STEVEN FRIEDMAN: Time to have second thoughts about the second wave
Debate in SA is more concerned with reviving a ‘normal life’ than keeping up the fight against a dangerous virus
If this country’s debate continues to sleep through Covid-19, we may all be in for a rough awakening. The debate pays so little attention to the virus that we might assume it no longer matters, either because it has left our shores or because a vaccine is nearly here. Neither is true.
Covid-19 infections are on the rise in SA. While cases are concentrated in the Eastern Cape, they may not stay there for long as people travel between provinces. On average about 1,600 new cases a day were reported between late August and last week. This is about eight times the number that prompted South Korea to warn of a national crisis. The debate here is presumably happy to live with these cases because the people who take part in it are not much affected. Even if a vaccine is rolled out in the US and Europe soon, it is unlikely to get here for a while. When it does, it may be available to very few of us...
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