by Shapol Mohamed
(source: Unsplash) |
I know, you must be exhausted by now of hearing
comparisons between the current pandemic we are experiencing and <insert
terrible moment in history here>. So that will be the last thing that I will
write about. However, I haven’t seen many comparisons between the novel
coronavirus with the future problems that await us, namely climate change.
I say climate change is a future problem but it
is not just a problem for the future; it is a problem for the present too. This
highlights the first similarity between the two stumbling-blocks for human
progress and that is both are invisible. The majority of coronavirus patients
show no symptoms once they have contracted it. The virus can not be detected by
the patients, yet it is deadly. Likewise, many of the symptoms of climate
change are hidden out of sight from us. The acidifying of oceans, a drastic
drop in the number of bees, coral reef bleaching are all unnoticeable to most
of us in the first world.
Unnoticeable it may be to us in the modern world
however we are all in this together. Just like how we are in the same boat with
the coronavirus, we are also under the same atmosphere. It will affect the
whole world. We are all the problem and we are all the solution. As the German
saying goes, we aren't in traffic but we are traffic - we are the problem. To
decrease the impact of the coronavirus we can enact social distancing and to
tackle climate change we can decrease our carbon footprint. In the media, we
hear a plethora of content covering herd immunity, the equivalent to herd
immunity in the fight against climate change is sustainability. This simple
solution will protect us all.
Climate change might be concealed to us right
now and we may see it as a distant problem but remember that Wuhan was once a
distant problem too. We underestimated how close Wuhan to us is. Wuhan is not
thousands of kilometres away from us - it is a few handshakes away. In
comparison, climate change is not centuries away from us - it is right here
right now banging on the door.
In parallel to one another, both problems have
their epicentres in the US and China. The two world superpowers have
experienced the most number of cases of COVID-19 and both are the biggest
polluters in the world.
The number of casualties due to the coronavirus
is approximately a quarter of a million and the World Health Organisation puts
the same estimate on the annual number of casualties due to climate change.
Both numbers will rise at an alarming rate if serious action is not taken. 1.5°C increase in the
average global temperature might seem not very disturbing just like how “minor
cough” may not seem very serious. Nevertheless, it is not just disturbing but
is life-threatening.
Action needs to be taken so that we return to
normal and continuing to see the Earth as only a money-making resource and the
sky above us as a bottomless bin, to artificially inflate the next quarter's
profits, with CEOs sitting in reality-proofed boardrooms comparing the size of their
bonuses while begging for taxpayer bailouts but refusing to pay taxes
themselves: no, thatʼs a “normal” we simply canʼt afford going back to. We need
system change, not climate change.
Comments
Post a Comment
Comments with names are more likely to be published.