Mankind has always aspired to play God under the guise of science or politics. Mother Nature, however, has time and again, reminded human beings of the dangers of that endeavour-be it the Black Death, the Bubonic Plague, The Spanish flu, or the invisible enemy we face today, Covid-19, which has global popularity right now. The origin of the virus maybe in Wuhan, China but it has impacted the entire world and has taken the shape of a pandemic., having claimed thousands of lives and counting. I’m not your everyday good, religious Samaritan who’d say that this is God’s way of punishing us. However, I am of the belief that this is Nature’s way of punishing us for our constant abuse of her gifts. The polar ice caps are melting in the Arctic, tectonic plates, as age old as Pangea are shifting radically –all consequences of careless human actions.

We as a civilization were yoked to this rat race and the only pace at which we participated in this race was what gave us the illusion that we are moving forward with our lives. Funny, how a simple, invisible virus can upset the established order and disrupt us, shaking the very foundations of modernity. Although many European countries are on the verge of complete recovery, the countries with the most population i.e., USA, India, Russia, and Brazil are the worst afflicted. The virus believes in equality. It is not like most corrupt politicians that target only the poor. It has affected big shots like Djokovic or Jair Bolsonaro.

This pandemic has revealed many hilarious trends of human behavior. One can literally see people fighting over sanitizers and toilet paper in an American supermarket while a man from Texas, who lives alone, has hoarded 1800 rolls of toilet paper. I wonder what his crapper smells like! Scratch that thought. The dire consequences that many poor countries will face is the economic depression that will follow as our country has already sunk into a period of recession. Thousands of employees being fired from their jobs, businesses shutting down and a feeling of uncertainty of the future is looming large. Maybe the Mayans were eight years early with their calculations about the world ending as some cynics might tell you. However, no matter the adversity, be it man-made like war or natural disasters, it is always the poor who suffer most.

I’m an optimist through and through. I believe that suffering creates character and we as a civilization will emerge victorious from this fear that grips the world right now. Medicines are already being manufactured to combat the virus, students providing community aid, NGOs helping with relief funds-these are the things that restore faith in humanity.