When the news of a new disease, Covid-19, broke out about two years ago, many of us thought it was just some dangerous disease that was the problem of far away countries — like you don’t lose sleep over news that a building collapsed in a far off country and about 50 lives were lost.
Today Covid-19 is in Uganda and you cannot be sure that if tests were carried out in your neighbourhood there wouldn’t be positive cases found.
Even last year when the first wave came, most of us thought it was not really the big problem it had been originally described to be. Many of us wore masks and social distanced just to be at peace with the police and not really because it was the safest thing for us to do.
This time people are dying from the disease, our hospitals are overwhelmed by the numbers of infected people, never mind that the great majority gets cured.
Schools and higher institutions of learning have closed down, businesses in most large towns are closed, public transport is not functioning, private cars and boda boda motorcycles must not cross district boundaries, and even places of worship must not conduct public prayers. Farming has also been brought to its knees.
Farmers cannot sell food to schools anymore; they cannot travel easily to purchase inputs such as vet medicines and pesticides and fertilisers.
Most town dwellers, being out of work, have no propensity to spend as they used to on foodstuffs such as vegetables, eggs, and meat. The big lesson drawn from the situation is that now people wear masks and practice social distancing not out of fear of police brutality any more but rather out of the great fear of the disease.
We see a rash for vaccination. We see cases of people dying and only a handful of concerned villagers going to the burial. Thousands have even bought sanitisers to use in cases where no hand washing facilities are provided. It is all an indication that we are learning to live with the disease and about to keep it under control.