I am from a family of 12 with ages ranging from 60 to 80 years, all of us still alive and in reasonably good health. For this we are truly thankful.
Our grandfather was orphaned as a seven-year-old in 1871, his father dying from typhus, three siblings all under six dying from measles and his mother dying from TB all within two years of each other. Our grandparents in turn lost three teenage children to TB between 1914 and 1920. We can only imagine the grief and devastation of our grandparents. They then died of meningitis at the ages of 55 and 61. These diseases were all highly contagious at the time given the then living conditions, lack of medical care and knowledge of transmissions of viruses – as was the Spanish flu which killed 23,000 in Ireland in 1918/20 and estimates of 50m worldwide. Grief and devastation were the lot of many families in those times.
Our living conditions, nutrition and medical care are now vastly improved, and these diseases are no longer a threat and a dread on families – also, we are much better informed as to the contagiousness of diseases.
However, Covid-19 is now a worldwide pandemic being very highly contagious despite our high living standards. It is accepted that each individual has the capacity to spread the Covid-19 virus on to an average of 2.5 others. This means that at the end of one week one person could have started a transmission resulting in 610 others getting the virus – the numbers being mind-boggling thereafter. With a mortality rate estimated by the World Health Organization of about 3.4%, one person in theory could pass on the virus that results in 21 deaths from those 610 – again the deaths being mind-boggling thereafter. We are being hourly reminded through the mass media how very easy it is to pass on this deadly virus – there is no lack of information as there was with past contagions.
Unlike previous deadly outbreaks of diseases, we as individuals having been very well informed, can directly play our part in preventing the spread of Covid-19 and ease the immense pressure on our health service and its dedicated employees. It is the moral responsibility of each and every person to strictly adhere to the guidelines for social/physical distancing, hand washing and to stay at home as has been well articulated by The Irish News, the GAA and other media outlets in recent days.
Everyone must be alert at all times as to their actions and curtail this deadly virus so that families are not devastated as our forebearers were.
J McGLEENAN
Dungannon, Co Tyrone
Minister must take blame for lack of testing general public
The police are there if needed. However, the health minister and the first and deputy first minister should be concentrating on the poor response of testing. Just read what the former health minister Jeremy Hunt said in the Commons debate: “All our focus has been on social distancing but testing and contact tracing to break the chain of transmission is every bit as important if not more important. South Korea tested and isolated people and are now seeing a fall in cases. They avoided national lock down despite having a worse outbreak initially than we in the UK. “Taiwan had temperature scanning in shopping malls and office buildings but kept shops and restaurants open. They have had just two deaths.
“In Singapore restaurants remain open and schools are re-opening. But 10 days ago we went in the opposite direction and stopped testing in the community. How can we possibly suppress the virus if we don’t know where it is?”
In Northern Ireland the lack of testing in the general public is something that Mr Swann, Mrs Foster and Mrs O`Neill must take the blame for.
So, instead of threatening people with the police they need to remember if we end up like Italy due to lack of testing then it will be a resigning matter for all three. Needless to say all, and I mean all, NHS staff must be tested and isolated if need be.
TERRI JACKSON
Bangor, Co Down
Talk of unity must not cause embarrassment
According to Allison Morris (February 19) “talk of unity is now firmly on the agenda”.
I have been around a long time (86) and can’t remember a time when there was not “talk” of unity, but nothing ever came of it.
I don’t think the English, or their colonists, are bothered by talk.
Joe Devlin and Harry Diamond were eloquent talkers, but nothing came of it – the anti-Catholic discrimination they complained of was not alleviated.
Indeed, it can be argued that the kept opposition of which they were part lent a veneer of legitimacy to the Stormont regime which it did not deserve. I am sceptical about the likelihood of anything of significance being achieved by talk.
At any rate talking about unity must not cause embarrassment by comparing those who declare themselves to be “simply British” with the German colonists in Czechoslovakia, or the French colonists in Algeria, and they must not compare the slogan ‘Ulster is British’ with the slogan ‘Algerie c’est la France’.
Logic would suggest that ‘talk’ of unity should involve a discussion of all aspects of the problem, ie repartition should be contemplated – along the line of the River Bann. I would not be enthusiastic about that, but it would hardly do any harm to talk about it.
Such talk might, of course, raise fears in some quarters. Southern unionists were abandoned in the past. Might western unionists be abandoned in the future?
Were that to happen some western unionists might feel obliged to move to the east, or even to Finchley.
SHAEMUS HARAN
Co Limerick
Important to place perspective where it fits
What happens when the very acceptable phrase ‘temporary layoffs’ becomes ‘permanent layoffs’ for a great many employees languishing at home today, wondering how they will cope?
Once the virus panic is over we will still have the consequences of this gigantic economic crash to deal with.
No amount of misplaced positivity and patriotism now, will replace the fear of not just Covid-19 but of the long-lasting poverty to come, which is the pressing resultant issue. After citizens have buried their dead as victims of this virus, financial ruin is ,for now, the horror we are scared to understandably even contemplate.
In the winter flu HSE update, issued in January, there were 28 deaths and more than 2,000 hospitalised from November last.
All flu strains can be lethal, so it is important to place perspective where it fits and which we can draw upon for reassurances at this time.
Good luck, everybody, as we try to follow the current rules. This pandemic will also pass. Being of an older age, and not impacted as to my finances, I shudder at the thought of the financial destruction the young could well be facing, immediately and into the long-term.
ROBERT SULLIVAN
Bantry, Co Cork
