Elizabeth Cook

Take this from someone who has spent the better part of the last month grasping for any minutiae of information regarding Covid-19 and I can tell you this, it doesn’t matter how much we read or listen to the news we, as a collective layman society, know nothing more about Covid-19 and can offer no new insights to the scientific experts and decision makers leading us through this pandemic. This is NOT the DaVinci Code that, only by watching ALL the news and Tweets and Facebook stories and Instagram posts, you’ll amazingly figure it all out. You, me, and my neighbour Walter are not going to solve the puzzle of this disease. Why, because we are irrelevant. Unless my buddy Walter here was an infectious disease expert but alas, he is not.

We have been told repeatedly the job we have to do and it’s quite simple – Stay home. When you absolutely have to go out, you keep at least 2 metres of distance between your own germ carrying vessel and others.

Any other time I would be tooting the horn of civil liberties for the populace but right now I’m with the government in releasing only “need to know” information. I don’t feel we’re owed all the transparency that’s being called for. Why? Because our collective working class opinion doesn’t matter right now. And, we have displayed that even with all the harrowing information out there about the disease and the simple rules to stay home, we still don’t listen. There are still people gathering in groups, hanging out at Walmart and the grocery stores. So no, I don’t think the government is obligated at all to release the projections they have been given to guide their decision making during this situation. If I thought it would solidify the degree of seriousness in those people that weren’t already abiding by the rules to stay at home then yes, by all means release the data. But I don’t think that. The same people who aren’t taking this seriously are going to take that information and look for loopholes, and the other spectrum of individuals are going to use that information as a means of placing the blame from here on out upon those that delivered that information. Because it is SO much easier to place blame, then take on the responsibility yourself. The Prime Minister has said repeatedly, the magnitude of impact the pandemic will have on our country and the lives of it’s citizens depends on YOU and YOUR BEHAVIOUR.

So, I’ll put this simply: I don’t care about your “need to know”. I don’t care if you think it is within your rights to have transparency. What you need to do now is listen to the rules given to you by the big brains in our country and worldwide to STAY HOME. Wash your hands. Distance yourself from other Germbags.

Let the government with all their advisers do their job and you do yours. Trust that everyone wants the best case scenario for all of us. Trust and have faith that once this storm passes, and it will, what’s left over will show how well we pulled together or how horrible we fell apart.