LEARN FROM CORONA- JANNATUL ASHPIA
For decades, people are being ignorant of climate change. An increase in CO2 emissions, a rise in sea level, floods, and droughts has caused none of us to change our approach. We have people still living under the impression climate change is a hoax.
Here we are, living in 2020 contaminated via the “coronavirus pandemic”. The disease has been spreading from late 2019 and even today. Within less than a year, fear began to enter people’s minds. This sudden outbreak has changed our lifestyle instantaneously. We see the government taking action, businesses shutting down, and more importantly, “the public is coming to understand that in that kind of situation you have to act in a way that looks disproportionate to what the current reality is” (Gardiner).
We are often told to picture the effect of climate change (which is already happening), yet people refuse to acknowledge it. Science proves with numerical values of what is yet to occur and nothing gets through to the public. To compare, for coronavirus, the popular people didn’t need any extra proof as we were already undergoing this pandemic. This new normal has caused us to take drastic measures and shift our way of living. We learned about social distancing, wearing a facial mask for protection, and adapt to the new environment.
“While the disease is playing out more quickly than the effects of global warming, the principle is the same, she said: If you wait until you can see the impact, it is too late to stop it” (Gardiner). We witness the aftermath of “waiting until” to see the impact.
This new pandemic’s drawback may outweigh the benefits, but it’s teaching people important lessons of adopting “to important measures”. “whether disease exposure or carbon emissions — impose on others. “It’s all about somebody else stepping in and forcing us to internalize the externality…” (Gardiner). To fight change, we need to take initiatives.
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