The Values Behind Covid

Social distancing. Self and community quarantine. Lockdown. Contact tracing. Pandemic. These are but a few of the new technical terms we came across and have been added up to our vocabularies of which same terms will forever be written in the history of the world. One March morning, we all woke up to a declaration from our national government that we had to be placed in a nation-wide “stay at home” mode for an invisible attacker more fearsome than the previous dilemmas of terrorism and natural disasters due its sneaky nature that we will never know if it’s already infecting us using our naked eye. The Coronavirus Disease-2019 or COVID-19 is just one of the strains of the large family of viruses which may cause illnesses to animals and humans. In our case, these viruses are known to cause respiratory infections such as influenza and lung problems. Some of the strains we had encountered in the past are Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus (MERS-Cov) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in the early 2000s. The COVID-19 originated in Wuhan, China late of December 2019 and has been declared by the World Health Organization as a pandemic which is an epidemic spread over multiple countries and continent. The impact of its widespread has been a global concern and life have never been like before. The media have been filled with news about COVID-19. It has been a depressing start of 2020 and we have been enduring its effects in our lives for more than half a year now and we just can’t see accurately when it is going to end. In our country, the statistics are still not able to curve down the rising rates of positive case. We have tried different community quarantines but we still can’t see the numbers falling and everyday, people are getting more and more confused and depressed because of the many plans and opportunities affected by it. People are getting more and more pressed down by the difficulties it brought us especially those who have been living in less and are barely getting by. However, in perspective, how did the COVID-19 brought a bit of a silver lining in our lives? Though life had been really tough but we are learning to use our survival skills and had become more creative. We are now appreciating the gift of family and friendship for we have stayed with them for quite sometime in closed doors and bonding times. We have seen our government officials trying their best to think of the safety of their people and our fellow citizens doing their best to show discipline as a manifestation of their support to fight this invisible foe. We have never been this close to the people we love and cherish. We have learned to value people. We have learned to pray and worship God in these tough times. And most of all, we do value our lives and the lives of other people for being safe and healthy is already a great help to one another. It has been a really difficult start of the new decade. A lot of lives have already been taken and still a lot more are struggling in all corners of the world. Yet the values we have attained through these struggles made us become stronger, better and more appreciating individuals. We can already see the essence of health, life and safety more than being insensitive, undisciplined and selfish. Soon, the light will come through this stormy ride and that we will flock the streets of the new normal as survivors of a historical battle. Soon, we will tell our next generation that the terms above were experiences we had that changed our world once and for all. Soon, better terms will be remembered and will be guiding the people after us: Life. Love. Unity. Healing. Patience. Values.