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The Fourth Protocol

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OUR LEADERS must be at their wits’ end.

By the latest count, COVID cases are back to the thousands daily, and projected to continue to riseunless a better solution is found.  As it is, the health measures seem to perfectly fit the definition of insanity: doing the same things over and over again and expecting to produce different results.

Various types of lockdowns have been iterated in many places since Day One of the pandemic.  There were the familiar protocols of washing your hands and how to do it the right way, wearing a mask or shield or both and keeping the recommended distance, physical or social, take your pick or poison.

Then, finally, there is the vaccine or vaccines, however late. Better late than never. Our leaders have even doubled down on their inefficiency by telling people that the best vaccine is what is available, even if it is from China and its efficacy is on the borderline of science and superstition.

Still, a research group is raising fears that cases will go up to as high as 8,000 per day — initially it was at 6,000—by the end of March. What’s the matter?  Even the loquacious presidential spox who used to point his dirty finger at the Filipino ‘pasaways’ has tested positive. Did three of his fingers somehow point back at him and other officials in the Malacanang camp?

Perhaps, a fourth protocol can make a difference: wash your mouth regularly, a holistic approach that is recommended to the country’s top leaders, starting from the Malacanang principal tenant.

Metro Manila is getting the brunt of the virus virulence, at least  for two reasons: 1) there’s more people exchanging their breath, fresh or foul, and 2) the air in the metropolis is more polluted than anywhere else.  The pollution isn’t just chemical; it’s verbal.

When people suffer from shortness of breath, a sign of oxygen shortfall, don’t look only at the industrial factories around that spew toxic waste into the air or water.  Look around also for human factories that emit unbridled verbal waste that are just as toxic and suffocating.

What are the verbal toxins floating in the air today in our midst?  There are the insults and invectives unleashed every now and then by Meanness-in-Chief to those who disagree with him, especially the opposition, especially the so-called ‘dilawans’, especially Vice President Leni Robredo who he keeps telling ‘no way’ she can be president.

Worse, there’s his constant ‘kill’kill rants that his choir is describing as mere metaphor while those who can’t distinguish take it literally and result in thesudden death of suspected enemies.

To make matters worse, there seems to be no adult in the room to remind the highest public servant in the land that to serve is to preserve, life primarily.  Records , both official and unofficial, shows that this is not the case so far in our hurting land.

It doesn’t help that those who are supposed to uphold justice are taking their sweet time to do what they’re supposed to do to clean the air of toxin, a devil –may- care attitude like the anti-terror pollution that keeps blowing hither and thither.

Verbal poisons engender fear. Fear creates doubt. Doubt erodes confidence.   All of these impact people’s well-being in many ways.  The bad side effects can range from mental to physical health, possibly harming their immune systems and, eventually, making them more vulnerable to the virus.

Our present environment is polluted not just by harmful bugs invasion but bullies’ verbal improprieties.  It’s not just about insults or expletives. They can also be lies and more lies, lack of transparency, mental dishonesty and immorality.

It’s no wonder there’s so much distrust in the air that helps breed lack of confidence about the future, despair about the present and indifference to who should be chosen as leaders who can move things forward, not backward, locally or nationally.

Deng Shiao Ping, the famous capitalist in Communist China, used to say that it doesn’t matter whether the cat is white or black as long as it catches mice.  It’s the political or moral relativity version of Einstein’s physics.

If our people can breathe freely without being assaulted with all the verbal toxins coming from our leaders, it can be like a highly efficacious shot in the arm of public conversation characterized by respect, honor, confidence and a strong belief in each other to deal with any crisis, pandemic or otherwise.

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