A Flawed Approach To Ending A Pandemic

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Switzerland is currently following a flawed approach to ending a pandemic, because rather than taking a pro-active approach to preventing outbreaks in various communities across Switzerland they are doing the opposite. They are ignoring the problem until it flares up enough that they can no longer pretend to see it. Today the number of cases has reached 6000 a day for the whole of Switzerland.

A rational and moral government, within a healthy democracy, as we have seen in pandemics since the SARS crisis and others, have done everything to contain the threat, but also to prevent it from spreading. They have done everything they could to contain the threat, and to keep people safe.

During this pandemic it feels as though countries have failed to have the foresight to keep people safe, but also the political strength to resist populism. This pandemic feels as if it is as much about populism, news as entertainment, as it is about a pandemic that could be controlled, if only governments could stand up to pressure groups. In a healthy democracy, and I’m speaking about the issues across Europe, England and other countries, we see that politicians let the virus spread, without seeming to fear that they will lose power, and this seems absurd.

I would expect politicians, in healthy democracies, with healthy media landscapes, to do everything that they can to ensure that their citizens are safe, and that their economies return to normal. By normal I don’t mean with masks, distancing, and covid passes. I mean that the virus is eradicated, and that life is back to the pre-pandemic normal.

For now it feels as though we are stuck in this pandemic for seasons, or even years more.

An event sent an e-mail today, about needing volunteers for an event in January but I don’t see how it will be able to go ahead when we have gone from 1000 cases, to 2000, to 3000 and now to 6000 within a few weeks. Politicians in Switzerland refuse to commit to vaccinating people beneath a certain age, and refuse to acknowledge the trends that we see in other countries. They are benefiting from people’s habit of not reading international news like some of us do.

If I thought the Swiss government was trying to end I would still not be traveling, and I would still be using the pandemic as a reason not to travel, but as things stand, and with the current Swiss attitude, we stand no chance of the pandemic ending for a while, so we might as well take liberties that would be absurd under a different government.

Liberties like road trips.

We need a change of leadership in Switzerland, to include people who use science, and have the courage to stand up against interest groups, to ensure that Switzerland may exit the pandemic sooner, rather than later.