Opinion

Bimpe Archer: When will we escape the dystopian hall of mirrors that is the Covid-19 pandemic?

Deputy Chief Medical Officer for England Jonathan Van-Tam. John Sibley/PA Wire.
Deputy Chief Medical Officer for England Jonathan Van-Tam. John Sibley/PA Wire. Deputy Chief Medical Officer for England Jonathan Van-Tam. John Sibley/PA Wire.

“And growing still in stature the grim shape/Towered up between me/and the stars, and still,/For so it seemed, with purpose of its own/And measured motion like a living thing,/Strode after me.” (William Wordsworth’s `Prelude – Stealing a Boat on Derwent Water)

IT’S almost a year since I slid from my imperfectly perfect, predictable life into the dystopian hall of mirrors that is the Covid-19 pandemic.

The impending anniversary looms ominously. Oppressively.

Every morning my mobile phone presses images of innocence lost upon me – My daughter sipping warm chocolate in a café with an improbable number of people crowded in the background; Me pressed up alarming close to one of my oldest friends for a selfie, lipstick-slicked lips parted into enormous grins behind platefuls of restaurant food; My niece beautiful and elegant as she prepares to leave for her school formal.

Life before the vacuum came - reminders of how much LIVING has been sucked up by the coronavirus.

When I pricked my fingers on a rose bush just before Christmas it shouldn’t have surprised me that a month later my baffled GP would be prodding my swollen hand, at a loss to understand why it had defied two courses of antibiotics.

For the past year has had the disorientating feel of passing from the 21st century into a fairy tale world out of time where a kiss, a hug or even a handshake can kill; loved ones are forbidden from meeting by a complicated series of rules and children are locked away from the outside world.

I realised I’m not alone in the feelings of disorientation listening to a government official in the Republic telling people that the number of cars on the roads hadn’t actually increased “it’s just we’ve maybe forgotten what traffic is like”.

In such a febrile environment it is little wonder that we are all desperate for solid information – ideally `When this hell will be over’ kind of information, but honestly at this stage we’d really take anything.

Like many people whose parents and in-laws are fortunate enough to have had their first Covid-19 vaccine, my husband and I had regarded it as a step towards spending time with them again, halfway towards once more crossing the thresholds of our respective childhood homes.

It was lowering to hear England’s deputy chief medical officer Jonathan Van-Tam warn that even after a second jab he wouldn’t recommend returning to the contact which we previously enjoyed.

If not then, then when? When will we hug again? When can we celebrate high days and holidays with the people we love? When can we flee these shores for warmer climes? When? When? When?

But there is nothing to be gained from forcing politicians and health chiefs into naming a date. We are not clearing our diary for a wedding. It is clear by now that Covid-19 is more capricious than even the most monstrous Bride/Groomzilla.

With morale low and despair lapping at our spirits, we cannot survive more broken promises when the virus fails to respect the timeline spewed out by a panicking politician.

That is not to say there is no answer to `when’ pieces of normality can return, but the answer is not in the soundbite but in the science.

We need to know what the transmission levels need to be for our lives to be unlocked once more and what we need to do to keep them there.

For while so many of our certainties have been shaken utterly, science remains.

In the end my hand was healed by a third course of antibiotics and dose of antihistamines.

The vaccines are here and they are working. We are on our way out of this hellscape.

Like the young Wordsworth frightened by the looming mountain, what seems to be a growing threat is illusionary and we are simply seeing it more clearly as we move further and further away, leaving it behind us.