COVID-19’s Resurgence and Why It May Be Worse This Time

The past few days have seen the world descend into fear and chaos as multiple countries have started reporting a sudden uptick in the number of COVID-19 cases, that too, all of different variants. Countries all around the world, from England and Scotland to Singapore and Australia, have noted a sudden increase in COVID-19 cases of new variants, and a subsequent increase in the number of deaths related to the virus.

The danger that a pandemic caused by the virus is well documented, both in statistics and in people’s minds. The sights of streets littered with lifeless bodies claimed by the virus, the days of relentless work that healthcare workers had to commit to at the risk of their own lives, even the minor inconveniences that the entire world suffered through for two years, from online schooling to being unable to escape the confines of their own houses - everyone remembers it vividly. That’s part of the problem; no one wants to go back to it, and so instead of taking preventive measures, everyone tries to ignore the fact that COVID-19 might pose a similar threat again to live a comfortable life for a bit longer. Governments try to avoid international lockdowns to try preserve economic stability while people pray that their worst fears - a repeat of the pandemic - will not be realised.

This fear of slipping back into the 2020/2021 pandemic method of life that grips almost everyone alive could well be why another potential pandemic may wreak more havoc than the first one. People’s reluctance to take preventive measures against the virus, the same way they did in early 2020, coupled with their unwillingness to be limited by more lockdowns may leave the virus to affect people’s lives in a manner as bad as, if not even even worse than it has in the past.

As long as people are unable and unwilling to accept the fact that COVID-19 could pose a very real threat to society all over again and are governed by fear, a potential second COVID-19 pandemic can easily hit the world a lot harder than it ever has, at least in terms of the functioning of a regular society. By: Rian Deviah