Decisions about preparing for a disaster like this pandemic are political and reflect what a country prioritizes. To cope with a health emergency such as Covid-19, we needed a substantial and significant investment in the public health system and in the scientific infrastructure of our country. Just the areas in which Chile has been fragile and where frenetic utilitarianism has prevailed over an ethic of caring for everyone.

 

In the academic and scientific environment, it is very difficult for us to break the barrier of communication with people. The higher your academic status, the more difficult it is for you to connect your work to reality in the streets. In healthcare something similar happens, adding the inequality of the private versus public system. Certain private clinics seem like monuments to wealth, while community health centers and regional hospitals operate with scarce and almost symbolic resources to care for their patients.

 

A country that favors private health systems will always trigger inequality, especially when a pandemic occurs that transforms into a disaster for the most vulnerable. We repeat the errors of the Spanish influenza of 1918-1920, when people also began to sew masks for their personal care and where 2,676 deaths were registered certified by doctors and 37,437 reported by "witnesses" in Chile.

 

This disaster by choice was mitigable. It was possible to prioritize health over weapons. It was possible that everyone could stop their work activity for a few months without leading to an economic crisis that will affect people, communities and the nation. It was possible. Today when the authorities and their representatives communicate to us and make announcements about what we should do for Covid-19 - possibly with good intentions - they continue to make mistakes that place obstacles on prevention and, on the contrary, generate even more opportunities for contagion.

 

They announce a curfew, but they do not predict chaos in public transport, which, in turn, generates new points of contagion because workers in the periphery of the city need early transportation that it is not available. They recommend people to vaccinate for influenza without planning how they will avoid contagion among people from risk groups in places where patients arrive. They postpone the payment of bills to help us with financial hardships, but the online forms are not available to fulfill the requirements, but then they blame the people for crowding and fulfilling their obligations. In each case, it is the fault of the people and not of those with responsibilities to communicate clearly, directly, and carefully, during a crisis.

 

These appear not just communication errors, they reflect our fragility in the knowledge and the public health system that we have built. Disasters occur because we are not prepared for a threat like this virus. Disasters are a tough test of how resilient we are to a threat. In Chile we know this because our earthquaje history has taught us to build solid infrastructures by choice and design. In the case of the Covid-19, we are condemned to repeat the dramatic images that our grandparents and great-grandparents experienced when they were children. Countries engaged in defending themselves with weapons of war but unable to cope with a virus. We did not learn in 1920, will we learn a century later?