Week 11 of the coronavirus quarantine

I ALMOST missed the deadline for this column as the days are no longer identifiable by name, just a day in, day out trudge. No wonder prisoners we see in movies mark the days with sticks on the walls of their cells and no other identifying mark as to the day or month as they go through their sentence.

We are into Week 11 and from the outside world come the usual problems that the pandemic has unearthed among us. One is the short view rather than the long view. Yes, quarantine, test, isolate, and then forget who was quarantined, tested or isolated and leave them to count the days with sticks for no other reason than the short view made for a short memory and left them in quarantine limbo. The short view is a compound of ignorance, indecision, fear of making a mistake which turns to paralysis. See all those cruise ships on Manila Bay with quarantined returning overseas Filipino workers who have passed the two-week mandatory quarantine, have been tested and found healthy and should be home? They are still there along with others in construction sites, hospital wards, or wherever they were first put on lockdown months ago. With all the mistakes that have already been made, why should officials quake at the thought of making a decision that will be another mistake? In this dispensation, mistakes are of no moment. Have a mañanita with no masks, lots of liquor and a big crowd; it s a mistake that is ignored and then justified. Give the wrong figures on the pandemic and the wrong premise that we are on the second wave because there was a first wave of three, and never mind the consequences for the prognostications and calculations that have to be made based on those figures. You are still excused, loved and trusted. Yes, no official has been appointed by mistake, no one has made a mistake that needs reproval, just some underlings kicked out on the “whiff of corruption” while the stench of it keeps others in their posts.