Garth Rattray | Barefaced ignorance – Pt 1

My piece of June 29, 2020, ‘Please do better to fight COVID-19’, spoke to wide-spread lack of mask wearing, ineffective mask wearing, poor hand hygiene and poor physical distancing. I used to check the online Gleaner to see if and how bloggers responded to my articles.

However, although there were positive feedback posts and, sometimes, reasonable comments expressing opposing views, some individuals took the opportunity to post farcical ideation and pent-up venom – so I stopped checking.

My piece referred to an obstinate cashier who gets away with refusing to wear a mask, although she interacts with the public at close range and without any protective screen. A concerned medical colleague drew my attention to a post by a blogger relegating the COVID-19 pandemic to an insignificant threat and labelling anti-COVID-19 measures as “extreme” and “obsessive”.

The blogger promulgates that our response to the threat is disproportional to the presence of the virus in Jamaica. This ‘genius’ obviously knows a lot more than all our very hard-working Ministry of Health and Wellness team and concludes that “… the low incidence of COVID-19 in Jamaica has very little to do with the containment measures”.

I am deeply concerned that many Jamaicans are badly underestimating this pandemic. We are doing well at controlling the spread of this horrible disease only because our Government has been extremely thoughtful and methodical in balancing our need for safety and our need for economic survival. If the authorities did not act with deft alacrity, we would be in the throes of an all-out, killer disease, our health system and economy would be in absolute ruin. Just look at what is happening to our First-World neighbour to the north. Our Government deserves very high praises for what it has been doing.

UNINFORMED OPINION

So, it grieves me deeply to see rampant carelessness in the streets and irresponsible, ignorant, foolish and dangerous posts claiming that we have nothing to worry about and that the threat is overstated. I am at a total loss to understand why anyone in his/her right mind would post such an uninformed and imbecilic opinion. Even if a cave-dwelling dummy held such a view, what harm can it do to be careful – just in case? Isn’t it better to err on the side of caution?

It’s devastating to see that unthinking individuals may turn the tide against our entire country. If (some authorities say “when”) community spread of the SARS-CoV2 virus begins, there may be unspeakable suffering and havoc. Because so many citizens cannot be trusted to follow the guidelines for minimising the spread of COVID-19, we must be much more proactive in this pandemic; recruit volunteer citizens as ‘wardens’ and dispatch inspectors everywhere.

You cannot try to buckle your seat belt in the middle of a major crash; by then it will be too late. Although nobody wants to crash, everybody must wear a seat belt in the event that one does occur. We must practice forethought and not afterthought.

I have a good family friend living in New York. She has a very high BMI, is elderly, sedentary, severely hypertensive, an insulin-dependent diabetic, has end-stage kidney failure, received a kidney transplant and is currently on immune-suppressing medication to avoid rejection of her transplanted kidney. Routine screening for a minor operation revealed that she was infected with the COVID-19 virus. She has no history of contact and is totally asymptomatic.

It would be natural for anyone to assume that if someone like her caught COVID-19, she would become very ill and likely succumb. But she remains asymptomatic and can spread it to many people, who could become ill and die! COVID-19 is easily transmitted, sneaky and dangerous – that is why we must all be very careful. (Next week, Part 2)

Garth A. Rattray is a medical doctor with a family practice. Email feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and garthrattray@gmail.com.