The Race to Flatten the Covid-19 Curve Might not be Addressing the Real Issue.

We need to address more than simply flattening the curve for the sake of posterity. Photo Courtesy of openDemocracy

Covid-19 came and virtually everything changed. How we interact with other people changed. How society appreciated the value of human and interpersonal associations changed. Our working could not sustain the impact the pandemic brought along. The education systems, travelings, in fact everything about human life became disrupted.

As soon as the pandemic knocked on our doors, the impulsive reaction we gave it was to start fighting it from every corner. In the event that we succeeded in combating it, we became the benchmark for other equally affected countries.

The source of the virus remains mysterious even today more than eight months since it was first discovered. The origin is well known to be Wuhan China, but the real source is unknown. There are so many speculations that the real source would have been a bat.

It is further speculated that the virus was then transferred into a snake or some other animal which then found its way into human diet. The dilapidated market standards and open defiance by the Chinese people to trade some of these meats openly without observing the right hygiene requirements has been the closest people have tried to understand the origins of this virus.

This made the Chinese government as well as other countries to follow suit with the banning of open markets and trading of un-inspected meats. It seems that the pandemic became an eye opener to what we ought to have done long before even Covid-19 came.

Now that we and everybody else is fighting the virus to the best of their efforts while other countries are in the race to find the first Covid-19 vaccine, we seem to have slowed down the effort to trace the source of the virus.

The advantage of tracing the exact source and probably doing more virology and DNA studies will help even the drug researchers to work with a forward thinking mind in that they will understand the transmission chain from the source up to how it found its way into human beings. Probably we can then know how to cut the transmission should it happen in future.

Another advantage could be that we will have prior and enough information about the virus such that in case the virus mutates, then we will be steps ahead of it on how to fight it in the best way possible. Such studies will open a whole world of possibilities in regards to virology studies.

Infusing technology, it thus means we can have rough predictive models of virus outbreaks as well as the sequencing now that we at least have some data in regards to virus outbreaks from centuries ago. With documented information, we can follow the path taken over the years which can help us be on standby for future eventualities.

I am not saying that this has not been done before, no. I am only saying that we need to double our efforts and become more aptitude as we put all our concerted efforts towards ensuring that human survival is put at the helm of everything.

And when we talk about human survival and the outbreak of viruses, one thing has been recurring consistently. A majority of these viruses are resulting or related to food or meat so to say. Think of the swine flu, the bird flu, covid-19 et cetera. Most of these viruses, you will realize, are as well related to food and human sanitation.

So as we address the whole issue of viruses, we need to be addressing the whole issue of human sanitation as well as proper diet for all people. And probably that is where the poignant issue relating to viral outbreaks starts.

The world population is growing, slums and poverty levels are as well on the rise. This means that the rate at which these things are happening, is the same rate we need to be investing towards finding sustainable food options and sanitation to ensure we minimize such future outbreaks.

As much research is being invested into the viral outbreak studies, we need to double our efforts too in the study towards finding better and sustainable ways of food production. We need then to invest an equivalent amount of efforts towards sanitation. Human and animal waste disposal will become a huge challenge as the populations’ increases.

And suppose we could have figured out how to feed all people well, in terms of diet and healthy food, then we need to prepare on how to handle the resulting waste. There is always a direct relationship between food and the toilet. It thus means an equivalent investment in food in proportion to waste handling.

We have done tremendously well, yet still we have much more in store to do. Our leaders should work even harder to address the real issues. The private sector should also play their role in relevant investment areas to beef up government efforts.

And as the populace, we should also support those efforts and do our part in reducing wastage resulting from food. Post eating well and healthy, we should then focus on how to do proper waste handling and disposal on our part.

End.