NEW NORMS TO PROTECT US AND FUTURE

What is Covid-19? Most of people know about this pandemic or

disease, but do they really know about this invisible enemy who
attacked in silence. It affects 213 countries and territories around the
world include 2 international conveyances. This is indeed a widespread
pandemic. The whole world really affects by this Covid-19. On July 01
2020, number of cases in the world hit 10,614,957. This prove that this
pandemic conquers most of the country in the world. Different country
handles this case differently from others. For instance, we can take
Malaysia as an example. When the first wave of this pandemic in
Malaysia, Prime Minister of Malaysia, Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin
officially announced Movement Control Order (MCO). All of the MCO
will takes place in two weeks or 14 days maximum. This range of time
is due to the incubation period of the virus.
This MCO is made to prevent the spread of Covid-19 among the
people. For your information, Malaysia have 4 phases of Prevention
phase which takes place between 18 March 2020 until 12 May 2020.
Base on World Health Organization (WHO), number of cases will
increase in mid-April 2020. That’s why Malaysian government extend
the MCO to protect people and reduce the Covid-19 cases in this
country. Next, when the cases in Malaysia start to decrease, the
government allow some of economic sectors to operate. This phase,
Malaysia is in Conditional Movement Control Order (CMCO) which
start on 4 May 2020 until 9 June 2020. The CMCO phase are made
because Malaysia loses RM2.4 billion every day when the MCO is
active .Because of that, the government need to cover the losses during
MCO in CMCO. After 9 June 2020, the government consider to open
more sectors. So, they create Recovery Movement Control Order
(RMCO) from 10 June 2020 until 31 August 2020 this year. During
RMCO, more sectors are open include education sector. For your
information, although there was MCO in Malaysia, education in this
country is never neglected. All school have their own ways to teach or
communicate with students. Plus, nowadays, technology is really
advanced and useful for students. All we need is internet and mobile
phones or other communication tools. Usually, teachers will make
online classes with their students through various apps like Zoom,
Google Meet, Google Classroom and other. That make discussion
between teachers and students easier.
“Prevention is better than cure”. This proverb is the best sentence to
describe what we should do to prevent Covid-19. Government has
outlined the guidelines for the people. This guideline is based on
personal hygiene, ways to reduce physical contact with each other and
step to prevent this virus. The government encourage people to follow
safety precautions that has been stated.
 First, people need to wear mask to cover their nose and mouth when
in public. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends people
to wear mask only when you are taking care of a person with Covid-19
or when you have cough or sneeze. In this case, the mask will protect
people around you and yourself. If in Malaysia, you don’t need to wear
mask when you do exercise or activities by yourself with condition
there’s no physical contact and doesn’t involve the public. People need
to know how to use mask correctly to prevent the spread of this virus.
Second, no handshaking or kissing on the cheeks like normal
Malaysian culture. For now, we need to put aside that culture. But,
without handshaking or kissing on the cheeks, it doesn’t mean we
cannot greet or say hello to our friends. Malaysian’s Government stated
how to say hello. The way is by putting your right hand on left chest
and bow a little bit to show respect. This new norm can avoid us from
physical contact thus reducing the spread of Covid-19.
Third, people need to wash they hand frequently. Well, you can clean
your hands with an alcohol-based hand rub or hand sanitizer. Make sure
the content of alcohol in the hand sanitizer is high. Alcohol can kill
most of the bacteria on our hands. But, after all, wash your hand using
soap and water are more recommend for people. You need to wash your
hand when preparing food, before eating, after eating or when you get
home. Always wash your hands after using the toilet because the toilet
is a dirty place and full with germs. As you know, our hands are the
biggest medium for bacteria to spread because we touch everything
with our hand, so that, we also need to stop touching our face
especially nose and mouth when we already touched something.
Fourth, the most important safety steps are keeping our distance from
people and avoid crowds. We can call this as social distancing. We
need to distance ourselves from others at least 1 meter away. We can
see at Malaysia that most of all stores, shops, even shopping mall had
put 1-meter line at cashier counters, and other waiting places. With this
step, people can keep their distance. Other example we can see is, most
of shops’ owner restrict customers to the store. So that, the shops are
not too crowded with customers, in the same time, make all customers
follow the social distancing.
Last but not least, I hope that one day, Covid-19’s vaccine will be
found. This can cure people and we can live our lives as usual. “It does
not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop” by Confucius.
So, don’t give up until we win this invisible war against Covid-19. We
in this together. Everything is possible by passion and hard working.
We can win!