1. What is COVID-19? Is this phenomenon new?

According to World Health Organization, Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is an

Most people infected with the COVID-19 virus will experience mild to moderate
respiratory illness and recover without requiring special treatment.  Older people, and
those with underlying medical problems like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, chronic
respiratory disease, and cancer are more likely to develop serious illness. (ref it)(
https://www.who.int/health-topics/coronavirus)

If we’re talking about the disease itself, then COVID-19 is indeed a new
phenomenon but if we’re talking about the fact that it became a pandemic then it is not.
It is not the first time that the world faced a pandemic, our history proved that more
humans beings are killed because of viruses, bacteria and diseases than war or natural
disasters.

(Walsh, 2020), The plague of Justinian struck in the 6th Century and killed as many
as 50 million people, perhaps half the global population at the time. The Black Death of
the 14th Century – likely caused by the same pathogen – may have killed up to 200
million people. Smallpox may have killed as many as 300 million people in the 20th
Century alone, even though an effective vaccine – the world’s first – had been available
since 1796. Some 50 to 100 million people died in the 1918 influenza pandemic –
numbers that surpass the death toll of World War One, which was being fought at the
same time. The 1918 flu virus infected one in every three people on the planet. ( By
Bryan Walsh26th March 2020 https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200325-covid-19-the-history-
of-pandemics)

2. What are the problems that arise alongside with this pandemic?
 Experiencing the pandemic first hand really made everyone realized a lot of
things and different problems also arise. Though situations maybe different
depending on each households’ financial status, we can’t deny the fact that
problems are still and will be there.

During this community quarantine, only one person per family can go outside to
procure our essential needs with a very limited time to do so. In order to limit their time
going out while also making sure that the family won’t starve, it became a personal duty
to buy as many food as the budget can. Due to this, one of the most obvious problems
we are facing is the lack of supplies, may it be the food to personal needs. Everyone is
affected because of this, especially the lower class of our society who can only buy little
by little.

Another problem that this country is facing is our health care system. This maybe
is the most controversial and obvious problem that everyone knows. It actually became
an uproar in social sites that the budget allocated for defense is greater than the budget
for our health care system. Then come the lack of medical supplies for our medical
workers and how unprepared our country is. The people can’t help but to be anxious
with the situation. Additionally, The UP Team also found that there are - on the average
- 3.7 doctors per 10,000 population in the Philippines. The ratio is below the World
Health Organization-prescribed ratio of 10 doctors for every 10,000 people. (Ornedo,
2020) . (By JULIA MARI ORNEDO, GMA News.
https://www.gmanetwork.com/news/scitech/science/735023/up-experts-predict-overwhelmed-
healthcare-system-urge-officials-to-flatten-covid-19-curve-soon/story/)

3. How does this pandemic divide the world?

Fear can not only cause uneasiness and panic but also division to ourselves and
to others. We can start the topic of division by describing a family since it is the
foundation of society. Family, according to Merriam Webster, is a group of people living
together: household. It is safe to assume that family is where people can interact as
close as they want with each other but that was the assumption until the pandemic
came. The existence of Covid-19 drew an invisible line that divided everyone starting
from our families to the people outside. The simple affections we’re showering towards
our love ones are now limited or worse, were reduced to none due to some
circumstances at home. It is even harder to the family whose member is a frontliner and
just like cell division works, our families are now starting to divide.

Next to this is the society itself, there is actually a lot of complaints from people
who work in the frontline that they experience discrimination and there are also those
who protects them from this. The people’s perspective is now divided into two which
leads to arguments and chaos.

4. How do humans/civilizations cooperate to solve this problem?

Every country right now are doing their best to stop the virus from
spreading and to cure the patients in need. Every individuals are also doing their
best to help each other in their own ways.

This pandemic is really an eye opener not just for people but also the
government itself. The government started to prioritize health care by
implementing a lot of measures to prevent the virus to spread. One of those
measures is the implementation of enhanced community quarantine in order to
contain the virus. Other countries like Italy also took an initiative to put their
country on lockdown. The food also became an issue and in order to prevent
people from hunger, the government distributed relief goods to each family. A lot
of non-government organizations are also raising funds to help those in need. In
terms of our medical field, a lot of protective personal equipment were also
bought to protect our health workers. COVID-19 test kits were also procured and
it is really fortunate that our local scientists invented our own test kits that are
 much cheaper than those from overseas. Some government facilities are also
converted to quarantine facilities and new testing centers are now available.

Prominent to normal individuals are also doing their best to help solve this
problem we are currently facing. Famous artist are starting to held live concerts
or videos to raise funds from their fans. Voluntarism also played a great role
during these times, some people offers free ride to frontliners, others offered to
pack food packs and some chose not to receive relief goods for it to be given to
those who needs it more.

Since this disease does not have a vaccine yet, countermeasures and
discipline is what we need to have to solve it slowly. Pandemic is one of those
times that we need to unite as one and set aside our personal interest and learn
to consider the effects of our actions towards other people as well. It’s not about
us being self-reliant and lose trust to the government but we can atleast help in
doing things to prevent the virus from spreading.

5. Does humanity exist because of this? why or why not?

Everyone is having hard time coping up with the pandemic but humanity
still exist even during these times.