Daniel Thwaites | More Italy and less Singapore?

We are all going to die! But you know that already. The present question is whether the Wuhan virus is going to help you along the way to meet your Lord and Maker. If you’re not aged or already infirm, chances are it won’t. So you can spend the time to keep reading.

When news that a novel coronavirus had erupted in China began to fly around the world, I was flying around the world too, actually heading eastward. Luckily it was to the Philippines and Vietnam, not China, but that was close enough. And by the time I was leaving there two weeks later, the Wuhan virus was the talk and obsession of everyone. Unfortunately, the likely potential of panic is itself panic-inducing. And people behave very oddly when panicked. I mean, what explains the worldwide run on toilet paper? As opposed to say, rum? Perhaps it’s all about priorities.

By the way, I was shocked, as always happens in Asia, at what we human beings can turn into food. Given my conservative palate, reflexes against animal butchery, and easily revolted stomach, hearing about and seeing the dogs, cats, rodents, snakes, toads, snails, grubs, bugs, worms, beetles, crickets, rotten eggs, and fermented meats that make it into people’s mouths over there is a dark fascination.

Surely, I think, what we eat must seem just as strange to them as their habits seem to us? When I think to the root of how cow-cod soup, mannish water, tripe and beans, corned “beef”, and sausages are all made, I’m less judgemental. But all in all, our staples are more predictable. Chicken, chicken, chicken. Goat. Pig (suitably blessed and addressed). Cow. Chicken, chicken, chicken.

Anyway, we were initially told that this virus began when what we would call a “ratbat” that was eaten, or more likely, infected a Pangolin. The Pangolin’s infection, by way of a Chinese market in Wuhan Province, made it’s way into the human body. The technical term for this is that the Wuhan-virus is “zoonotic”, meaning it jumped from the animals to us.

But as I have been trying to understand this threat it has become clearer that the real trouble isn’t just the virus itself, but the knock-on effects its spread will have.

It isn’t the regular flu. And the it’s not as if the “regular” flu isn’t deadly enough already. Think about it: each year one billion people get the winter flu, and between 290,000 and 650,000 of them die, depending on the severity.

This virus is wickeder. It kills a lot more people than the regular flu, although the people it tends to kill are older or already sick. It’s catchier than a Vybz Kartel hit. It may have a long gestation period before symptoms show, so carriers will “spread the wealth” far and wide. Furthermore, it’s new, so we’re not exactly sure how it’s spread and there’s no vaccination against it.

Italy instructive

The crisis in Italy is instructive. With almost 18,000 cases and over 1,000 deaths, doctors are facing conditions reminiscent of wartime and are making life-and-death decisions on the fly. In practice that means that the elderly and the immune-compromised who are most likely to die are left to die. The hospitals are overrun; the cities empty; the economy crashing. Too late, the country is in complete lockdown.

Here we’re a few weeks behind Italy. In terms of communication, Health Minister Tufton has been doing a sterling job. He’s out front and centre, explaining, cajoling, warning, and soothing as the event or occasion may require. That is no small achievement.

But that’s not to say the response has been all what it ought to have been. For instance, why is the Government scrambling to find people who were on the March 4th flight BA 2263? How is it that the state doesn’t have the flight manifest in hand? Or do they?

Why is it only today (March 13, 2020) that the information about “patient zero” attending Gloria Clarke’s funeral on Saturday March 7th is forthcoming? Other mourners who were likely exposed are being asked to self-report. The Gleaner reports that “Health Minister Dr Christopher Tufton was reluctant to release the details saying he never wanted to create panic.” Whuttt??? It’s worse panic when nobody knows and people are left to guess and speculate, isn’t it?

Most of all, we’ve had three months of warning that this thing was coming. A simple question then: are the wards prepared? Has the additional equipment that WILL become necessary been acquired? It was nice to hear about additional budgetary allocation in the upcoming year, but what was deployed since early December when this lethal certainty was first made public? January? February?

Latterly PM Holness has stepped in and his decisions have been decisive and sound. For example, proactive school closing is better than reactive closing for arresting contagion. There the right decision was taken and communicated. The next question, however, is whether the facilities for distance learning have been put in place? The technology is there, it’s readily available, relatively inexpensive, and so the schools should be ready. Anyone willing to guess if they are?

One can’t help but note how the authoritarian regimes out east are impressive in their ability to contain the disease. China really highlights the weaknesses and strengths of their kind of governmental system. They started out by suppressing news and information about the virus and punishing journalists who wanted to get that information out. Till today there are journalists who have simply disappeared. It was only after people, including medical staff, started dropping dead in un-hideable numbers, and the evidence of a runaway virus was unimpeachable, that the mandarins rounded up to face it.

But then the Chinese Government moved with amazing efficiency to throw up hospitals, cordon off and quarantine whole cities, and lock down the virus like capitalist swine in need of re-education.

Singapore has had amazing success as well. There the Government boasts of careful preparations being put in place and practised since the 2003 SARS outbreak. The LA Times reports that the Singaporean Government “upgraded medial equipment and infrastructure, built more isolation wards and created systems to map and trace the spread of infections.” They have sophisticated surveillance capacity, quarantine procedures with real punishments for breach, and special police investigators trained to question patients and their contacts to derive useful tracking information.

Needless to say we could take a page out of the Chinese and Singaporean books in terms of the response. Is that possible without replicating the distasteful authoritarian aspects of their governments? I hope so. And I hope we can do it while sticking to the chicken and cow-foot diet. But so far, even with some of the decent moves noted, we’re more Italy and less Singapore. In other words, hang on tight, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.

- Daniel Thwaites is an attorney-at-law. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com