By Segun Gbadegesin

The COVID-19 pandemic has turned the world upside down in many respects. Ask grandparents unable to hug their grandchildren. Or parents who have to juggle between working virtually and attending to the study needs of children in virtual classrooms. Or the trauma of lost jobs and the heartache of shuttered businesses.

On top of all of these are the millions of folks worldwide who have suffered enormous disruptions to their lives as victims and family members, and the physicians who have gone beyond the call of duty to care for them. Furthermore, while we are not used to seeing governments and their agencies as victims, there’s no doubt that this virus caught many, if not all of them, by surprise. And while some strove hard to meet the challenge, others, including some of the rich and powerful, were caught pants down, with enormous consequences for the governed.

Though, we had prematurely thought of seeing the light at the end of the dark tunnel, the virus has demonstrated its ferocious capacity to do harm with its various mutants, the latest being the Delta variant. When, hopefully, all is over and done with, historians will have plenty to ponder about the global experience of the first part of the present decade. For now, however, we can indulge our curiosity regarding what we have encountered and are still experiencing in real time.

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I hope that we all agree that the fact that we are still dealing with the devastating effect of the virus eighteen months on, is because its degree of ferocity has not been robustly matched by either the intervention of governments or the sensible response of the public. But there is no single answer to the question why this is so. There are multiple answers, varying from the tragic consequence of politicization, arrogance of ignorance, misplaced assurance of faith, and the claims of freedom to be unreasonable.

For a once in a century plague of the magnitude that struck the world in early 2020, we cannot fairly blame any government for lack of adequate preparation. It caught everyone unawares. Whether the virus escaped from a lab in China as the Trump administration alleged is yet to be seen as investigation is still ongoing. If it turns out that it did, then, of course, China would bear enormous responsibility for the global distress it caused.

Meanwhile, however, we can assign blame for how governments responded subsequent to the virus’s emergence. Did they take it seriously? Did they see it as a ploy by their political opponents to do them in? Did they deploy all resources at their disposal to fight the virus nationally and globally? If not, why not?

That the former President of the United States, Mr. Donald Trump, downplayed the virus is no longer news. He admitted as much in his interview with veteran journalist Bob Woodward. He downplayed it because he didn’t want people to panic, he claimed. He referred to the virus as nothing more serious than the common flu. Yet, he confessed privately to Woodward that it was exponentially worse than the flu.

For the better part of the year, Trump engaged in this duplicitous approach for political reasons. He feared that a long lockdown would tank the economy in an election year and he would be blamed and punished by voters. His allies in Congress and his base supported him all the way. In the end he lost, not because the economy tanked, but because voters saw through the dishonesty of the approach.

To his credit, however, Trump didn’t object to investment in vaccine against the virus. Operation Warp Speed was at his behest, resulting in the historic success of three vaccines at a record time. This feat promised to return the country and the world to normalcy. But even though it was developed under a Republican president, Republicans are disproportionately averse to having a shot of the vaccine than Democrats with Red states won by Trump recording an average of 40% vaccination rate to Blue states’ 93% vaccination rate.

Without the desired herd immunity that requires 80% vaccination rate nationally, the country has been overrun by the Delta variant and it is not letting up even as political leaders are letting down. From Florida to Texas, Executive Orders have been signed banning mask and vaccination mandates. They argue for personal choice over government mandates.

Personal choice is certainly preferable to government mandates. This preference is however predicated on people having the requisite information and adequate knowledge for informed decisions about their health. We know, however, that a vast majority of COVID deniers and vaccine resisters are fed with lethal doses of conspiracy theories which have been devastating to their welfare. They are told that COVID is a liberal hoax, that vaccines cause infertility or autism, or that they can change a person’s DNA. It is however one thing to be fooled, it is another thing to fool oneself.

Not a few had fooled themselves in believing such misinformation because they were too arrogant to seek information before it was too late for them. And Republican leaders in Congress have wasted precious time before they now embarked on corrective vaccine campaign when they saw that their constituencies are dying unnecessarily. The arrogance of ignorance is a terrible life changing disease. That the richest and most powerful country in the world can have such a disproportionate number of ignorant folks who are egged on by media pundits who know a lot better is mind boggling.

The misplaced assurance of faith is even more disturbing since the beginner and finisher of, for example, the Christian Faith himself had set the example of not tempting God when he sent Satan packing. Yet some pastors play God. One in Tennessee even threatened to throw out any of his congregants wearing mask in the sanctuary just as he objected to vaccines as a liberal scam. This is a state where the virus has become so deadly that even Republican leaders are urging vaccination, and he had lost some of his members to the virus. What else could go wrong!

In our own corner of the world, there is a combination of ignorance and misplaced assurance of faith. While we thankfully have a government that has placed its trust in science, and a media which takes seriously its responsibility to inform, there is a sizable amount of misinformation coming from the realm of faith.

Not all Christian priests or Muslim clerics distrust science. But quite a fair number of evangelicals boldly but falsely assured their congregants of the potency of their touch to heal the disease. Now that Delta has penetrated the land, and all precautions appeared to have been thrown to the wind, and we don’t have access to vaccines that the rich nations control, what is our expectation?

Finally, there is quite a bunch who don’t profess any faith in God but are quite assertive and proud of their freedom, even it is freedom to be unreasonable. Surely, liberals place a high premium on individual freedom. But it is freedom with a high sense of responsibility. Thus, no one has a right to falsely shout fire in a crowded movie theater. And no one has the freedom to cause harm to others. But this is what we should expect from freedom claimants who refuse masking or vaccination and go about infecting others with deadly virus.

Back to our clime where we don’t have the luxury of available vaccines. What should be our attitude to the escalating incidence of the virus? The elders advise the motherless to avoid back injury. That is because without a mother, they don’t have the certainty of nursing a back wound. That is our situation. With no adequate hospital facilities, with a dearth of medical professionals, and knowing well that rich nations would rather keep their surplus vaccines for their reluctant citizens, shouldn’t we wisely embrace preventive measures? Why do we go about as if there is no fire on our roof? Why tempt God? Why allow the hateful prediction of bodies on African streets to become self-fulfilling? It’s hard to comprehend!