With the start of summer, countries began to relax their isolation measures. The United Kingdom, where there were no deaths reported yesterday, plans to lift many restrictions on June 21. Turkey, on the other hand, where the number of cases is declining rapidly, entered the process of partially loosening its strict measures as of June 1.
According to the new regulation, it is still mandatory to wear masks – even outdoors – in Turkey. Restaurants and cafes will be able to serve until 9 p.m. before the curfew starts at 10 p.m. On Sundays, the full lockdown continues. Collective events and activities in the public sphere are also limited.
Some experts argue that increasing vaccinations and drastic lockdown measures are effective in decreasing cases. However, they have not yet been able to produce convincing evidence to support their theses.
However, as in India, some authorities claim that the cause of variants is vaccines that make the virus resistant. Others explain the decrease in the number of cases comes with the arrival of summer in the Northern Hemisphere and the warming of the weather. Some scientists emphasize that for centuries upper respiratory tract diseases tended to decrease as the weather got warmer, so they attribute decreases in coronavirus tables to this calendar.
Although such a viewpoint is "scientifically excommunicated" as it goes beyond the official discourses of the World Health Organization (WHO) regarding the pandemic, this thesis does not seem unreasonable at all. As the weather warms up, people's immunity gets stronger. People who get more sunlight and fresh air become more resistant to diseases such as the flu and coronavirus.
Of course, in this case, the first question that comes to mind is what will happen as the summer passes and the weather starts to cool with autumn.
Considering the practices of last year, a return to strict isolation measures would not be surprising. In this case, we can predict that the measures will be tightened as upper respiratory tract diseases increase in winter.
When is the end?
How long will this "medical martial law" last?
Will we always live like this from now on? Are we going to relax partially in the summer and be confined to our houses in the winter?
In other words, will we continue to panic and stop life each year as if we are encountering a virus for the first time?
This state of affairs does not seem to be pleasant unless we do not get rid of going into a panic, which was conceivable at the beginning of the pandemic.
The serious side effects caused by controversial isolation measures we have enacted to prevent the spread of the virus also increases our concerns.
Because restrictions are imposed in line with utopian goals such as zeroing the number of cases, "our new seasonal flu" will have much more deadly results. Limiting the practices that connect people to life paves the way for hard-to-recover losses.
The fact that economies come to a standstill due to isolation measures causes many times more deaths than the coronavirüs pandemic.
Not to mention the severe consequences of suspending our universal rights and freedoms, which were acquired over thousands of years, such as going out and traveling.
I hope I stumble in the dark scenario I predicted by assessing the process and dominant discourses. I wish the nightmare ends this summer.