Another community case has surfaced in our country and the panic has started. Many are rushing out to get tested, queues at testing stations are inevitable. Healthline is inundated with calls and rogue checkpoints in Northland have the potential to rise again.
Media outlets are full of COVID stories, relating to everything from the number of negative tests, the likelihood of a lockdown and dissatisfaction from returning Kiwis about (usually) food in isolation.
If you are an active thinker, the above gives rise to a million questions; why are there queues? Are the requirements enough at the border? How did the latest case catch COVID? Surely, a year is enough for returning kiwis to come home…. Where and what are the protocols in Government for such outbreaks? elocal has contacted the Minister of Health to ask, but have not yet had a reply.
And so, it goes on, because essentially what all this means, in an environment that is ever changing, is that our world is changed irrevocably.
Despite valiant efforts to keep COVID from our shores, if we are to continue to keep our borders open, we will ultimately expose our population to the worldwide pandemic.
Running parallel to this latest crisis point are numerous nationwide issues that I think are far more important but getting no air. Our housing issues, local infrastructure, transport, families in poverty, our education statistics, all prevalent every day in our communities, championed by our community providers but yet seemingly ignored by our government.
As a country we are currently keeping COVID out, but as this latest case has shown, it is all so easy to get in. What happens then, because at the moment, we have all the issues we need and can’t deal with them.
Adding COVID to the list means we will snowball into a situation we can not control, because if we are unable to deal successfully with our issues in a safe COVID free environment, how will we be able to deal with them when added to the influence of a worldwide pandemic?
Overwhelmingly questions relating to our own domestic issues are far more important and therefore should be directed to those in our government repeatedly and with fervour, until we get answers.