2020: Pandemic slows life, changes discourse

Despite optimism on vaccines. the new year is likely to be more of the same.

Every end-of-the-year stock-taking I have read so far threw up the same conclusion: We are bidding adieu to a year that was the most unusual and one-of-its-kind in history and its legacy will live on for many years to come. The havoc wreaked by the coronavirus pandemic has upended our lives in a big way and altered our ways of thinking.

The much-neglected discipline of epidemiology has become a trending science. Mask-wearing, sanitisers and social distancing have become the key concepts of the virus discourse. Despite optimism abounding on account of vaccines, the new year is likely to be more of the same. Virus protocols will continue and easing up will be very gradual and cautious.

Just at this moment last year, we were on the cusp of a large outbreak, though we did not realise its severity. This year too, we are seeing the emergence of variants of the same virus with super capacity to spread and infect more. Are more lockdowns and closures on the way? Hopefully not, though which way it will pan out is difficult to say. At the moment the isolated UK is battling it out.

The UAE has experienced its fair share of pandemic woes. It has been able to rein in the virus after a few months of closures and sterilisation measures. Our office lives went online and we perfected the art of working from home which will remain a permanent legacy of the pandemic. Our learning curve has been swift.

Experiences of expatriates have been mixed. Most of them are safe and sound thanks to the strict measures put in place by the UAE. But some of them experienced distress after losing jobs and businesses due to prolonged closures. A few of them missed their loved ones as they were stuck in their country due to curbs on air travel at the height of the pandemic. Some of us could not say final goodbye to the near and dear ones who fell prey to Covid-19 and other diseases in our home country.

Social distance, a misleading term to denote a safe physical space between each other, has altered our lifestyle. It taught us the virtues of shunning hugs and handshakes. Sanitisers and masks are now part of any travel kit. Liquids of varying intensity are being used to cleanse our hands of contamination. Colourful pieces of cloth cover our mouth and nose to save us from the floating virus aerosols. These accoutrements will remain part of our livery for foreseeable future.

The pandemic-hit world continued to deal with long-term issues of climate change and space travel. Though emissions were temporarily reduced due to lower economic activity induced by the coronavirus, the greatest number of storms in Atlantic were a rude reminder of the changing climate dynamics. A record 30 named storms had developed in the Atlantic, some of them making a landfall in the US and Latin American coasts, causing big material and human losses.

Though man-made carbon emissions were down by 7 per cent, total emissions rose due to a ghastly wildfire season in the US and elsewhere. This year is slated to become hottest year on record. All those who believe in climate science are celebrating the exit of climate sceptic US President Donald Trump. Joe Biden, who was pocked in a highly polarised election, has promised to bring the US back to the Paris climate treaty, which should bolster efforts to save the earth from impending perdition.

Space exploration projects, though slowed down by the virus, continued affirming the determination of the man to discover new frontiers of the universe. Spaceships kept travelling to the International Space Station (ISS) with astronauts on board. The UAE has successfully launched its Mars probe Hope which is now on its way to the red planet. SpaceX, a private player in the US, began its trips to the ISS and is nursing big ambitions to reach the moon and Mars.

The US has shortlisted a group of 17 astronauts who will be part of its ambitious Artemis programme which plans to set up space labs on the moon, and launch missions from there to Mars and beyond. China has made great strides in the space sector this year and its probe brought back rocks from the moon successfully. If this automated process of mining extraterrestrial objects is perfected, man may never need to plunder Earth’s resources to meet his burgeoning needs. I was left wondering about the futility of these space dreams at a time when man was unable to defeat an invisible, microscopic virus which has been holding the world to ransom for a year.

On a personal level, we tended to connect more with our immediate family members due to the work-from-home policy. Netflix, Amazon Prime and many other streaming websites enriched our lives by creating unforgettable experiences at home. Hit shows such as Panchayat, Paatal Lok, A Suitable Boy, Breathe into the Shadows left an abiding impression. The Crown, the one I am seeing at the end of the year, is mind blowing. The characters are so vivid, so earthy and so real. This new mode of entertainment has come to stay in our lives.

To sum it up, virus has snatched one whole year from our lives with no assurance yet that the coming year is not hostage to it. Life will never be the same again even after we put a conclusive end to the pandemic.

— sreenivasa@khaleejtimes.com