Virus and Big Brother

Monday 16th November 2020

Whoever would have thought, a few years ago, that a runaway virus would upend the modern world in this manner? Coronavirus has brought about an unprecedented situation where everyone, across the globe, feels just like Winston Smith in George Orwell’s dystopian novella, ‘1984’. Winston is troubled by his omniscient party leader, Big Brother, watching him and monitoring even his thoughts.

Surveillance as a pandemic control measure has become the order of the day. It is a necessary evil, given the severity of the global health emergency. More than 54 million people have been afflicted with COVID-19, which has snuffed out as many as 1.3 million lives, in the world. The global economy is screaming. The worst is yet to come, according to international health experts, who warn of a much more destructive third wave of infections.

The world is at war with the highly contagious virus, and the response of some countries to the health emergency is said to be becoming increasingly militarised. Sri Lanka is among the first few countries that deployed their militaries to battle the virus at the very early stages of the pandemic. It looks as if other countries had to follow suit.

The Sri Lanka army has unveiled a newly acquired capability in the war against the virus, which is as elusive as terrorists; it has set up a drone brigade and embarked on a mission to trace quarantine law violators in the city. Military intelligence has been tasked with tracing infection clusters and deal with those who defy the anti-pandemic health regulations. Now, there are unsightly military drones hovering overhead and spying on people! Gone are the days when children could play and adults meet in alleys in housing schemes freely during curfews. Those who do so now run the risk of being traced and even prosecuted.

Sri Lanka is on the verge of the much-dreaded community transmission stage, and drastic measures have had to be adopted to contain the pandemic. The need for the deployment of military drones and Air Force choppers in the city would not have arisen if the people had acted responsibly; COVID-19 is spreading fast in housing schemes and areas full of slums and shanties.

It is believed that humans will have to learn to live with COVID-19, which will not go away anytime soon. There is also the possibility of surveillance and other such draconian measures currently being employed to tackle the health emergency coming to stay in some parts of the developing world even after the pandemic is brought under control.

Coronavirus has landed the democratic world in a dilemma. Democracies have their work cut out to battle the virus in that they have to be mindful of the rights of their citizens, who resist any measure that curtails their rights and freedoms even if it is aimed at ensuring their own safety. China has been able to beat the virus effectively as it is not in the least concerned about individual freedoms and is free to do whatever it takes to control the disease.

Difficulties some countries are faced with in overcoming resistance from their citizens to the steps being taken to battle the virus remind us of the theory of social contract, according to which humans had go give up some of their freedoms to bring order out of chaos; they exercised their natural reason and gave up their natural freedom to reap the benefits of an organised society as they did not want to continue to live a life, which was ‘solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short’. The current pandemic also poses an existential threat to humans. They have a choice; they can do without some of their freedoms and rights temporarily to help beat the virus, or they can refuse to do so and endanger their own lives in the process. The challenge before democratic governments and those who are staging protests to safeguard individual freedoms at this hour of crisis is to find a middle ground if disaster is to be averted.