Unprecedented

Imagine a coronavirus that is not visible to our naked eyes and affected 5,082.661 with deaths at 329,294 globally across 215 countries and territories in five months since the start of 2020, this is mind-blowing. Covid-19 coronavirus is far worse than the SARS in all aspects. It is the not the end of the pandemic yet.

Countries close their borders to prevent people arriving and infecting their citizens. The lockdowns instituted by many countries, where people are restricted from leaving their homes, is the first of its kind in combating this very infectious coronavirus. The extent of losses to the global economies is unthinkable because of shutdowns of businesses and movement of goods cross borders is disrupted. Tourism and travel industry are major casualties in this pandemic.

In Singapore, a partial lockdown termed as Circuit Breaker Stay-at-Home started on 7 April and it is slated to end 1 June (8 weeks in total). But not all things get back to normal. There are three phases for easing of lockdown.

The government has planned a total budget S$59.9 billion to fight Covid-19, to save lives and protect livelihood of people, ie via Unity Budget, Resilience Budget and Solidarity Budget. This gigantic amount resulted in Singapore dipping into accumulated past reserves to the tune of S$21 billion. There will be a fourth supplementary budget to be announced on Tuesday 26 May*.

Because of this Circuit Breaker Stay-at-Home, work from home and home-based learning become a norm. People have a steep learning curve to harness IT technology to do that and to communicate with one another remotely. Social media such as WhatsApp and video conferencing applications such as Zoom become everyday tools to cope with Stayat-Home restrictions.

Covid-19 coronavirus without a brain wrecks havoc to the human race. It brings to the fore how ill-prepared we are in stopping the spread of the virus globally. It highlights the poor living conditions of human beings in some countries; how human beings have been polluting this earth with their bad habits and modern living; how unkind some politicians can be in their behaviours towards others.

It seems that this pandemic is negative through and through. This is not so. Out of this crisis, I see also kindness and compassion among people. I see how these people help one another to cope with it. I learn to treasure my loved ones even more (when we are not able to visit each other). I met some people delivering parcels late in the evening to my doorsteps, all masked up! We got what we needed since most retail shops are not allowed to open because of the Circuit Breaker. I find that friends were sharing nice stories to lift my spirit, whether it were on Facebook or WhatsApp.

We are in this together. We look out for each other. Take care!

* 26 May 2020 on Budgets to fight Covid-19

The government has planned a total budget S$92.9 billion to fight Covid-19, to save lives and protect livelihood of people, ie via Unity Budget, Resilience Budget, Solidarity Budget and Fortitude Budget. This gigantic amount resulted in Singapore dipping into accumulated past reserves to the tune of S$52 billion.