IT’S good to be careful in the face of the coronavirus epidemic. Thus one should avoid crowds as it appears the virus spreads by air or by contact. Wearing a face mask in such crowds or gatherings would help. The Department of Health also advises thorough washing of hands.
Every day, the media report new cases discovered along with new deaths in the country of origin, China, especially in the city of Wuhan in Hubei province, as well as in some other countries. It is good to be informed of continuing developments around the world but we must take care lest we panic into taking extreme measures out of inordinate fear of falling victim to the disease.
As of Tuesday, 426 deaths and 17,205 cases had been reported in China. There was one death in the Philippines, a Chinese visitor from Wuhan where the coronavirus began. At least 171 cases have been reported in over 20 countries and these are now all under close watch and treatment.
It must be pointed out, however, that we have had far worse epidemics in the recent past. In 1976, we had the ebola epidemic which began in Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Africa, which killed 16,300 out of 29,000 cases from 1976 to 2018.
SARS – Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome – first appeared in southern China in 2002; it ultimately killed 774 out of 8,098 cases in 17 countries.
MERS – Middle East Respiratory Syndrome – killed 858 of 2,694 cases in 2012, mostly in Saudi Arabia.
The avian flu of 2013 – H7N9 – killed 36 of 131 cases in eastern China.
But the biggest death toll in a viral epidemic was set by the novel influenza virus H1N1 which began in the United States in 2009. It ultimately killed 284,500 out of 1,432,258 cases worldwide.
The coronavirus had already killed 426 people, mostly in China, as of Tuesday and many more are likely to succumb to the new disease in the coming days. But the world’s scientists, especially in China, are hard at work in developing a vaccine. They did this in the previous viral epidemics and they are bound to do it again. The world just has to live with all these viruses now living quietly in various animals like snakes, monkeys, bats, and birds, then unexpectedly mutate to a form affecting human life.
The Philippines has taken protective measures against the coronavirus, including restrictions on the entry of foreign visitors and on travel for our own citizens. As for the masses of Filipinos who have no plans to travel, the need is to stay calm.
We just need to follow the Department of Health’s basic instructions and accept President Duterte’s assurance that there is no need to be scared or get hysterical. We have been through this before and we will emerge from this one sooner than we think.
