A group of protesters dressed as aliens holding banners reading, among others, ‘we require transparency’, ‘Leave no one behind’ and ‘Back to serious’, demonstrate against conspiracy theorists at Mauerpark, amid the Covid-19 pandemic, in Berlin, on 30 May 2020. Picture: Odd Andersen/AFP
Yes, parents allow their children to run amok and there is reckless behaviour around the availability of alcohol, but it’s the conspiracy theorists that really irk me.
The ones who believe that millions of people have died because of a phantom disease, the ones who want us to believe that Covid-19 doesn’t exist.
They maintain the Presidency has been paid to broadcast “imaginary scores of deaths and impose lockdowns to hold the global population at ransom”.
Healthcare workers have worked tirelessly, put their lives on the line. The heroes of the pandemic – these men and women who have carried the nation, risking their lives because they took an oath – have also been affected by the pronouncements of death.
They tried to reassure the most vulnerable that they would make it, giving hope even when none really existed, ultimately serving as pseudo family in the final stages as isolation prevented biological families accessing their family members.
These same men and women have buried colleagues and friends.
They have perished after contracting a virus we have exposed them to because we cannot reason with ourselves that lives are at stake…
The elderly are at our mercy. They are at risk. They have gone to bed having said their prayers hoping for changed behaviour – their twilight years wrapped in ribbons of nothing but anxiety that having survived so much in their lives, the biggest threat to their lives might be something flu-like that would have been brought into their space by those who cannot behave.
Men of the cloth have had to remove from emotion as they work extra hours to keep up with the high number of deaths.
The presentation of pallbearers in personal protective equipment is a constant reminder of a different final goodbye.
And, so, to the conspiracy theorists who want to believe that the pain and grief experienced by many is nothing more than a depopulation exercise, I find you exhausting. Loss of life cannot be faked – death is irreversible.
Kekeletso Nakeli-Dhliwayo.
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