Diaries from the Quarantine - II

Just like any other human process, being in quarantine is a cycle. You go through all the classic phases of grievance: denial, acceptance, sadness, anger, resolution. Not necessarily in this order. 

I have been in denial for a bit, believing the epidemic would not turn this bad in Italy. Then I accepted that the only way to slow the contagion down was isolating and making some sacrifices, and this led me to the sadness phase - which is still there, especially at night.

I am now going through anger as well. 

I am not even sure what I am angry about. Can I be angry at something that is barely alive? At something that is so small we can't see it, yet it is disrupting our lives so tragically? Can I be angry at a virus?

Maybe I am angry at all those who fled from Milan almost two weeks ago, potentially spreading the disease all over the country; or maybe I am angry at people queueing up outside supermarkets, afraid of unlikely food shortages. It seems they are not worried about spending a long amount of time in close proximity to other people, about touching goods that dozens have touched before them, as they greedily stock up food they don't need right now. Maybe I am angry because people seem not to realize how important it is to stay home, change our daily habits, avoiding unnecessary contacts.

No, I am certainly angry at people who do not understand how serious this is. In Bergamo they cannot cremate and/or bury the deads fast enough, so the army had to come into the city and move the coffins somewhere else. Can you imagine what if feels like, to mourn someone like this? Without even saying goodbye, because the moment a patient enters the hospital they are not allowed to see anyone from family. If they die, they die alone. Funerals are not allowed. Deads cannot be mourned through the rituals we are used to.  In human societies, this only happens during wartime. The tear in the cultural and social fabric is so deep in communities, after experiences of this kind, that recovery is hard and not often reached. 

Maybe I am angry because I can't feel useful to the society in any way. I am not allowed to work and I am not sure, at the moment, when it will be possible for interns like me to start working again. We are still getting paid, at least, but how long is this going to last? And what is going to happen in the next months? 

I tried to do some volunteer work, but the fear of contagion - and thus the impossibility of going back home may my parents need me - stopped me from even leaving the house. 

That's what happens when you read nothing but news about the coronavirus, when you hear nothing but people falling sick and your hometown on the news everyday because the highest death toll is concentrated there. You start to be afraid, and one of the human reactions to fear is anger. 

Many European leaders have described this as a "war-like" situation. Most countries in Europe by now have acknowledged that the "Italian way" might be the only tool we have to stop the virus from spreading; my own country is now going through the worst crisis since WWII; more restrictive measures may be applied if the situation doesn't get better. It is, indeed, a critical situation all around the world. 

Nevertheless, during wars, you can give a face to the enemy. You can hate them, and be angry, and fight for your side. In an epidemic, you can't do that; you can't organize social dinners against the virus (as some students did in Venice, potentially spreading it even more), you can't use "we are not afraid" or "everything is going to be alright" as a slogan, you can't pretend that this enemy has a face and an opposite idea to you; the virus doesn't care about national borders, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation. It only cares about staying alive, just like we do.

In war, you do not feel safe in your own home, if you are lucky enough to still have a home; in our situation, home is the only place where you feel you have control, where you can still feel safe. 

We have to use different tools to get over this situation. Being angry is a privilege of the healthy ones. For anybody else, there is just fear and desperation - and when despair takes over, anything can happen. Only rational and scientific thinking will bring us out of this epidemic, because it is the only weapon we have - a weapon that is not there to kill, but to give us hope and understanding.

Therefore, it may not be like a war, but it will certainly leave equal consequences on a social and economic level. A generation is disappearing in Bergamo, and, maybe soon, in other parts of Italy or the world; our economy will struggle to get through this, especially if the tourism industry will take long to recover as other continents and countries go through the same issue in different times from us.

Maybe one thing we can learn from this situation is that research and healthcare should not be underfunded. You reap what you sow, and the cuts to our national health system are now resulting in a tragic situation we have never seen before. 

Mola mia, they say in the dialect spoken in Bergamo - do not give up. It is to me the only slogan that we can use right now. Do not give up on hope that this will be over soon (because it will end), do not give up on being healthy, do not give up on supporting each other - even if from behind a screen - do not give up and let anger or sadness devour you. This too shall pass.

Mola mia.

Bergamo. October 2018.