Dreaming of a safe Christmas

Whenever I meet with my medical colleagues—virtually, anyway—the No. 1 worry I hear is that the coming Christmas season may also be the second coming of COVID-19, and that we may see an escalation of the pandemic beyond what we have faced. So far, we agree, we haven’t been in the upper tier of countries where the death toll has been catastrophic, but the holidays with all the merrymaking, gathering, and videoke singing can change all that.

Their anxieties are warranted. By now, the global experience indicates that holidays are superspreader events in themselves—as most recently demonstrated by the Canadian Thanksgiving last Oct. 12 which is associated with a spike in cases. Holidays create a lot of opportunities to spread, from family reunions where it is near-impossible to practice distancing or wearing masks due to kahiyaan, to shopping sprees that see people crowding in tiangges and shopping malls. Crucially, family reunions necessarily involve our lolos and lolas, who are the most vulnerable to COVID-19.

Faced with the same worry in the United States for Thanksgiving, former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director Tom Frieden remarked: “Better a Zoom Thanksgiving than an ICU Christmas.” But who will suggest a virtual Christmas for Filipinos, at the twilight of the pandemic year when people need the Yuletide cheer the most? Already, in my bike rides around Laguna, I see barangays that have set up giant parols and Christmas lights, complete with loudspeakers blaring Jose Mari Chan’s voice, and even the aroma of the traditional puto bumbóng that my late Lola Rosing used to secure in time for our reunions.

“Who will play the Grinch?” as my friend, Dr. Julian Cañero put it. Undas may have been canceled, and so has the upcoming Black Nazarene, but to cancel Christmas—undoubtedly our most important holiday—or even to suggest it, is something that neither politicians nor physicians may have the energy, or will, to do. Especially with the optimism over forthcoming vaccines. Especially with businesses hoping for one last hurrah in what has otherwise been a listless year.

These overlapping contexts make for a worrisome situation, particularly amid growing “pandemic fatigue” that sees people wearing masks less and less and ignoring public health protocols more and more. While many are pinning their hopes on vaccination, it is clear that Santa won’t be bringing vaccines this time around, given that it will take several months before we get hold of them in the best case scenario. And between now and then, many lives can be unnecessarily lost.

Thankfully, the Department of Health is recognizing the danger and has begun to embark on—in the language of Department Circular No. 2020-0355—a “reiteration of the minimum public health standards for the COVID-19 mitigation during the holidays.” Recognizing the impossibility of canceling Christmas, health authorities are instead recommending measures like shopping online, limiting the number of people in gatherings, holding such events outdoors, and keeping them as short as possible.

Despite this welcome recognition and appeal, however, we need to be more forceful in discouraging inter-household gatherings altogether, especially in light of the near-impossibility of practicing “public health standards” (e.g., one-meter distancing) in them. All the traveling and homecoming—both across and beyond the nation—that Christmas involves would amplify the risk, especially in the provinces. And while there are ways to mitigate it (e.g., testing, quarantine), these may not be accessible or practicable for most Filipinos.

In light of the above, I am calling on medical societies to send a message as forceful as the collective call last August for a “medical timeout.” We may have already endured so much in this annus horribilis, but we need to call on our fellow Filipinos to make one more sacrifice in 2020, for the sake of a better 2021.

I am also calling on the President to use his platform to amplify this appeal. He has been a cheerleader for vaccines, and he should now be the communicator-in-chief for this urgent message. Ditto with his spokespersons and of course our other officials, from the Vice President to local officials. Can we count on our officials to practice what they preach? And can the spirit of Christmas not bring some peace, unity, and communitas in our politics?

Believe me, I miss all my family and friends and would want nothing better than to be with them for the holidays, most especially my nieces Tori and Liza and my newborn nephew Vito.

But the pandemic need not get worse before it gets better.

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