For the first few weeks of this pandemic, we were mostly just waiting for life to get back to "normal". To be able to drive, to go further than a couple of miles from home, to hug neighbors and greet friends, to look forward to reunions and vacations and milestones. The pandemic pandemonium would, we thought, be a little blip on the ever-upward-trajectory of growth, and a shared milestone of some suffering that we could reminisce about for decades to come as we lived our old lives again. It is now slowly dawning on us that there is no way back, only a way through, and we need to choose what the new normal will look like. And that for much of the world, the old-normal was not always appealing.
In terms of the origin of the pandemic, do we want a world where intensive mass-scale animal agriculture leads to the kind of crowding and stress where pigs and poultry become the source of disease? Or where smaller farmers keep getting pushed to the periphery, where interaction with wildlife and the cross-over of pathogens becomes more and more likely? The evidence is mounting that COVID-19, like more virulent strains of Flu, or Ebola or AIDS or other diseases, are not random events. Their emergence can be directly tied to the choices we make about food, about consumption, about land. When those choices harm the majority-world poor but enrich the powerful, there is little public will to change them . . . but now that everyone is suddenly vulnerable, perhaps it is a good time to, in one of our favourite movie phrases, "re-evaluate our decision-making paradigm".
In terms of the response, do we want to keep having a world where healthcare is a commodity that goes to the highest bidder? Where decisions about health rest in the hands of for-profit corporations? Has this pandemic led us to question the wisdom of assuming that our final metric is growth, consumption, spending, wealth? It has been interesting to see the world grapple with this, and there are no easy answers. Poverty kills. The coronavirus kills. Isolation measures have increased poverty and prevented coronavirus death. Which has been more significant? The jury is still out. Who should measure, who should decide? Has unbridled embrace of decentralisation and continuous mistrust of government been helpful? Or does this pandemic point out the need for coordinated action on behalf of the common good?
In terms of the impact, we are already seeing the way underlying disparities affect outcomes. On an individual level, people of colour in the USA have had disproportionate mortality. On an international level, now Africa is projected to have as many as 300,000 deaths (we have usually 400,000 per year from malaria, so we still can't forget the big killers). 60% of urban dwellers live in unplanned settlements with poor access to clean water, and zero ability to isolate themselves. Rural populations represent the majority on the continent, and cannot work or study online without electricity and internet connections. Much press has gone to the number of ventilators or lack thereof, with the USA bemoaning only 1 for ever thousand or two thousand people . . . when Africa has one for every 200 thousand to 20 million people. Since up to 80% of the people put on ventilators even in high-resource places die, maybe we should focus on the basics. What if this shake-up allowed us to commit to clean water? To a strong public hospital system with good malaria care, with oxygen plants, with basic antibiotics, with safe deliveries?
Favuorites in one bowl, all local plant-based: g-nut sauce, gonja, beans, sombe, and rice.
In terms of the propagation, is there any limit to the benefits of the transportation of humans from place to place? As a human whose life involves roots on two continents, that is a difficult question. But people like us brought this virus to almost every country in the world, in a very short time. Sitting in Africa, I can hardly blame people for questioning the justice of the very places that pillaged this continent's resources now turning their backs to us in a time of pandemic brought to us by them. And by them, I mean, me. Workers like us who decimated the Americas and Africa with smallpox. We didn't think it would happen again, but here it goes.In terms of the response, do we want to keep having a world where healthcare is a commodity that goes to the highest bidder? Where decisions about health rest in the hands of for-profit corporations? Has this pandemic led us to question the wisdom of assuming that our final metric is growth, consumption, spending, wealth? It has been interesting to see the world grapple with this, and there are no easy answers. Poverty kills. The coronavirus kills. Isolation measures have increased poverty and prevented coronavirus death. Which has been more significant? The jury is still out. Who should measure, who should decide? Has unbridled embrace of decentralisation and continuous mistrust of government been helpful? Or does this pandemic point out the need for coordinated action on behalf of the common good?
In terms of the impact, we are already seeing the way underlying disparities affect outcomes. On an individual level, people of colour in the USA have had disproportionate mortality. On an international level, now Africa is projected to have as many as 300,000 deaths (we have usually 400,000 per year from malaria, so we still can't forget the big killers). 60% of urban dwellers live in unplanned settlements with poor access to clean water, and zero ability to isolate themselves. Rural populations represent the majority on the continent, and cannot work or study online without electricity and internet connections. Much press has gone to the number of ventilators or lack thereof, with the USA bemoaning only 1 for ever thousand or two thousand people . . . when Africa has one for every 200 thousand to 20 million people. Since up to 80% of the people put on ventilators even in high-resource places die, maybe we should focus on the basics. What if this shake-up allowed us to commit to clean water? To a strong public hospital system with good malaria care, with oxygen plants, with basic antibiotics, with safe deliveries?
why we need the basics--a totally fine recovery from malaria with deathly-levels of anemia
And so as we pass the month-mark soon of COVID-19 in Uganda, that is what we are doing. Plugging along at justice. Encouraging our political leaders, speaking with our public health system, supporting our excellent medical superintendent. Augmenting oxygen. Doing one more ultrasound, one more C-section, one more infant resuscitation. Working our way through annual review meetings with our teams. Planning. Listening. Because the world needs faithful hard work, tenacity and grit in the face of suffering, people just doing their job over and over with kindness. That is how the Kingdom comes. And that's the new normal we hope to see.
Two people with tenacity and grit, our friends at market.
And two more who once went to school with our kids and now are worried about their survival in the dangers of America--love to see the global leveling this time brings
Trying to improve care for infants, don't let that one fancy incubator fool you, we have a LONG way to go
The most vulnerable, a malnourished toddler and her mentally-challenged pregnant mom
Linsdey prayed Thursday for relief from the heat, and we got quite a rainstorm that night. It probably dropped from 90 to 75 degrees on Friday morning, prompting this winter outfit.
As I was leaving Friday I found an escapee
Confirming a healthy pregnancy in a young lady
Just walking into the next needful thing
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