Narratives and Metaphors Inspired by the COVID-19 Trauma

Background. Epidemics And Their Effects

The epidemic that begun in China in 2019 and quickly extended throughout the world has been an attention call for the world´s population and has served as proof that epidemics tend to be global and can easily become pandemics. The world is a small place that cannot easily slow down the dissemination of such phenomena, in spite of the fact that social mentalities still think of it in terms of a geography separated by political or administrative borders.

A few years back, economists theorized about the butterfly effect to explain how any change in the order of things produced in the most remote place on earth could affect the economy of the companies and countries farthest removed from where the allegorical fly of that insect was happening.

Another field in which globalization has imposed itself as an undeniable reality is climate change, at least for scientists and citizens who do not agree with negationist theories. More and more, the planet is seen as an organism that functions through the complex and delicate equilibrium of its parts, where the deforestation of the Amazon forest, for instance, is related to polar ice melting, recurrent drought in large parts of the world, and the harshness and frequency of meteorological phenomena that are very damaging to human life …

Many people are not ready to renounce the advantages of technological civilization in their daily lives, although they do not dare deny the successive and progressive evidence of this change. This is more so when the silent and practical negationists are the elderly, and even more if they belong to the privileged classes that perceive the risk as removed in time and the probability of being affected in their lives as low.

Young generations -even teenagers- have raised with more energy the banner of creating awareness about this change, which has produced a generational gap or divide in the sociology of many countries.

What is curious is that with the pandemic the roles have been reversed regarding COVID-19 since from the beginning it has been perceived that the elderly are the most vulnerable people -which is very likely- while the young are almost exempt from the risk of infection or the consequences of infection would be weak in them -which is questionable. In general terms, we can affirm that at least in the West the social practices of young people have created problems of new pandemic outbreaks because of group contact or even massive contact when the recommendations of the health administration have not been followed. It is a practical negationism similar to that of climate change, although in a different generation, and its effect is a similar but opposite generational gap (Salvador, 2020).

Be that as it may, one of the effects of the pandemic has been the fear sensation it creates because of the social uncertainty produced by the swinging opinions of scientists during a phenomenon little known until then: a new and highly unpredictable virus that could mutate easily, as proven by successive strains.