Klenny Adria M.

Batisan

12STEMH A2-2

The Life of Miss Corona

The 2019 novel coronavirus (Covid-19) shocked the whole world by being one of the

most significant emergencies that it had ever confronted. Many of us referred to this health crisis

as a "black swan event"—a word popularized by a New York University finance professor and a

former Wall Street trader, Nassim Nicholas Taleb, who used it to refer to exceptionally unusual

and unpredictable incidents with devastating implications like the US 911 attacks or the 2008

global financial crisis. However, Taleb himself affirms that the COVID-19 pandemic is, in

reality, a "white swan event"—a predictable and preventable occurrence (Schatzker, 2020). Also,

the Philippines suffered severely as being compared to other countries. What is this new

infectious disease? Why is it so much of a threat worldwide? The Philippine government

restricted people from going out according to the specific quarantine protocols they implemented

for everyone's safety. Given that our actions are limited to this situation, how can we cope with

the pandemic?

The first cluster of pneumonia cases by unknown causes of disease was first identified by

officials in China in December 2019, as stated by the World Health Organization (WHO). Some

of the early known patients were found to have purchased food from a wholesale food market in

Wuhan City, Hubei Province of China. Environmental samples taken from this market were

screened positive for the novel coronavirus strain SARS-CoV 2. It was taken as evidence that the

market in Wuhan City played a part in the initial amplification of the outbreak of COVID-19, the

name of the disease caused by this novel coronavirus (WHO, 2020). The first laboratory-
confirmed case outside of China was registered in Thailand on January 13, 2020. By February 1,

there were 11,953 registered cases in 24 countries worldwide (WHO, 2020). Three months later,

the World Health Organization (WHO) reported more than 3.1 million confirmed cases and

224,172 deaths worldwide, with only 13 countries and territories reporting zero cases of COVID-

19.

Dengue, chikungunya, leptospirosis, measles, pertussis, and meningococcal disease are

examples of infectious diseases that are no strangers to the Philippines. It has had its share of

reacting to biological hazards that posed severe health risks, as the severe acute respiratory

syndrome (SARS) in 2003, avian influenza in 2004, Ebola Reston virus and H1N1 in 2009,

Middle East respiratory coronavirus in 2012, West Africa Ebola virus in 2014, and Zika virus in

2016. There are at least 70 significant emergencies and disaster events, including biological

hazards that the Department of Health (DOH) responded to from 2006 to 2016 (Law, 2017).

As news of the novel coronavirus starts to move out of China, the Philippine government

took early notice. As of January 5, 2020, the Department of Health (DOH) “ordered a tighter

screening of incoming travellers from abroad following rumors of a 'mysterious disease' from

China” (ABS-CBN News, 2020). A woman who entered the Philippines from Wuhan, China,

was registered as the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in the country on January 30, 2020. It

eventually prompted the government to ban travellers from the Chinese province of Hubei after

weeks of refusing demands for a travel ban on travellers from China (CNN Philippines Workers,

2020). The DOH published its “Interim Guidelines on the Preparedness and Response to Novel

Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) from Wuhan” on January 21 (DOH, 2020). The DOH has developed

surveillance systems to investigate cases of COVID-19 aggressively.

 Despite these early attempts to prepare for the outbreak of COVID-19 in the country, the

government's subsequent response revealed the national disaster response mechanism's

inadequacies and exposed the country's health system's sad condition. Attempts to stem the

pandemic have cast a harsh light on long-standing shortcomings in the country's social,

economic, and political structures that have intensified the insecurity of significant parts of the

population.

We cannot avoid accidentally contracting the virus, so what do we do in these times of

despair? According to What to Do If You Are Sick (2020), if you feel Covid-19 symptoms like

coughing and fever, you must immediately separate yourself from other people. Monitor your

symptoms such as trouble breathing, persistent pain or pressure in the chest, inability to wake or

stay awake, and bluish lips or face. Having these symptoms does not automatically mean death;

we need to take up the precautionary measure to wear a mask protecting our mouths and noses

and cover our cough and sneezes.

The pandemic of school closures affected more than 70% of the world's school

population (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, n.d.). Overall,

working hours decreased globally by an estimated 4.5%, with workers forced to shut down

worldwide in the first quarter of 2020—equivalent to nearly 130 million full-time jobs lost or

suspended—compared to the previous quarter. The 1.6 billion informal economy workers

worldwide are among the worst affected by lockdown policies (International Labor Organisation,

2020). Early World Trade Organization (WTO) projections suggest that global gross domestic

product ( GDP) and trade in goods will fall by about 2.5% and 13%, respectively, in 2020

(WTO, 2020).
 Since then, people's movement in many parts of the world, including the capital, has

restricted access to necessities and work. Land, domestic air, and sea travel inside and outside the

capital have been prohibited. Mass meetings were banned, and classes were cancelled. The

lockdowns have created a wide range of problems, including significant loss of livelihoods, the

collapse of companies, specifically micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs),

universal disruption of schooling, a dramatic reduction in government revenues, multiple cases

of police brutality, domestic violence, an increase in hunger and a worsening of the plight of the

poor. Unfortunately, even though the vaccine would be successfully developed and deployed by

next year (according to the most optimistic scenario), no one expects the world to return to the

“old normal”.

The response of the Philippine Government to COVID-19 was reactionary and

insufficient. Although quarantine and social distancing measures may have slowed the spread of

new SARSCoV2 infections, the government has been slow to increase the healthcare system's

capacity to test, track and treat COVID-19 patients and to address non-COVID-related health

needs of the population. The discrepancies and failings in the government's response to COVID-

19 cannot be due solely to weak leadership or lack of experience in coping with a pandemic of

this magnitude. The Philippines' response to the pandemic has been profoundly limited by the

country's public health system's sad state from the outset. This flawed public health system is the

product of deliberate policy decisions, fiscal objectives, and structural design that have been

made for several years to date. As the nation and the rest of the world step slowly and cautiously

towards a "new standard," the Philippine health system's fundamental ills need to be discussed

beyond the criteria for coping with emergencies such as the COVID-19 pandemic.
References:

 Schatzker, E. (2020, March 31). Taleb says ‘white swan’ coronavirus was preventable

[video recording of interview]. Bloomberg. https://www.bloomberg.com/

news/videos/2020-03-31/nassim-taleb-says-whiteswan-coronavirus-pandemic-was-

preventable-video

 World Health Organization (2020). Coronavirus disease (COVID-2019) Situation

Reports. https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/situation-

reports

 World Health Organization (2020a, April 23). Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)

Situation Report-94. https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/situation-

reports/20200423-sitrep-94-covid-19.pdf

 Law, R.P. (2017). Promoting cross-sectoral collaboration for building disaster resilience

in the Philippine Health Sector. In Philippine Institute for Development Studies. In Risks,

Shocks, Building Resilience: Proceedings of the Second Annual Public Policy

Conference 2016 (pp. 93- 100). Philippine Institute for Development Studies and Bangko

Sentral ng Pilipinas. https://think-asia.org/bitstream/handle/11540/7553/pidsbk2017-

appc2016_ fnl.pdf?sequence=1

 ABS-CBN News (2020, January 5). DOH orders tighter screening of travelers amid

‘mysterious disease’ from China. ABS-CBN News. https://news.abs-cbn.com/

news/01/05/20/doh-orders-tighter-screening-oftravelers-amid-mysterious-disease-from-

china
 CNN Philippines Staff (2020, January 31). Duterte orders travel ban from China province

amid coronavirus scare. CNN Philippines. https://cnnphilippines.com/

news/2020/1/31/Philippines-novel-coronavirus-Chinatravel-ban.html

 Department of Health (2020, January 21). Department Memorandum No. 2020-0034.

Interim guidelines on the preparedness and response to novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV)

from Wuhan, China (as of Jan. 21, 2020).

https://www.doh.gov.ph/sites/default/files/healthupdate/DM-2020-0034-Interim-

Guidelines-on-thePreparedness-and-Response-to-2019-nCoV_0.pdf

 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2020, September 11). What to Do If You

Are Sick. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/if-you-are-sick/steps-when-sick.html.

 United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (n.d.) COVID-19

impact on education. https://en.unesco.org/covid19/educationresponse