A world of Covidiots and Covidients

The coronavirus has united the world, but also spawned new communities.

By ET Bureau | Updated: Mar 24, 2020, 08.26 AM IST

There are the toilet roll hoarders and hand sanitiser stockers, both communities inexplicably oblivious to the fact that there are alternate means of achieving what the two items do.

At a time when people around the world are coming together setting aside their conventional differences to battle the Covid-19 pandemic, new communities are springing up at the same time, also triggered by the virus. These are not dependent on ethnicities or political leanings, social status or nationalities; they based on responses by different people to the most serious worldwide public health crisis in recent memory.

For instance, there are the toilet roll hoarders and hand sanitiser stockers, both communities inexplicably oblivious to the fact that there are alternate means of achieving what the two items do. Then there are those who see this as the disaster movie come-to-life with no guarantee of a picturesque new dawn at the end of two hours and a bucket or two of popcorn. And they are in direct opposition to those around the world who are insouciantly going about their business convinced they are either invincible (by virtue of age or circumstance) or some unknown immunity.

In short, various types of Covidiots are now emerging. Unfortunately, by comparison, the ranks of Covidients — who obey the directives and orders, appeals and advice dispensed by authorities these days with varying degrees of urgency — are far less numerous. Social anthropologists as well as political scientists will have plenty of new material to study.

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