#oneaday Day 1049: Variant of Concern

So apparently there's a new COVID variant or something, and they've gone and called it something like Omicron to make it sound extra-threatening. I guess the upside of calling it that is that it now sounds a lot more like an RPG final boss, so that hopefully opens up the possibility of someone with a big sword gathering a party of plucky heroes to take it down once and for all.

I joke, because the alternative is in acknowledging the fact that this situation feels like it's never, ever going to be over. And it just kind of baffles me why people the world over have felt the need to be so goddamn resistant to attempts to keep everyone safe. There have even people that I know and respect acting like bonkers conspiracy theorists online over all this.

The reality is that the whole pandemic situation could have almost certainly been brought under control a lot sooner were it not for the fact that apparently a significant proportion of the world's population are complete nutters who think they know more than the concept of Science. These are the people who were still out and about in lockdowns, the people who have been anything but responsible about gatherings, and the ones who have been shouting the loudest about perfectly reasonable requests in a scenario like this.

Now we're faced with the situation worsening once again, and the possibility that the "light at the end of the tunnel" — the vaccine — is ineffective against the new variant. But you just know that if they try and instigate another lockdown or something, the same idiots are going to be out in the streets whingeing about personal freedom and whatever, making the whole situation worse for everyone.

I'm pretty fed up of it all. Not because I'm in a particular hurry to go out or anything, but because I'm so tired of what appears to be the apocalypse happening around us in more ways than one, and that a not-insignificant number of people appear to be perfectly happy to selfishly hasten it along rather than actually attempting to think of the wellbeing of others.

It doesn't really surprise me any more, though. If the last ten or so years in particular have shown us anything, it's that a lot of people are really self-obsessed, and if something doesn't affect them personally, it doesn't matter to them. Hell, I know I've been guilty of that at various points in the past too — only difference is that on the occasions when I've been guilty of it, I wasn't putting other people at risk in the middle of a global pandemic which, despite what everyone inexplicably decided partway through the year, is absolutely not over.

Oh well. Nowt that can be done about it right now at 11pm on a Saturday. Time for bed, I think.