The COVID-19 Wave III and the lessons we should have learned

This article was exclusively written for The European Sting by Ms. Moushami Priyadarshini, a Final Year MBBS student from MKCG Medical College and Hospital, Berhampur, of state Odisha, India. She is affiliated with the International Federation of Medical Students Associations (IFMSA), cordial partner of The Sting. The opinions expressed in this piece belong strictly to the writers and do not necessarily reflect IFMSA’s view on the topic, nor The European Sting’s one.

One thing the COVID-19 pandemic has proven through its changing morphology, physiology and pathology is that humans are not infallible, from putting a mask on their face to making sure they keep their hands clean when they travel or just simply go outside. The ravaging and unprecedented spread of COVID-19 has led to various changes in its form, therefore producing new variants. 

Spreading animosity during the 1^st wave, Covid-19 was relentless, it took hundreds and thousands of lives and besides taking life and maintaining impeccable reputation it placed an abysmal fear in people’s minds. But when the cases started to go down the commoners thought that was it, we are saved, we have fought off the virus somehow. Little did they know the 2^nd wave was just around the corner, and it was not over.

They started taking things normally and just continued with their life. That caused a tremendous increase in the spread of the virus, thus an increase in the number of deaths. Statistical analysis clearly indicates death ratio increased twice as much before. 

The same thing happened when the 2^nd wave ended and the 3rd wave started. In Pakistan the 3rd wave reached its peak after fifty days, and that’s six fewer days as compared to the peak of the 2nd wave. Even though vaccines are available now but it is not averting the crisis. The number of diseased populations is increasing more than ever.

Now that we are in the 3^rd wave of COVID-19 we may have learned to put masks on our faces but numerous people still opt to go outside unnecessarily and expose themselves. Main problem lies in the “special events” whether those are religious practices or some official programs. We have experienced two insufferable waves of this deadly virus, and we went out in those “special events” and suffered consequences that we dreaded. Same thing happened in this wave.

The latest example is “Kumbh Mela” in India that has led to the implausible spread of the virus.  Thousands of people are dying on a daily basis. What exacerbates a circumstance like this is, poor management.   Ineffective management of the hospitals to contain COVID-19 patients spreads the virus even more.

The lesson we have learned from this prolonged pandemic is to delegate ourselves to simple behaviors. The simple behavior of regularly washing our hands, disinfecting our places, wearing face masks. This simple, yet meticulous behavior has the most effective response and it has surely lessened the number of reported cases by just simply taking care of ourselves and our atmosphere.

An effective measure of restricting the hot spots to contain the virus can also be extrapolated as a mundane lesson. And to conclude this topic, I think maybe we are still learning and one thing I fear the most is that maybe it does not get too late for us.