PANDEMIC AND CLIMATE CHANGE

Over the centuries, there have been pandemics that killed millions of people who had no idea of the cause except the wrath of God.

The bubonic plague ravaged Europe during the little ice age. Europe was bitterly cold and caused inhabitants to live in the warmth of their homes that were freezing cold too. 

Agriculture ceased and no markets for food. Rats lived in the homes and brought bubonic plague to every family. The Catholic church was helpless and made worse by the deaths of the priests. 

The plague was a key factor in the rise of Protestantism as believers did not go to church for fear of infection. 

The educated believers bought Bibles that were being published. The uneducated believers in the rural areas stayed with the church then and now.

The little ice age continued through the Napoleonic wars and World War 1. Soldiers on the Western Front suffered cold. Many Germans on the Russian front died of vicious cold.

Then came the Asian Flu in 1918 that cut a swathe through armies and citizens. Up to 100 million people died from fierce pneumonia that turned their lips blue and brought death within days.

Now Covid 19 has hit every nation on the planet infecting millions but causing a lesser number to die. Death is now a new normal.

We are not to know how long the pandemic will last. A worst case scenario is that it will last forever. 

It may mutate. It may infect the same person more than once as the antibodies become ineffective after 3 months as research has shown. Sufferers may have a spiralling down of resistance.

We will learn the hard way if we ignore the protocols and be punished by spikes in infection in hotspot areas. This has happened in the USA.

We take risks by attending group meetings in churches, nightclubs, sporting matches, ANZAC Days and Black Lives Matter rallies. People are foolish to protest against lock-downs. 

Nations are rushing to produce vaccines. Let us hope that failure does not bring the rejection of the protocols and a spike in infection that hits thousands.

Social Distancing will affect us in myriads of ways. Relationships between all people will have to change.

Focus will have to be on FAMILY. Family members have to accept permanent limitations on movement, activities and associations.

Covid 19 will affect sport, travel in passenger liners, nursing homes, naval movement in war ships and deployment of soldiers.

Education, health and employment will suffer as schools, work places and hospitals are locked down due to positive diagnosis. Unemployment and recession will bring national poverty across the world.

Reducing our activities will lead to pre-existing illness that make the sufferer susceptible to Covid 19 at a later date. We may die of illnesses that we have not been infected with yet - obesity, heart problems and diabetes 2.

We face the virus at a time of climate change with earthquakes, tsunamis, drought, floods, forest fires , sea levels rising and polar ice caps melting. It is a disaster if a community suffers from the virus and natural catastrophe at the same time.

We have to return to agriculture with market gardens for home consumption and market sales. Our immune systems have to be strengthened through a regular diet of FRUIT and VEGETABLES. These do not cure Covid19 but strengthen the immune system to defend.

Recent media reports advise that the world will be inundated with sea water within a hundred years. Those living will all be dead but our descendants will suffer. 

Islands of the world will be inundated together with lowlands that are the homes of millions of people. As the ice caps melt, the sea level will slowly rise giving people a chance to retreat to higher ground. Coastal towns and villages will be covered in sea water.

The Markham and Ramu valleys of Papua New Guinea will become straits between two islands as before. The USA will be divided into two continents by the inundation of the Mississippi River. 

The Ganges delta will deprive Bangladesh of massive land resources. The sea will sweep across Europe. There will not be enough land for the climate refugees.

China will lose the stolen islands in the South China Sea. The Philippines will lose most of its islands. Who knows what will be the effect on the San Andreas fault in west USA?

And Coronavirus may still be raging across the world. There are those who believe the world is facing "end times" as we read in Revelations. 

One does not need to be a believer to hold this view. The world is masterminding its own devastation. The skies of Beijing and Mexico City are on their way back to their old levels of pollution before the Covid 19 lock-down.