PROBLEMS GIVE LESSONS. A COVID-19 PERSPECTIVE
The world has stand still, east, west, north and south. From one man to one country to a continent and to the whole universe. The whole world is in a state of comma, awaiting to be pronounced dead or alive, from businesses to education and normal lifestyle.
The global COVID-19 pandemic has brought forth numerous lessons for the human mind to contemplate, as man has been heedless and reluctant on various issues. It’s evident a single problem can bear detrimental consequences accompanied with significant lessons. With COVID-19 outbreak lessons on family interaction, global unity, poverty alleviation, freedom of movement, freedom of choice, hygiene and sanitation as well as power and authority can be derived.
Some families got a chance to see one or both of their parents for probably a whole day due to lockdowns in some countries, other countries have learnt the essence of having one voice and being one as the whole world is battling the pandemic, the poor and neglected members of the society have been seen and even assisted with Aid and donations, people have learnt that it’s almost next to impossible being denied movement from one place to another bearing in mind one is fit and in dire need to move, choice on whether to wear mask or not, sanitizing your hands or not and lastly people in power or authority might have control in many things but not everything as it has been widely seen globally. All these are important lessons we’re learning and still more are coming from a single problem.
As I travelled to Kilifi County, where I observed my 21 days lock down I got an exclusive chance to interact with the youth, women and elderly and happened to learn various lessons; from young children consuming locusts as one of their daily meals bearing in mind the recently ended activity on mass locust spraying who eventually migrate, open defecation by both young and elderly with countable numbers of latrines in villages, lack of awareness on symptoms of the virus with anyone coughing publicly risking mob clobbering, community disapproval of wearing of masks and avoiding public gatherings which is termed as ‘infringement of freedom of choice’. But the question is were these problems in existent before outbreak of COVID-19? Yes, they were existent but many barriers to tackling the above issues are being seen now as attention of the whole world has been shifted to communities with regards to the pandemic.
It’s an important lesson for one to learn from the pandemic that what goes up will definitely come down. Everyone had freedom of choice, movement etc. But now almost every place has been restricted on movement and at some point even choices we make.
Sadly low public health interventions has attributed to high cases of morbidity, arrogance and sometimes ignorance on important health measures and practices. Public health intervention measures are key and will always remain core pillars in combating any human life threatening situations, from advocacy and awareness campaigns to policy implementation. Therefore public health isn’t restricted to learned professionals on medical field only, rather a bigger role is to be played by me and you to ensure a healthy public environment.
Name: Abubakar Abdallah Kheir
University: Kenyatta University
Country: Kenya