Remain virus-alert, there’s still danger out there

Health experts have welcomed the slight reduction in restrictions of the national lockdown, while also warning that the threat has not completely passed and people must remain cautious and abide by the loosened regulations.

The biggest consideration in easing the lockdown regulations from the hard lockdown, level five, to level four, was the growing need for food, something many public health officials have been grappling with, as access to food was one of social determinants of health.

“The increase in need for food security that we were seeing on the ground as the situation evolved was just as concerning as the health concerns,” Dr Atiya Mosam, a public health medicine specialist, said.

Plagued by unemployment, poverty and inequality, several experts have said the hard lockdown had simply become untenable, as civil coalitions claimed the pandemic exposed the country’s brutal economic weaknesses.

Mosam said the phased approach to the lockdown, which will be effective from May 1, was a sensible approach to balance health with societal impacts.

Such an approach also gave people a sense that things could definitely get better and in some ways, they already are, due to the measures in place.

“As health workers, we are grateful for the time that the lockdown has afforded us to ready the health system for this disease, especially with the concern that the onset of winter would complicate our response.”

Mosam cautioned that with more leeway, people may not adhere as stringently to the eased lockdown regulations, warning “we are not out of the woods yet”.

This meant public participation was essential to protecting everyone.

Announcing the move from level five lockdown to level four, President Cyril Ramaphosa admitted that the lockdown could not be sustained indefinitely as people needed to eat and earn a living.

Businesses permitted to resume operations will be required to do so in a phased manner, first preparing the workplace for a return to operations, followed by the return of no more than one-third of the workforce.

Though Cabinet ministers were yet to expand on the details of the eased lockdown, research has shown that the public’s higher levels of positive expectation was crushed by the level four restrictions.

People had high expectations, according to a Happiness Index study conducted by the University of Johannesburg’s Professor Talita Greyling and Auckland University of Technology’s Dr Stephanie Rossouw.

As the nation awaited Ramaphosa’s announcement to ease or remove restrictions, the hourly happiness scores soared to levels above the norm, revealing the positive expectations, from 5pm. But the higher levels of positive sentiment were crushed by the announcements of the level four restrictions, which was not the “good news” which was expected.

“We saw hourly happiness scores dropping to below the norm, during and after the president’s speech,” the study said.

Considering the analysis of the emotions of South Africans, it was interesting that joy decreased significantly from 17% to only 11%, and distrust (despair) or trust showed an unprecedented increase from 19% to 39%, the study found.

According to the C19 People’s Coalition, a group of over 250 civil society organisations, Covid-19 exposed brutally that SA’s economic system could not work.

“This crisis will not end with the easing or end of lockdown provisions. Structural changes are needed … we reject an approach by government that aims to simply return us to business as usual – a crisis of unemployment, poverty and inequality,” it said.

– siphom@citizen.co.za

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