Treat us like adults

Alexandre Lourenço
 

The development of the Portuguese health system suffered, like so many others, from excessive paternalism and over-centralization. Perhaps part of our failures in responding to the covid-19 pandemic lies in these two issues.

Last December, a Spanish friend shared an article from the El Mundo magazine where he gave some inputs: "nos tratam como niños, y nosotros tan contentos." The infantilization of Society - "the NHS will take care of everyone, everything is fine, the warm weather is the only cause for the excessive mortality, the cold weather is the sole cause for the excessive mortality, the vaccines are there and will solve everything" - demotes individual responsibility. Look at the peskiest kids fighting for the first sweets: vaccines. In the face of terrible mortality indicators, it is not so strange to see people's gatherings without any protection at the first ray of sunlight.

A year later, the inability to deploy an effective contact tracing and testing apparatus demonstrates our failure to do more than the routine. As with the ever-forgotten prevention, the system tends to focus exclusively on the conventional cure structures.

Last month, the British Government presented to its parliament the white-paper "Integration and innovation: working together to improve health and social care for all".  The topic is not new, but it is a sign that gives us hope in the middle of a pandemic. It is this kind of discussion that engages citizens and brightens our future.

It is not the millions from the European "bazooka" that will make us better. Persons, their ideas, and a vision that unites them will make us better.  As my colleague said: If the Government wants to engage Society, the first thing it has to do is to conceive us as adults.