The Coronavirus, pollution and living in Bangkok
I was blissfully mask and worry free for two weeks, the coronavirus and pollution a distant dream.
I have just spent almost two weeks down the coast of Thailand in a place called Baan Krood, followed by a town called Prachuap Kiri Khan, and then a more touristy city called Hua Hin. All of which were lovely in different ways and I highly recommend them. I will review them here at some point. When we left Bangkok it was going through something of an air quality crisis, which is still ongoing, and a lot of people were wearing masks. It was mildly worrying and odd to see so many people with their faces covered up. While we were away, the coronavirus had made itself felt and now the city looks like there is the world’s largest surgeon convention going on. It’s not nice.
This morning as I risked my life by leaving my condo, it was shocking to see how many people are wearing a mask. As my taxi cruised slowly through Bangkok on my way to work (I am both classy and lazy), well over half were masked. Possibly more. Most people in Bangkok had easy access to masks because of the pollution and now with the coronavirus, it is decidedly the fashion du jour. What scares me at a more psychological scale is that the standard surgeon mask mostly makes sense for when you are ill and don’t want to pass that illness on. There are arguments that with a mask on you won’t be touching you mouth as much but their basic design is to stop stuff going out, rather than going in. So it kind of feels like the entire city is sick. And I don’t like sick.
This feeling of being mildly perturbed by almost two-thirds of everyone I see is partially offset by the maths of the scenario. At time of writing the death toll is a few hundred with around 20,000 infected. The normal flu kills around half a million people each year, which is awful but annual. So I try and remain calm even when, on arriving at work this morning, they shined a temperature-reading laser in my eye and then stamped me as all clear. (Literally – I have a stamp on my hand.) While I have a mask, I have yet to wear it. I would rather run from people who sneeze and obsessively wash my hands than cover half my face in a hot and sweaty country. That may change when the figures and statistics do.
If the coronavirus does continue to spread then apparently Bangkok is in for for it, with Thailand and Japan being the most at risk countries. According to the Bangkok Post today:
“Bangkok and Hong Kong are most at-risk from the spread of coronavirus based on air travellers expected to arrive from affected cities in China, population mapping experts at the University of Southampton concluded. Taipei ranked third.
Sydney is 12th, New York 16th and London 19th among 30 major cities, the researchers said. Thailand and Japan are the most at-risk countries, followed by the US (6th), Australia (10th) and UK (17th).”
The strange result of the pollution and the coronavirus is that the former is now making me cough and the latter’s presence is ensuring that while coughing, no one wants to be near me. So for now I will calmly go about day as I normally do, stockpiling food and avoiding contact with a many people as I can. The desire to work entirely online grows stronger every day. Be safe people.
