Dehai News

The Right Way and the Wrong Way to Control COVID19

There are only a couple of countries in the world that have completely
prevented COVID19 from infecting their people and I live in one of
them, thank god.

We don't wear masks and our hospitals function normally. We are not
afraid to meet anyone, to go anywhere and any cough we develop is no
cause for alarm.

When COVID19 first began to sweep the planet back in March, 2020 our
leaders closed our borders and shut down the airlines arriving here.
All passengers and land arrivals after March 20 went directly to a 14
day quarantine, isolation. All those who arrived in the days before
the lockdown were taken to quarantine and tested as well as those in
their immediate family and friends they had been in contact with.

Only one domestic transmission has taken place, that being in early
April, a husband returning from the border who infected his wife. Over
four hundred have tested positive while in quarantine but no one
inside the country ever tested positive since, and over 40,000 tests
have been done.

As a second wave of COVID19 begins to sweep through those countries
that opened their bars, restaurants and cafes we remain under a
modified lockdown. All hotels, bars, restaurants, cafes and pastry
shops remain closed but pretty much all else are open.

Vehicle traffic is almost shut down, with no public transport or
taxi’s and no non-permitted private vehicles are allowed. Even
permitted vehicles must be off the streets by 8pm.

For some this has been a real hardship and hunger has shown its face
here. The number of people begging on the streets has become apparent.
Life is hard under lockdown, make no mistake. We all hope that more
aid for the hungry is made available by our government.

Many millions of dollars have been donated by our fellow countrymen
and women outside our country to help purchase state of the art
testing equipment that is now available everywhere.

No one here is afraid for COVID19 was contained at our borders even
though over 20,000 or our people have returned home. We maybe riding
our bicycles, if we are lucky, walking if not, but nobody seems to
really mind. The air is certainly cleaner and our neighborhoods are
quieter thanks to our cars being parked in our driveways for the past
7 months.

The president of our country said it best early on in this pandemic.
“We don't know where this came from and we don't know where it is
going…”, so all we can do is hunker down and wait it out. Those
countries, especially the rich, western ones, couldn’t seem to do
this, their people just don't seem to know how to bite the bullet for
whatever time it takes and now they are getting hammered worse than
before. Thank god we have a government here that cares for its
people’s wellbeing first and foremost, and to hell with the economic
consequences.

What comes first, the almighty dollar (or euro?) or the health of your people?

Personally, I think how so many societies have begun to crack, if not
break, yet, under COVID19, foretells calamities to come when climate
disaster begins to seriously affect the planet. If governments and
social systems based on private accumulation over the peoples needs
predominate, as seen by the reaction to COVID19, major environmental
disasters will turn into calamities, for how can leaders confined by
an ideology of greed and avarice do what is really best for their
people rather than the super wealthy?

p.s. You may wonder what the two countries I mentioned are that have
had no COVID19 domestic transmissions? Good luck finding out from the
MSM. Maybe this will help.

Thomas C. Mountain is an historian and educator who has been living
and reporting from Eritrea since 2006. Reach him at thomascmountain at
g mail dot com.