Navigating a Health Crisis: are you sailing on a yacht or on a lifeboat?
Photo by Manuel Sardo on Unsplash
According to Darwin’s theory of evolution, in a changing environment, the ones who have the favored characteristics to survive the rapid changes are the ones who will survive more. He called it the effects of natural selection.
You can argue that Darwin’s theory was about wild animals. So what does this mean for us, humans?
Well, even if we are not wild, we are still animals and we are still affected by the rapid changes in our world, and they affect us differently according to the variables we have in our favor (or not).
Why are we talking about selective forces and natural selection?
That’s because right now our world is under a pandemic caused by COVID-19. And it’s time we check our privilege during this pandemic.
For starters, if you are not elderly or if you don’t suffer from chronic illnesses, then you are already a little bit higher in the list of privileges. As you can see in the graphic below, the illness mortality rates go higher with age.
What does this mean for you?
It means that, if you are privileged enough not to belong to a risk group, then you have a responsibility to follow the rules and stay safely home and wash your hands to prevent spreading the disease. You should be mindful of how your disregard for your privilege can put someone’s life at risk.
Ok, but what if you don’t belong to a group risk but you can’t stay safe at home?
Well, the reality is that some low-income communities who don’t have paid-leave benefits have to, unfortunately, choose between going to work sick or risk losing their wages.
But these people probably have savings for situations like this, right?
According to CNBC, in the United States, more than 20% of the population doesn’t save their annual income.
This happens because people either don’t make enough money a month to be able to save some, or because they don’t see the advantages of saving their money for later when they could be spending it in things that bring them instant joy.
Do you understand what losing your wage means?
It means that you won’t have money to pay your bills and, consequently, you won’t have money to stock up. Yes, stocking up is definitely a privilege.
Now, consider that not all countries have access to free health care and some poor countries don’t even have health care at all. For example, in the United States in 2018, around 27.5 non-elderly people didn’t have insurance. Not only that but, in countries with a fragile health care system, a COVID-19 outbreak could mean the collapse of that system.
Besides that, according to a report on SDG 3 — Good Health and Wellbeing — in 2019, 40 percent of all countries had fewer than 10 medical doctors per 10,000 people. This might pose a threat in combating a pandemic in those countries.
Now imagine being in a position where you can’t afford to not go to work but also knowing that, if you go to work and get sick, you won’t have access to any kind of health care. I don’t know about you but, if I was in this situation, I would most definitely be in constant fear of getting sick and living haunted with the idea that I might be putting other people’s lives in danger because I can’t be safe at home.
We need to understand that COVID-19 doesn’t know if you’re poor or rich. If you live in a country with free health care or in a country with no health care at all. It doesn’t know your age or skin color. It doesn’t identify if you’re male, female, trans or non-binary. It doesn’t care what your sexual orientation is or what addictions you have. More importantly, it doesn’t care if you’re sailing on a yacht or on a lifeboat.
The more privileged you are, the closer you get to navigate this health crisis in the safety of a comfortable and stable yacht, and that’s fine. But, if that’s your case, remember that many of us aren’t in your position.
So, every time you pass a life-boat full of people trying to manage their way through this pandemic, remember to pick up as many of us as you can.
Knowing our privilege comes with the responsibility of taking action and making sacrifices for the well-being of the other individuals whom we share this planet with.
Knowing our privilege and caring for those who don’t stand on the same baseline as us might help us stop this pandemic.
Liking it or not, we are all in this together and it’s time we act like a Team. There’s no I in team, but there’s a me, and that stands for the responsibility we have to pull our weight and help our team win. Find out how to stay safe here and keep playing the game.
