until 2023 or later.”
India makes more than 60 percent of all vaccines sold globally, having the Serum Institute of India (SII) which is the world’s largest vaccine maker. Because of this, it has signed on as a major player in COVAX, the global vaccine-sharing agency that feeds discounted or free vaccine doses for lowerincome countries. Amid a devastating second wave of infections there, with 261,500 new cases registered last Sunday, India has now decided that, rather than supply vaccines to COVAX, it would prioritize the health of its own citizens.
With an estimated 7.8 billion population as of 2020, the world now has only the European Union (1.3 billion doses committed COVAX for 92 lowand middle-income countries); the United Kingdom (1 billion doses to 92 developing countries); China (10 million doses), and Russia (no figures, but will be a small part of COVAX) to depend on for vaccine supply. But the vaccine rollout has been grinding slowly due to some adverse effect issues.
For one, a small number of the nearly 7 million people who have gotten the Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen Covid-19 vaccine in the US has reported suffering from a rare and severe blood clotting reaction to it. These reactions happened six to 13 days after vaccination. As a result, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have recommended a pause in distributing the Janssen vaccine. Occurrence of these blood clots haven’t been reported among those who received the Pfizer-biontech or Moderna Covid-19 vaccines. On Saturday, Manila time, the CDC is expected to make an announcement on J&J’S jabs. It is expected that its vaccine would be given the go-ahead with some restrictions on its applications.
Where does this leave us? I guess we are left with no choice but to rely on ourselves and each other to survive or ride out this pandemic. Currently, experts do not know exactly how long the virus can stay infectious (outside the laboratory) because different environmental conditions, such as humidity and temperature, or exposure to direct sunlight, can affect its viability outside the body. Scientists estimate, however, that the Covid-19 virus can survive on hard surfaces, or in the air, on the order of hours, but can be killed by wiping down surfaces with a bleach or alcohol-based disinfectant, trapped by helping to keep indoor air “clean” with filters and face coverings, or diluted from indoor air by improving ventilation.
We now know that the virus is helpless unless it gets inside our bodies through our eyes, noses and mouths. It is destroyed by soap and alcohol and is helpless if it doesn’t infect a host. This means that the minimum health protocols of frequent hand washing, wearing masks and face shields, social distancing and staying at home remain our first line of defense. While waiting for our vaccine shots, observing these minimum health protocols and staying at home are what can shield us from the microbe up until we get ourselves inoculated.
Perhaps the private sector should be given the leeway to institute its own health protocols. With the knowledge on the nature of how the virus is transmitted, these businesses are now equipped to adjust their operations to protect their employees from the virus and finally set the stage for the re-opening of commerce.