The pandemic is winding down, businesses are reopening, yet normalcy is hidden by a mist of uncertainty. Some day we will know if the measures taken during the pandemic were the right ones. I don’t believe I am qualified to comment on that. All levels of government did what they thought was best, according to the information available to them. It is fair to say, though, that China and the WHO did not provide reliable information at the beginning.

I want to talk about one aspect of the pandemic. There was much fear-mongering at the beginning, with good intentions, to prepare people for a monumental health crisis. However, 80% of the deaths from COVID-19 have occurred in long-term care facilities.

We have known for years that there are risks when we take people whose health is not robust and place large numbers of them in one place. Influenza and Noro viruses spread like wildfire in such a setting. A little carelessness in food handling exposes many frail people to gastrointestinal upsets, sometimes fatal.

Why do we think it’s a good idea to expose them to such risks? Possibly because we don’t know what else to do with people who are no longer contributors to society. We have lost the respect we should have for elderly people. The best thing to do is put them in a place where professional staff can amuse them and care for them until the end of their days.

I know many of them have dementia. But evidence suggests that dementia develops more slowly when people feel they are doing something of benefit to others. Wouldn’t we all benefit if we could break down the walls of age segregation? Perhaps this pandemic has given many people time to ponder whether our pursuit of new and change is delivering the benefits we expected.

Every life lived has a story that can offer insights and encouragement to others. I’m not talking about nostalgia. That’s when the old folks get together and talk about how things were better in the good old days. Honestly, though, in many ways they were not better. But people have learned lessons from the difficulties they have faced, the mistakes they have made.

Getting back to my starting point about the way we care for the elderly, I don’t have any ideas about how we should change the institutions we now have. But I think social distancing is a horrible choice of words. We had far too much of that, already. Let’s do physical distancing as long as it’s needed. But lets build social connections between young and old and all strata of our society. I believe we will all benefit. Emotional and mental health are as important as physical health. People who are emotionally and mentally healthy are usually more physically healthy.