Restrictions may have been lifted, but anxiety still remains
The last two years or so have been an unprecedented experience in the chain of human evolution. The phase has not been declared formally over, yet. There are ripples of different types of experiences continuing. China for one, is going through a re-spread of a version of the pandemic in Shanghai and elsewhere. On April 11 yet another version of the virus was detected in South Africa. The extent and the nature of the spread is yet to be fully worked out. Whereas social distancing has raised fewer crescendos, masks continue to be a major focus of attention. In India, some states have removed the penalty clause on not wearing masks whereas others have retained it just as an advisory. It remains in force in a few states in the country. It is a challenge to an average citizen to keep up with the various regulatory variations. The bewildering complexity does not end there. As the ART home testing kit becomes more popular the kind of monitoring system which was in place till some months ago with the district administration seems to be somewhat on a decline. The story has other interesting overtones. Some are reporting false positives in the ART test, the consequences of which can well be imagined. Clearly, the general verdict seems to be that if there is a variance between the ART test and the PCR test, the findings of the PCR test are deemed to prevail. Notwithstanding a general decline in the number of cases and its global virulence, the feeling of restlessness and the fallouts thereof continue. It impedesa natural flow to return of normalcy. The collaterals continue to be significant. One has to also keep in mind the anxiety which would settle into anybody’s psyche in the initial or the subsequent stages of the continuing trauma. The process of transmission of the virus is not yet sufficiently established in all its modes and shades. As the number of occasions grow for the number of social groups being spontaneously or temporarily formed, one can never be sure which individual is a potential carrier of the disease.In that case one would not know to what extent one is really being exposed to the possibility of an infection. These questions can only be answered by a far greater understanding and awareness of the nature of the virus and where it can survive or for how long does it survive. In the earlier stages of the pandemic the mutation process of the virus made an understanding of the process of infection, itself. open to debate. Medicines and therapies (such as the use of the blood plasma of a formerly infected person) did the rounds. With time, medicines like Remdesivir became less fashionable and the feeling grew that even the Pulmonologist could only go so far. Today, the atmosphere is far more relaxed and many a diagnosis stops with reference to a few doses of Erythromycin and more. How long this will continue to be so, as of now, evokes very few definitive projections. All told, the exacting distress of impending consequences of infection has receded but the habits which got formed as a psychological shield in the last several months of anxiety, continues. Anybody’s cough in a group of
people draws attention. If people then get to learn that somebody in the group was found infected, the others begin watching themselves for symptoms. All told, the infectivity seems to have waned but
anxieties continue to be the underpinning in a seemingly overwhelmingly large part of the population. So it appears, the lay of the land in the era of the pandemic.
(The writer is an acclaimed management consultant. The views expressed are personal.)
