Criminal Inaction Of Kinglet

What fabulous illusions live in the mind of the President of Narnia?

When after the New Year holidays, slowly eating my mother's cutlets, I was lazily flipping through the news feed on the net, it was already reported that there was another outbreak of something atypical in China.

I yawned, and I started to look through the English Prime League statistics.

Then there was Christmas, the old New Year and the Epiphany Day. There was a modest plate with a diet salad standing next to my laptop on the table, and the Internet was full of news that a disease was spreading in some kind of "buhan".

- Wow...- I yawned, - I hope they can handle it. And turned to the news of local politics and economy.

When two weeks later the name of the coronavirus and the geographical location of Wuhan (which turned out to be more crowded than my entire country) became familiar, and it was clear that the Chinese New Year instead of "show must go on" was held in a strict quarantine and in the emergency conditions, I exchanged views on these amazing events with a friend and said: "Probably something serious, since there are such measures. I wish it wouldn't get to us".

My friend, an intelligent and decent man, a historian by education, condescendingly smiled at my distant alarm and asked me to recommend him a good family film for the evening.

Ten days later, YouTube was full of videos about the post-apocalyptically empty streets of Chinese metropolises, journalists were hyping actively with their naive jokes, and data about the first infected outside China started to come from around the world. At that time I expressed my online opinion on the forum where I actively communicate. I was saying that the disease seems to be spreading actively, and given its long incubation period, and given how global the world has become, there is not much chance that it will be a problem for one country. And it is necessary to think about preventive measures seriously already today, proceeding from simple wisdom of life: sometimes it is better to overreact than to underreact. In response, I got shot with a volley of aggressive irony and with some single shots about the conspiracy of the world's pharmacists.

I didn't argue for long, I just went and bought a dozen masks at the nearest pharmacy. I am paranoid, so I realized that if there was a conspiracy, there would be a deficit.

It took another week, during which the world was destroyed more and more, the clothes of the world were becoming more and more like a shroud, and reasonable people were no longer talking about something "no more terrible than the flu". February was coming to an end. I asked my wife to be a bit more positive, not to cry, but to go to the pediatrician to get prescriptions for our five-year-old allergic child. I'm paranoid, and I didn't rule out further supply disruptions. And some of the medications the baby needs are vital.

It was early March. The Chinese were doing great. But some carefully hidden mess was happening in Persia, where people from the higher echelons of power were getting sick and dying. So what was going on among the lower classes? There was an uneasy situation in Italy, so far only in the north. In general, soon there would be no countries left without infection. Our neighbours, the Poles, found the first carrier. We urgently went to Poland with my wife and child to pass the planned expensive allergology analysis, which is not done in Belarus. We were in a hurry, because I am paranoid, and I was sure that the borders would soon be closed. A neighbor heard about my trip, laughed and said: "Who's going to block it? Bialystok will die away without Belarusians". March 6th was on the calendar.

I don't see any sense in describing the next days until today. The news was falling in avalanches. A nightmare in Italy, and then in Spain. Ubiquitous cancellation of events and stopping the championships. Border closures, serious quarantine events. Public figures, initially sceptical about the topic, suddenly started talking about the seriousness of the problem. WHO declared a pandemic. Many countries introduced an emergency regime.

And at this most serious moment, when such nontrivial and dangerous events are unfolding around us, when our neighbours are taking unprecedented steps to control the epidemic as much as possible, and some countries have shown a vivid, demonstrative but absolutely tragic example of delay in taking adequate action, we see only the flapping lashes of Karanik, unable to make decisions even for students, let alone for the whole country. And the whole country, through the eyes of the leadership, is looking through pink lenses at transparent borders, and smiling in a silly way.

I do not know what fabulous illusions live in the head of the chairman of Narnia, who sunk in his pathological self-deception, but there is a feeling that he simply does not perceive any objective data. I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out that Yarmoshyna personally reports him about the number of coronavirus infected in Belarus. Besides, his overwhelming cowardice has never thought about anyone's safety, except for the safety of his own useless skin

And the people? And the people would shut up and go to work. Oh now, the villeins have set their minds to worry! The coronavirus will be banned by our decree, and all losers who dare to die outside the planned statistics will be buried in the trenches with lime by the experience of Iran.

I wonder, isn't it time to announce the best coronavirus treatment? No, really! Who is our regime's stronghold, the defenders of the fatherland? Well, not the lousy intellectuals - those very "fascists" - with their thirst for knowledge about the true history of the state and love for their native language? No. Our saviors are only the riot police! Right there in full uniform they will be sent to infectious disease units: each patient gets one rifleman! Those who are especially heavy - two each! There they will fulfill their duty to the people, and if someone lacks medicines or IVL machines, our brave soldiers will disperse the virus with batons and counteract its attack with a shield. And if they read out loud the protector-quote by Lukashenka, the virus will undoubtedly retreat. This system has been building up for a long time, they have been protecting it, and therefore, I am confident, they will cope with the new task with honor.

Because I, as an ordinary average paranoid, don't know about any other special preparations for the epidemic. The master hasn't bothered to tell me.

No, I'm lying! The Ministry of Health came up with a "takes one to know one" performance. We don't need any quarantine, we have everything under control, and those who don't believe - they are alarmists.

Dear Ministry of Health!

I'm not an alarmist, I'm paranoid! At the land of the most honest elections and impossible devaluations, where deodorant "Soviet Union" is spayed into the air and they do not want to tell the truth about the consequences of Chernobyl, any conscious citizen must know it absolutely: if an official has opened his mouth, then he is lying.

And if these days they are trying to calm us down, and the figures of the officially infected are growing not in mathematical progression, but according to statistical expediency, it is possible that the real number of infected people is hidden from us. Or the Ministry of Health itself simply does not know it.

The Internet is full of stories how people return to their Homeland without undergoing any sort of control. There’s a lot of outrage about the formalism at the border, which looks savage in these conditions, in the country where no one gives a ***k about anything.

Here, in Vaukavysk, all the basic industry enterprises have been totally destroyed. Many women, very many men leave their families and migrate abroad in search of a job. There are more than just one hundred of long-haul truckers alone in the town. And when they return home to their families, after the haul cycles, rotations, working shifts - who takes the remotest interest to them? What are you talking about?...

I'm paranoid, I am not a prophet. I cannot tell under which scenario the coronavirus infection will develop in our country. Maybe, by the time when the virus gets some serious grip around us, it will have mutated to some more or less safe form? Or maybe the spring sun will start scorching at some 30 degrees, and the natural ultraviolet will stop the epidemic. I do not rule out aliens will help us, dropping a test-tube with the vaccine right onto Drazdy. Or, in the worst-case scenario, we will turn out to be a God-selected nation, immune to any infection. What if, hah?

However, most likely, we are cut of the same cloth by the God, as the dwellers of the rest sinful world. This destiny will not bypass us. And if we suppose that the number of hidden infection cases is now quite high - and alas, this is very likely - the situation in our country may be more complicated than in Italy.

You don’t think that the qualification of our doctors, and еру provision of our hospitals is better than in Italy, do you? What will happen when it comes upon us? We had a visualized lesson right in front of our eyes, and a two-week leeway. Apparently, we will not use any of it.

I think this year may appear decisive in the fate of Lukashenka. If God does not save us from this by some miracle, and the logic of development of an epidemic, under the criminal inaction of the authorities, takes many lives, I do not rule out that the most devoted dogs will bite the feeding hand. Because, ministerial gods, well-fed deputies, executive committees’ muck-a-mucks, dishonest policemen, impudent KGB men - all of them may pay for the criminal inaction of the kinglet with the lives of their close people. They defended him while he protected their families. And if there are many dead, no one knows what will happen next. Right?...

So, what should we do - the taxated menials, who are even not allowed to go for a quarantine, because the master will under-receive the mentioned taxes?

I will tell you a rather sad story that happened yesterday night. I came to a food store late in the evening, when there are not so many people, objectively. I was sitting in the car watching the store entrance: not a single person put on a mask when entering the store, in ten minutes. I realized how stupid I will look, but still put on this mask, having fingered it over. I heard the opinion of virusologists that the mask does not protect perfectly well, although the last researches claim there is a certain effect of wearing the face mask, but I didn’t wear it for safety reasons. I did it out of respect for others, because I had contacted those who returned from abroad in the recent days. I myself was in Poland. Therefore, I have no idea whether I could be an infection carrier. I am 47, I have long ceased to try to be liked by someone, I just live in accordance with my principles. Watching the faces of my compatriots with curiosity, I saw sneer in every second look, and felt irritation. When I was getting in the car, someone shouted into my back, ironically and slowly: “Coronaaaviiiruuuuuus!”

You are right, my dear compatriots! I am too paranoid, one needs to live without trouble, and wear a less complicated facial expression!

But I am so much afraid that these sneers will start fading away only when cemeteries fill up fast. But I fear it will be too late…

So, what am I calling for? I am calling for more serious attitude towards the virus. There is no need for panic, but how can you possibly know how your body will react to the virus? Have you really been convinced that the young do not die? It’s triple haha. HAHAHA! ... Okay, you got into the 80% of those who endure the disease with no problem, but will your grandparents cope with it so easily? And your parents? What if they need help, but by that time there will be the collapse in hospitals, there will be no room not only in the intensive care units, but in the corridors? Yes, this already happened… In Wuhan, in Lombardia, in Iran.

There’s a wide range of safety recommendations in the internet. The common rules are very similar. It is possible to memorize and follow them, although it may seem tiresome. Just like taking some voluntary quarantine. Maybe this is even more annoying. But take care of your elderly, if not of yourselves. You can curse all power endlessly, but at such moments we should not shift our own responsibility to the power. Otherwise, are you any better than the virus which put on a crown and thinks only about itself?

Viktar Havarouski, reader of Charter97.org

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