No excuse to ignore advice

Róisín Conaty lives in Shanghai, China’s most populated city, located some 840 kilometres from the province of Wuhan where reports of the Coronavirus outbreak first emerged towards the end of last year.
At its height, Róisín reported back that the city’s streets were like a “ghost town”, and she herself even travelled to Japan for several days after the consulate in China issued advice for Irish citizens to leave.
But the school teacher returned soon after and continues to work from home as the country tries to manage some semblance of normality amid this evolving health crisis.
Despite there still being an overbearing sense of concern in China, Róisín says: “It’s gotten back to being a lot more busy and, when you’re out and about, apart from everyone having face masks on and temperature checks everywhere, you can see things returning back to the way they once were.”
Among the new protocols introduced, members of the public now have their temperatures checked upon entering bars or restaurants, and leave their name, phone number, and in some cases passport details at the door.
The other system employed is a colour coding system linked to the stipulation that any new arrivals into China must now self-isolate for a period of 14 days.
“They also have this system where, on one of the apps you use to pay for things, you get colour coded, either red, yellow or green, depending on if you’re in quarantine, or free to move about. If you’ve a green code, it means you’ve done quarantine. If you go into a bar they ask you for your code and if it’s not green they won’t let you in.”
The only fresh cases of COVID-19 contraction are among people coming into China. People arriving from South Korea, Japan, Italy, Iran, much of Europe and the US all get extra screening in the airport, and have to complete 14 days of self-quarantining at home or in a hotel if they don’t live in the country.
“Four people came in from Germany yesterday, and they’ve now got the virus, so the mandatory quarantine is being extended. I think Beijing have it that everyone coming in has to do the two weeks’ self-isolation.”
Looking at what’s happening in Ireland, Róisín is glad to see restrictions being implemented.
She’s receiving regular updates from her family here in Cavan, and says: “People think because they’re off it’s a great excuse to go out and have fun. Living in China and seeing what’s happened over here, and what’s still happening to a certain extent, it’s not! There’s no excuse not to listen to the advice being given. Everybody should be adhering social distancing,” says Róisín, expressing surprise at the rapid rise in COVID-19 case numbers in recent days.
She’s critical too of the Government and HSE’s position not to name exactly where cases are appearing, feeling that it may encourage more people in those areas to quarantine more quickly.
“You don’t want to cause panic, I get that, but I don’t think it helps anybody. I think it would be more helpful to tell people where cases are emerging so that people to then take things like social distancing more seriously.”