Seven Good Practices for Tiding Over the Pandemic
By Dr Goh Seh Kai
3 May 2021
Since its outbreak, the Covid-19 pandemic has already lingered for more than a year. Until now, many regions in the world are still grappling with reducing their infection and fatality rate. With the implementation of the vaccination process worldwide, the world is yet to see the pandemic run its course. Generally, most of us have somehow experienced negative impacts caused by the pandemic — for example, lockdown, stress, wearing a mask, hands sanitizing, social distancing, etc. At this juncture, it is worth reflecting on how to cope with the current crisis more effectively. This article shares my views on the following seven good practices for tiding over the pandemic.
1. Adaptability: Life is vulnerable during the Covid-19 pandemic, as evident from the tremendous overall death toll worldwide. Although we have been living well for years compared with our past generation, we are not fortunate this time. It is highly crucial to minimize our health risks by adhering to the safety measures strictly, such as wearing a mask, social distancing, etc. Although it might not be your culture to follow these practices, your ability to adapt to the preventive measures will determine your fate. Similarly, although the pandemic has forced many companies to cease their operations, some enterprises have adjusted well by changing their business models to cope with the crisis. For example, many eateries have leveraged the cloud kitchen model to revitalize their business. Likewise, it would be best for job seekers to be more realistic in this gloomy job market, such as lower their compensation expectations, acquire more sought-after knowledge and skills, etc.
2. Cooperation: It is challenging to enforce people to follow safe and hygienic practices during the pandemic, especially when the social pressure on them to change is not intense. Likewise, some people might not think that societal needs are more crucial than individual needs — for instance, they are egoistic and ignore social requirements. Although individual behaviour alone is inadequate to improve social well-being, everyone’s effort will make a difference. People will live well if they can sacrifice some freedom to meet social expectations. It shall be every entity’s effort — governors, institutions, and individuals — to support the country’s antiviral measures earnestly. This premise is evident from some countries’ relatively low infection and fatality rates. Likewise, the world’s economic performance will benefit from the cooperation and collaboration among nations to tackle the virus instead of competing for individual interests.
3. Agility: Agile decision-making is always paramount, especially during the outbreak. The premise comes from some countries’ swift governmental decisions in handling the pandemic — for instance, quick lockdown, virus detection, quarantine, cross-border-movement restriction, work-from-home practices, etc. I applaud their agile decisions in containing the virus to enable a safe living environment for their people despite many inconveniences caused. Looking back at the outbreak history, most governors initially unrealized the virus is so highly contagious that they did not respond fast enough to prevent a high infection and fatality rate from occurring. According to the news, lately, mutant viruses are even more infectious and virulent than the previous one. This information means that future countering measures should be more agile to minimize the potentially severe impacts of mutant viruses. Likewise, enterprises’ rapid transformation is critical to uplifting their efficiency and effectiveness and strengthening their post-pandemic competitiveness.
4. Discipline: Discipline is crucial during the pandemic despite legislative measures to restrain people’s irresponsible behaviour. Sometimes, we could notice people did not wear their masks covering their nose and mouse properly while talking to others. Likewise, they did not follow safe distancing guidelines while socializing. Others did not see a doctor but went to work even when they had severe flu, sore throat or high fever. Although most people have strictly adhered to the rules, a few undisciplined people could potentially cause an infection spike. Hence, strict compliances with the safety practices regardless of time and place are paramount to everyone. Likewise, it would be best for each nation’s governors to constantly monitor, control, and discipline their people to ensure they follow preventive measures. Also, they should continuously create safety awareness to ensure people always adhere to preventive measures.
5. Trust: People must trust that information is accurate and reliable before responding to it accordingly. People will obey safety measures only if they believe the practices are appropriate and benefit them. Governors can gain people’s trust and respect by always keeping promises to enhance their well-being. It will be challenging for the governors to inspire their people to follow the safety measures if they do not trust or believe in them. Nowadays, it is challenging to convince people since fake news or unreliable information can emerge in social media to mislead them. Governors should eliminate and control inaccurate information from flourishing to ensure people will respond appropriately. Likewise, all information about the virus should base on scientific research before dissemination. It will be best if the governors can regularly cultivate their people’s trust since it will help change their behaviour during a crisis like the current pandemic.
6. Research: We should reckon that there are still unknown facts about the Covid-19 virus that research scientists need to determine — for instance, what is the best protection method? How effective is the vaccine for protection? We cannot presume we know how to handle the current and future issues with our past knowledge as they might be unreliable and ineffective. It will be best for us to stay humble and learn about the virus through scientific research. Relentlessly researching the best ways of undermining the impacts of the virus is crucial for the world to survive the current crisis and beyond. Likewise, sharing research findings among nations to update people with the latest virus development is also essential to curb the world’s infection and fatality rate. We should not take the virus lightly but should continuously finding the best virus prevention methods and improving vaccine effectiveness to counter the impacts of more potentially contagious and virulent viruses in the future.
7. Flexibility: Although life is more superior to economic performance, our safety plans should be logical and flexible depending on the situation. The safety plans must be helpful to our business activities besides ensuring people are safe while socializing publicly. Governors should change the plans flexibly not to undermine the economic activities. For example, governors shall revise the safety plans accordingly once it is evident that fully vaccinated people can immunize themselves against the virus and allowed to travel. However, when the mutant virus has become more contagious and poisonous, the safety protection plans should be updated swiftly as well, such as revised testing and quarantine procedures, etc. It is crucial to change the safety plans flexibly to reduce health risks and enhance economic performance simultaneously, although it is pretty challenging. Enterprises cannot survive if they cannot generate sufficient revenue due to excessive people-movement-control measures affecting their business activities. However, it is challenging for the governors to judge when is the right time to relax on socializing restriction measures. The ability to flexibly balancing safety measures and easing economic activities is crucial but challenging for survival.
In conclusion, the seven good practices mentioned above and recapped in the following are vital for the world to tide through the current catastrophe.
1. Adaptability — Everyone must adapt to the safety preventive measures. Enterprises should embrace different business models to revitalize their business. Job seekers need to be more realistic in their job hunts and focus on more sought-after knowledge and skills.
2. Cooperation — Every entity in a nation must cooperate to support the country’s antiviral measures earnestly, and all nations have to cooperate and collaborate in containing the virus.
3. Agility — More agile safety measures are required to minimize the negative impacts of more potentially contagious and poisonous viruses in the future. Enterprises need to transform swiftly to uplift their efficiency and effectiveness and strengthen their competitiveness in the post-pandemic.
4. Discipline — The governors must constantly monitor, control, and discipline their people to ensure they follow preventive measures. Also, they should continuously create safety awareness to ensure people always adhere to preventive measures.
5. Trust — The governors need to cultivate people’s trust with them to help ensure they abide by the virus protection measures.
6. Humility: Relentlessly researching to learn the best virus prevention methods and improving vaccine effectiveness must be continued by research scientists to counter the impacts of more potentially contagious and virulent viruses in the future.
7. Flexibility: The governors have to balance safety measures and easing economic activities flexibly.
Thank you for reading, and your feedback and comments are welcome and appreciated!
