Rehearsal for the end of the world
Emilio Pantojas García[1]
I know it's not the end of the world, but if there were a rehearsal for it, this would be it. News reports of closed ports and airports, videos of people in masks and protective suits transporting sick people inside plastic booths and bubbles on social media and television. Empty supermarket shelves and shops full of anxious-looking people, culminating in a curfew and a total lockdown of the country. The panic is discreet and contained because, as the American poet T.S. Eliot said, "This is how the world ends... not with a bang but with a whimper."
There is talk of a “post-catastrophe” Puerto Rico, alluding to the changes that occurred after Hurricane Maria and the earthquakes of last January. Then COVID-19 appeared, the third catastrophe in four years. The biblical Book of Revelation speaks of four horsemen representing conquest, war, famine, and death. The first horseman, who arrives on a white horse, symbolizes a warrior who appears to promote peace but actually promotes a war of conquest, “going out conquering and to conquer” (Revelation 6:2). This horseman should not be confused with the one described in chapter 19, who descends from heaven on a white horse and is ridden by a redeeming and righteous leader presumed to be Jesus Christ.
In Hurricane Maria, death, need, and helplessness reigned. During the earthquakes, hunger and abandonment were evident. With the coronavirus, we witnessed, in addition to abandonment, a belligerent xenophobia against China and even against the former “allies” of Europe. As in the biblical story, the three catastrophes of this Puerto Rican apocalypse were preceded by a power-hungry rider on a white horse.
That first horseman of this Puerto Rican apocalypse, the one on the white horse that paves the way for the calamities we are experiencing, is the two-party kakistocracy. This political class, thirsty for power and profit, is the one that led the country to fiscal bankruptcy and political-economic collapse, the one that plunges us into helplessness with its mismanagement of these disasters that resemble the end of the world.
Kakistocracy created this failed state, incapable of guaranteeing the health and safety of its people. These incompetent rulers allowed a cruise line, denied entry to Jamaica, to reach Puerto Rico and disembark two of the first three diagnosed cases of the virus on the island. They mobilized the National Guard to the airports when they lacked the necessary and sufficient equipment to do the job for which they were deployed. Nor did they have the skills to properly prepare the shipment of medical tests to the CDC in Atlanta.
No, I don't think it's the end of the world, but it extends the "Great Puerto Rican Tribulation" I discussed a month after Hurricane Maria (October 25, 2017, https://www.elnuevodia.com/opinion/columnas/lagrantribulacionboricua-columna-2368528/). In any case, these catastrophes won't be overcome if we don't move beyond the lamentations, misunderstandings, and infighting of the two-party kakistocracy.
The answer
On Sunday, March 15, 2020, the governor of Puerto Rico decreed a curfew and quarantine until March 30 as a measure to prevent the rapid spread of COVID-19. However, the response is incomplete: mass testing cannot be carried out to track the virus's evolution. The country is being ordered to hide from an invisible enemy behind a smokescreen; when it dissipates, we will be exposed and defenseless.
But the drama intensifies with the resignation of the Secretary of Health, his replacement by the mother of the Secretary of Justice, and the discovery that the state epidemiologist is not actually an epidemiologist, but rather obtained her certification through training at the CDC in Atlanta. Amid the doubt, confusion, and distrust created by the farcical handling of the pandemic by government officials, the governor appoints an “advisory group” to manage the crisis. This is merely a “makeover”; the shortage of tests and the lack of reliable statistics persist.
During lockdown, we see news confirming that the world has changed. COVID-19 completes the cycle of globalization. What began as a health crisis in a rural province of China spread around the world in a matter of weeks. What should have been an epidemic became a pandemic that has overwhelmed the healthcare systems of developed countries. The management of this crisis is shifting from local governments to international entities. New global regulatory frameworks are being considered and tested. The result of the lockdown measures to contain the pandemic will be a global recession of unimaginable proportions.
Faced with the monumental economic crisis, a “neo-eugenicist” vision for its solution is beginning to take shape: rationing intensive care medical services, prioritizing those with the greatest chance of survival. The US president insists that the COVID-19 mortality rate is lower than that of influenza, and therefore the economy should not be ruined at the expense of a health crisis that “isn’t that serious.” If the majority of deaths are among the elderly and those with pre-existing medical conditions such as high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, or cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease, then their deaths represent savings in healthcare spending. This seems to be the logic behind those who advocate “not sacrificing” the economy; a perverse logic born from neoliberal bioethics.
It's not the end of the world, but the world we knew has changed irreversibly. Although, as Antonio Gramsci said, "The old world is dying. The new one is slow to appear. And in that chiaroscuro, monsters emerge," like Donald Trump, there is hope. Social distancing has resulted in closer human connection through virtual and in-person means. Artists are gifting us poems and songs through social media, and exceptional individuals are risking their lives to protect and heal their sick neighbors.
[1] Puerto Rican sociologist. Member of the CLACSO Working Group on Crisis, Responses and Alternatives in the Greater Caribbean. Article originally published in “80 grados – Prensa sin prisa”.
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