Collateral damage: the dramatic effects of the pandemic (and lockdowns) that do not enter the official balance sheets
The consequences of Covid-19 are, unfortunately, known to all of us. The coronavirus affects in various ways, in most of the infected it has mild and moderate symptoms but sometimes much more serious, in some circumstances even fatal, including breathing difficulties, chest pains and loss of the ability to move.
What many still do not understand is that the pandemic, or rather the restrictive measures adopted by governments, bring with them many long-term disturbances and damage that cannot, indeed must not be underestimated.
Not negligible psychological disorders such as fear, sense of loss, up to the most serious forms of depression and exhaustion. Obviously, it is normal to feel lost following an experience as strong as that of a pandemic that has totally upset our lives, but it is not so normal that no one talks about it and that we pretend that these psychological consequences do not exist: unfortunately we they are and are as serious as the "physical" consequences.
The perennial isolation, the very scarce social life and the continuous uncertainty about the future entail a difficult burden for everyone's mind to manage. All of these factors only add to the worry and discomfort of most people. The lockdown and the consequent social and economic crisis have unfortunately also caused an increase in the use of alcohol and drugs, especially among young people and the most fragile people. Unfortunately, these are problems that will carry on for a long time, well beyond the end of the pandemic.
Young people have been so affected in particular by the lack of school and university life and the sociality connected to it. The lack of a daily routine and the deprivation of contacts have led, not only in young people, to the unbridled search for a "sense of satisfaction" in alcohol and drugs.
The alarm also concerns the progressive increase in the use of psychotropic drugs to counter the increasingly widespread sense of anxiety and anguish. The chronicles of these months of pandemic tell us many stories of suffering and pain that unfortunately, on too many occasions have led to tragedy: suicide. Unfortunately, the pandemic has also brought with it a progressive increase in suicides: many people have decided to take their own lives because they are afraid of the contagion or because of the disastrous economic consequences that have affected their activities.
It is not a question of negligible damage, but of effects – also of public policies – that were somehow budgeted.
The post Collateral damage: the dramatic effects of the pandemic (and of the lockdowns) that do not enter the official balance sheets appeared first on Atlantico Quotidiano .
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Atlantico Quotidiano at the URL http://www.atlanticoquotidiano.it/quotidiano/danni-collaterali-gli-effetti-drammatici-della-pandemia-e-dei-lockdown-che-non-entrano-nei-bilanci-ufficiali/ on Sat, 27 Feb 2021 04:51:00 +0000.