How was your Christmas? Let me guess, quiet? While some of us were enjoying Black Narcissus and working our way through the Celebrations tub, Covid-19 was on an epic bender.
A snapshot of how the #coronavirus rate has dramatically increased in Northern Ireland over the past few months.
On 3rd of Sept, Oct, Nov, Dec & Jan.
Mid Ulster's rate has increased from 9.3 per 100,000 to almost 900 per 100,000 pic.twitter.com/O1P7u49G96
— Darran Marshall (@DarranMarshall) January 3, 2021
As you can see figures are through the roof. Was it all the shopping? Home visits? Lack of vitamin D? Lack of ventilation? I imagine it will be a bit of everything and some more.
I can understand the politician’s dilemma. No one wanted to be labelled the Grinch who stole Christmas, so they probably gave us too much leeway. It is hard to change tradition. If someone arrives at your door over Christmas you feel bad if you don’t invite them in. But like most hangovers, you do wonder was it worth it/ The vaccine rollout has started but it will be already too late for some. We give our health service a lot of abuse, most of it deserved, but it is quite an achievement that they have vaccinated most people in care homes already.
I actually preferred the quieter Christmas. Normally we have an endless round of engagements, and to be honest it was nice to chill out with some TV and go to bed early. I imagine if you were on your own it was very lonely, but I think a few of us will be embracing a quieter Christmas going forward. Winter is meant to be a time of hibernation. It is against nature that we try to fight this urge to chill. By giving ourselves a lot of stress in the run-up to Christmas we weaken our immune system and make ourselves more susceptible to illness.
I also believe lack of sleep is a huge part of illness. Scrolling Twitter in bed and binge-watching Netflix shows we think we can fight mother nature. But no way you are winning a battle against millions of years of human evolution. Stay well.
“Still Having A Hangover?” by lucielle.sweet is licensed under CC BY-SA
Managing Editor of Slugger O’Toole. I help to manage Slugger by taking care of the site as well as running our live events. My background is in business, marketing and IT. My politics tend towards middle-of-the-road pragmatism; I am not a member of any political party. When not stuck in front of a screen, I am a parkrun Run Director.
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