We started the month of December 2021 with a perfect recipe that combined the best ingredients to give the virus its best flavor, as bridges, vacations, dates to meet, many company meals come together - it seems exaggerated but there are more company dinners than companies themselves in our country - which together with the cold and rain are the best of delights.
Turning on the television, browsing any social network or simply walking down the street, and it seems that the world has its hours numbered. Watching "news" whose first lines are, "ICUs collapsed", "triple of infections", "the new Omicron variant is more contagious" and a long etcetera is what we have been exposed to in recent weeks.
This avalanche of apocalyptic headlines from the media as a ruthless campaign to profit from this situation, filling the battered citizenry with concern and alarmism in a stale way, is certainly anything but information. Reading newspaper covers, or headlines such as "Spain reaches Christmas with triple the infections of a year ago", generates in society a sized interest, an unusual fear, an unease and a paralyzing restlessness resulting from incomplete information. And it is not that these are false headlines, but rather unfinished content, given that our country registered in the first weeks of 2021 triple the number of infected than in 2020, but with a big difference, with 41% fewer hospitalized for COVID. This downward trend is extrapolated to cases in patients admitted to the COVID ICU, and in the number of deaths from the disease, also reduced. And wouldn't you tell me that the aforementioned headline with the latest references indicated would not have another reading?
And what is it due to? Well, it is not because the hospital emergencies are only saturated due to Christmas, it also contributes to the lack of trackers, of personnel who were applauded at eight in the afternoon every day, and who, for the most part, have been fired, and an effective and exhaustive control over infections. Although without deviating from the question, the answer is found in the vaccinated population, and that is that in the first weeks of December 2020 the vaccination rates were non-existent, and in the same weeks a year later they are 87%.
Nor do we have knowledge regarding another parallel pandemic, and that is that no one tells us that while yesterday there was one death due to the new Omicron variant, there were 11 people who decided to commit suicide. Since the beginning of COVID until now, the increase in the number of suicides is greater than all deaths from COVID. And although the care number for people with suicidal thoughts has come into effect, there is still much to be done in this area.
We are generally exhausted from this situation, we all want to finish and put an end to this captivity that we are experiencing (and/or suffering), therefore it is necessary to see the progress and the positive that the implementation of vaccination in the population has brought, as well as other prophylactic measures that help contain the virus. Reason enough for the media not to skew data to manipulate the population, but rather transmit tranquility and complete headlines full of information, -although of course it is not profitable-.
New measures from December 24, 2021
This week the Conference of Presidents took place where the different leaders of the different Autonomous Communities met to share concerns and solutions that would allow addressing the increase in cases of COVID through the launch of a package of measures, for my taste, excessive and incomprehensible, in order to contain the bug as soon as possible.
Are we responsible for the fact that hospitals have not been sufficiently strengthened in these two years of pandemic? What a joke!
We are facing the sixth wave and I have the feeling that the means we have at our disposal to stop it are identical to those available to the system two years ago. The restrictions sought to prevent the health system from collapsing, but it seems that it has not helped much. I would have preferred that more health servers be hired, and not force citizens to wear masks on the street once again. We are the ones who, when we had to be distanced from our friends and family, we did; we are the ones who, when we had to get vaccinated, we did; we are the ones who, when we had to keep months of quarantine, we complied.
Therefore, it is they, the rulers, the representatives who refuse to use the COVID passport to access the Congress of Deputies because it is unnecessary and because it violates their fundamental rights - which seem not to be the same as those of the rest of the Spanish mortals - those who must take serious measures and live up to the circumstances, it is up to them to comply.