I remember that two years ago I read the news about the opening of an oxygen bar that selling flavored oxygen in New Delhi because the air pollution in there was such a debacle, in fact, it’s still today. It’s spine-chillingly reminded me of some of the dystopian genre book’s premise. I had never thought before that someday we will also have a similar situation here. Fast forward today, we finally have reached that point in Indonesia, to the extent that everyone is hoarding the oxygen tanks and every oxygen refill station is packed with people who are in panic. Yes, we’re having a disastrous yet predictable COVID-19 situation and government haven’t take any step to solve the problem. This is happening due to the increase of COVID-19 cases yet the government is too denial on this. It’s eerily similar to the situation that India had 2 months ago when their healthcare system had collapsed due to the sluggish government on trying to handle the COVID-19 newest, more infectious, and deadlier variant, Delta.
I have never seen anything like this. It’s the worst. Moreover, I’ve witnessed the scarcity of oxygen supply in my workplace that leaded to the death of patients. It was so hard for me to handle this, let alone the patients’ families when they hear the news. Even though the family of patients has already signed the informed consent paper about the probability of the patients could deteriorate rapidly and die, the death of their family member is would still extremely difficult to cope with.
Breathing oxygen without using any device is something that maybe we hadn’t been grateful enough about in the past. Breathing in and out easily is such a precious thing to do compare to the patients in the hospital who are gasping and hungry for air because their lungs are already cannot function normally. We must stay thankful and aware of our surroundings. In this distressful situation, lots of people need our help and we, who are still capable on doing anything, must lend our helping hands.
Hope we can get through these hardships together.
352 words in 45 minutes
