The coronavirus pandemic is destroying citizens of the world. No doubt, Ghanaians should be deeply concerned at the threat and consequences of the pandemic to the lives of people, especially to the people of this country, if we allow it to get out of hand. The worldwide coronavirus shutdowns over the past two weeks have grounded certain countries of the world to a halt. We have probably never before in our history seen so much economic activity in the world vaporize so quickly — within days or even hours.
Clearly, Ghana, our beloved country, is not prepared for this pandemic. Of course, no country is really prepared for this — even countries with very developed healthcare systems are crying out for help. The problem is we are still not prepared and equipped to meet the threat this dangerous virus poses for the lives of all citizens. We are deeply in trouble, especially, taken into consideration equipment shortages; lack of basic needs like surgical masks, medical gowns, rubber gloves, respirators, ventilators, scarce hospital beds and poorly motivated doctors and nurses.
This country is finding that it has limited means to protect itself when the feared virus escalates. Now, known victims so far confirmed has gone over the fifty mark and one death. Meanwhile, testing remains patchy. Years of underfunding, neglect, corruption and lip service have debilitated the health system and made us all very vulnerable to this pandemic.
While the number of afflicted persons keep on rising, we still do not know about how the coronavirus is going to affect our lives in the months to come. For example how do the vast majority people in the rural areas get to a doctor is one small question our authorities have not been able to answer very well, many days into the pandemic.
Unfortunately, it seems the majority of the citizens have decided to be fatalistic on the issue of what we ought to do to protect ourselves. To them ‘all die be die’ and life goes on as usual. Thankfully, a tiny minority have absorbed the fact that it is critically proper that the right thing is done to protect ourselves. The painful fact, however, is while we are preparing for the worst, the means at our disposal, presently, would not enable the system to be behind every Ghanaian. Decades of economic misrule and corruption have exposed the weaknesses in our health service and is exposing all of us to a gruesome and painful death.
This is a deceptively tricky time. The questions we ask start small, but then expands. The first-order question around this virus is obvious: How do individuals keep from getting it? If they get it, how do they keep from spreading it to someone? How do we deal with the fear that is building up and the tons of fake news around us?
“Wash your hands”, and ‘observe social distancing’ seem now to be the agreed upon solutions. We are still grappling with the idea that people should “stay at home.” However, although while limiting human-to-human interactions may be the only way to control the spread of the coronavirus, some people and some public health experts say social distancing may be a very difficult option for the hundreds of thousands of workers in Ghana’s informal sector. Tactics being employed in other countries are just not possible in Ghana, they insist.
The first priority should obviously be equipping the hospital system and protecting front-line medical workers. We need to create a system of population-wide testing and the distribution of protective gear to workers interacting with the public to protect against the spread, while allowing for ordinary work. Sadly, there is a catch. This plan would depend on the availability of resources, but that is surely, what this nation lacks.
Indeed, for whatever course of action our leaders choose, there are serious social implications and economic cost for each of us and for our country. Workers in the informal sector really need their daily wages to sustain their families and to afford food and drugs. It is extremely difficult for them to adopt the social distancing approach because they live in compound houses; they work in crowded markets and travel by public transport. The situation is indeed dreadful. There are no easy decisions.
Trying to fight and stop the spread of the virus now, will cause serious social and economic problems for the majority of our people who work in the informal sector. This we know. However, that does not mean we should fold our arms and refuse to take necessary and effective policy decisions and actions to save our lives from the pandemic. We have been told that the price of failing to slow the spread of the virus will be a health care system so overwhelmed that mortality rate will shoot up to perhaps unimaginable levels. We should take the warnings seriously.
Especially, the advice from the Ghana Medical Association and the Trade Union Congress should be taken seriously. The answer to our current situation requires highlighting the menace of COVID-19, and stop going about business as usual and hoping for the best. To protect our way of life, we need to adopt a targeted approach that limits the spread of the virus but still lets some people and essential service providers go back to work and resume their daily activities. We need not spread fear and panic. That is why some suggest a partial lockdown and not a total lockdown as suggested by some people.
The advantage of a partial lockdown is that it would make our attempt to fight the pandemic look urgent, inexpensive, prep people to take personal responsibilities for their actions and prepare us for when the need for mass lockdown arises. Also, if as the evidence suggests, the virus is enormously dangerous to people with certain medical conditions and those over 70 years old, but a much smaller danger to those under 70, then shutting down the entire country now is probably a bad idea.
The immediate imperative is to clear all the streets and pavements and restrict vendors and people from selling in the open. Our markets in the cities should be made to set-up shop two days in a week for foodstuffs and once a week for non-essential commodities. This is the practice in most of our rural markets and it can be replicated in our cities easily. Meanwhile, our supermarkets could open but with strict adherence to simple hygiene and social distancing.
We are aware of the difficulties a partial lockdown will cause on self-employed people, and the stress families would go through but it is important to note that COVID 19, when it escalates would impose a bigger cost than we can imagine. When that happens, no one would be safe.
Whatever decision we take would exact an enormous price, in the lives of all citizens. No matter how painful partial lockdowns would be, this is the time to take that decision than to wait and take draconian actions later with our current weak health-care system already in deep crisis. It would be foolish to give-up on the idea of partial lockdown before it has the chance to succeed or fail. We must discuss this without the normal emotional outburst and politicisation.
Should we allow individuals and all the citizens to go through pain, and disturb the economy to save our beloved Ghana from the rampaging coronavirus? The answer is yes. Sometimes doing the right thing is painful. Now is the time “to destroy the village (partially) in order to save it”.
From Kwadwo Afari
The post COVID 19: Let the lockdown begin, partially appeared first on The Chronicle Online.
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