Notes On An Epidemic

 Optimism and hope are necessary states of mind for a well-balanced psyche. But it's increasingly worrisome news we hear, more liable to make people feel glum and powerless than to look to the future with confidence. Public health authorities and government figures at the executive level keep emphasizing that there is just so much that they can do for society; society too must make an effort to ensure that we all come through this dreadful pandemic as well as might be expected if everyone recognized the vital importance of tuning in to messages of quiet instruction.

Among us there are too many skeptics, those who appear to believe in conspiracy theories, that the COVID-19 epidemic that is making people ill, sending many to hospitals, where some will not survive is nothing but an attempt by government to take greater power over people's lives. That physical distancing alienates people, mask-wearing is a needless exercise in frustration and the manner in which ordinary, normal life has been altered in an effort to restrain the virus's contagion is all for nothing.

Cranks and outliers see nothing amiss in behaving as though these temporary restrictions in lifestyle and the social distancing mandated in an effort to control a deadly virus that preys on the elderly and the health-impaired are unneeded. That they will comport themselves as they wish. While mocking those who slavishly adhere to authority. In the process of eschewing masks to control the level of contagion, and mingling in close interior quarters with others of like mind, they believe themselves to be superior to the quaking fear-mongers.

They become disease carriers and since they're mostly fairly young, most sail through the period of infection, but those whom they have themselves infected may not be young and represent the vulnerable in society. Even so, they are responsible for widening the pool of SARS-CoV-2 virus sufferers, ensuring that the disease acquires a firmer grip on society as a whole. A process that leads inevitably to an unsustainable burden for the medical community, with hospitals stretched beyond their capacity to function, equipment and protective devices coming into short supply, and cases continuing to multiply, along with community death rates.

 We have all of this in the back of our minds, as we go about daily life trying to do our best to shelter ourselves from infection and bearing in mind that in so doing we're also helping to keep the infection rate down. It's a question of whether the majority of the population who do as we do will in the end have the greater, positive effect on the situation, or whether the situation will continue to spiral out of control as a reflection of a minority within the population who have little concept of personal responsibility.

To soothe our overworked concern quotient, we're able to enter an environment that salves the wearied mind with its calm natural landscape. So we are among the most fortunate of the fortunate, making our daily venture out into a natural setting accessed by us with little effort, taking along our two little dogs both as irresistibly accented company and for the good of their own health. 

As we did today. As we did yesterday. As we do every day of the week, the month, the year and the year before this one. It's fall, and fittingly, cool, windy and rainy. But eventually the rain does stop, and the sun emerges, highlighting the change in the season moving steadily from early to late fall and eventually winter. Each season with its own charm and challenges.

When we descended into the ravine early this afternoon, we did so on increasingly leaf-and-needle-padded forest trails. Where freshly fallen leaves lie like colourful confetti and as we progress, our eyes are drawn to individual leaves, different from the congregate they lie among; carmine, splotched, striped, gold, as distinct and individual as are those who make up a population of people, some stand out and some melt into the crowd.

Night rain had swollen the creek again, and it was muddy close to the bridge we were about to cross, just as the floorboards of the bridge had muddy imprints of dog prints as testament to the love of many dogs to plunge into the creek, likely for them the most attractive element of their ramble through the woods as companions to the humans in whose homes they live.

Since the pandemic, the woodland trails that once were the precinct of community members who love the natural trails through the extensive forest and ravine, suddenly became a popular destination for many others out on bicycles, runners, family groups, dog walkers, and though things have quieted down substantially from earlier months as area parks have re-opened along with other venues popular with people, it is only Saturdays now that we see occasional trail walkers among the regulars. 

Half of the time we were out, we were hard put to dodge groups of other people making their way along the trail system, but the other half of our circuit was relatively free of such impediments to quiet peace and balm to a disquieted mind. Most people are courteous, and those that are not are simply a temporary part of the landscape. Is that a metaphor?

Sheltering Safely in Community Neighbourhoods

"Neighbourhoods at the core of the city [Manhattan] had a lower rate of infection."
"And through the first two weeks of April, that gap between the core and the periphery actually grew rather than shrank."
Salim Furth, senior research fellow, Mercator Center, Arlington, Va.

"The right way to do isolation is to do it quickly."
"We want to have the ability to isolate over short periods of time and use that short time to help people get over the disease and get back to normal."
Yaneer Bar-Yam, director, New England Complex Sciences Institute

New York is down, but certainly not out. PHOTO: Colton Duke

Logic had it -- or so it was thought -- that dense urban environments would ensure that the SARS-CoV-2 virus causing COVID-19 infection rate would skyrocket. In New York that didn't quite happen. The super-dense city wasn't super-infected in the densest areas, after all. A map of viral spread in New York in mid-April showed that the heat of infection was not in the subway-tentacled heart of the city; rather it took place in the roomy car-dependent outer neighbourhoods.

When coronavirus infection data was compared with commute models across zip codes, researcher Salim Furth realized that higher viral infection rates appeared to take place in car-dependent neighbourhoods. The reason behind this phenomenon is not yet understood, but a reasonable theory has arisen; that subway users, conscious of the need to self-isolate stayed behind in their own communities, while those residents living in suburban sprawl continued to drive.



Grocery stores, pharmacies and all manner of services are located some distance away in most suburban sprawl locations, as are big box stores and shopping plazas where hundreds or thousands of people gather and physically interact. Though epidemiologists are left to sift through piles of risk factors, viral spread is being increasingly linked to crowded conditions within dwellings as well as occupations placing workers in close proximity to many others.

These conditions are associated not with density per se, but poverty. Toronto released a map indicating viral rates at the end of May across the city, where poor neighbourhoods on the fringes were hit harder than the dense, affluent downtown core. Similarly globally, the densest cities -- Seoul and Singapore among them -- were recognized as being the most successful at countering the viral infection rate.

Vancouver's Commercial Drive, Edmonton's Strathcona, Toronto's Danforth are all areas where residents are able to readily walk to access daily needs; shopping, school, supermarkets, community centre, places of worship, parks.  These represent self-sufficient communities, where short local lockdowns can take place without inconveniencing residents to the straining point.



Public health officials have advised that cities adopt more walkable community designs, where those living in walkable communities with an abundance of local shops, services and amenities report being likelier to know and trust their neighbours; relationships where people look out for one another. Even children growing within mixed-use, walkable places benefit hugely, and end up more likely to climb the socio-economic ladder.

Because of the global pandemic and the influence it has exerted on people's daily lives an unprecedented opportunity has opened for a timely change in city structures. As a result of the crisis neighbourhood streets have seen changes with less traffic enabling people to have room to move and breathe. Business districts have been transforming parking lanes into patios for social distance dining and shopping. Homeless people have been offered hotel rooms during the crisis.

Will these lessons in civic and civil bonds between people continue, should city planners recognize the benefits inherent in community neighbourhoods? In a truly crowded city like Tokyo, community neighbourhoods are the norm; people belong, feel comfortable, are able to walk to all the services they hold dear and require for a comfortable lifestyle. Why not emulate what is successful?

The Hungry Among Us

"I was trying to find something [that would bring people together in an effort to help others] that was universal and everyone can agree on -- and everyone has to eat."
"[Since then the Lowcountry Blessing Box project has] exploded."
"My response [to people who complain] has been that poor people are always here -- you can't judge somebody based on what you're observing." 
"Everybody goes up to the project the exact same way — whether you’re putting food in or taking food out. So no one knows what position you’re in."
Katie Dahlheim, Little Free Pantry network, South Carolina

"The reason people were so ready for this [Community Food Box Project] is because they see people in their neighbourhoods every day who are hungry, and this is something they can do about it."
Sierra Nuckols-Cosby, Little Free Pantries, Indiana

The Little Free Pantry

Most people have seen Little Free Library initiatives where people leave books they have read for others to pick up and take advantage of and leave behind books of their own. Usually there is a boxed arrangement of some kind with shelving set up innocuously in a public space and people are invited to help themselves, free of charge. It's a great way to spread books and the love of reading around; people are able to dispose of books they've read and offer to others the chance to read a book they might otherwise not know exists. The book, or others like it, can be returned to the shelves after reading and the entire community is set to be enriched by this mode of sharing.

The concept appealed for its simplicity and its open-handedness and its benefit to communities, and it inspired a global movement called Little Free Pantry, giving to those in need, with 24-hour access and no questions asked. Every community has its local Food Bank and its purpose is similar albeit not spontaneous. To qualify, people are screened to ensure they have access to Food Banks, an organized affair unlike the free pantries which ask no questions, are always open and accessible and are meant to serve without intruding.

The founder of the Little Free Pantry used the free library project as her model. Jessica McClard meant community members and local businesses to become involved, just as they have with free book access in over 90 countries, with free-standing boxes appearing in cities making books available to the interested. The first free pantry box was built by Ms. McClard in 2016 in Fayetteville, Arkansas on the grounds of a church. Arkansas, she stated, has always been one of the most food-insecure states in the country. She stocked diapers and hygiene products, along with non-perishable food.

The 2008 recession had a profound effect on communities in the United States, just as it did all over the world where recovery is only yet still in progress. A September 2018 report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture indicated that over 11 percent of the American population live in "food-insecure" households. A damning statistic that is reflected all over the developed world, in very fact. Harvard University research in 2017 showed "severely burdened" households spend half of what secure households do on food.

Using the motto "Feeding Neighbours, Nourishing Neighbourhoods", the Little Free Pantry movement in four years has expanded to 670 recorded projects. Not only has it seen pick-up across the United States but abroad there are now similar projects in Europe, Canada, South Africa, the Philippines, New Zealand and Australia, according to Ms.McClard. South Carolina has the distinction of boasting one of the larger Little Free Pantry networks, born out of its founder Katie Dahlheim motivated two years ago by a nationally polarized atmosphere and deciding to build four pantries from old cabinets,

nets.

Two years later, close to one hundred such boxes have spread throughout a third of South Carolina. When children are out of school in the summer, their families must face the need to feed them three meals daily, and these boxes respond to that need for impoverished families. In Indianapolis, old newspaper distribution boxes are the vehicle of choice for Sierra Nuckols-Cosby. In 2016, she realized the city had "food deserts" where people lack access to grocery stores and fresh produce. And so she used the decommissioned newspaper boxes for Little Free Pantries.

Two preteen girls stocked their refurbished dresser with fruit, canned goods, toothpaste, children's books and other items in Alexandria, Virginia. Twelve-year-olds, Amanda Santana and Anna Rissi, attached a sign to their cabinet that read "Take what you need, leave what you can", and the residents of the area make it their business to regularly stock the "pantry" with non-perishable food, toiletries and toys, readily available free, to anyone needing them.