The hysteria has reached such a climax that when someone nearby says “coronavirus”, we all bounce and run in fright. And, God forbid, if someone starts coughing, we rush home fast, to warm ourselves up with a 50-degree brandy, carefully chewing a clove of garlic. Following this procedure, quarantine is obligatory, for obvious reasons.
The panic is great, and emotions are detrimental to the thought process. An example of such deviation are the comments of the ruling bodies on how people with suspicion of the insidious disease will be set into quarantine-with sick leave, unpaid or paid leave. The Chief of GERB Parliamentary group Daniela Daritkova sends them in sick leave while the Health Minister Kiril Ananiev and his colleague from the Social Ministry Denitsa Satcheva do not agree and recommend paid or unpaid leave.
Only employers have not yet spoken out on this issue. Knowing their radical views on sick leaves in general, we can assume that they will declare anyone fallen ill as a simulant. And they will recommend tight control and sudden inspections of police and NII in the homes of the lie-ins.
Although there has been no case confirmed yet in Bulgaria, the coronavirus is causing some discrepancies in the speech and behaviour of people in power. For example, Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Donchev, as a typical technocrat, thinks that not everyone who sneezes has caught the coronavirus.
He may be right, but we are curious what he would say if he was also on the plane of the Bulgarian delegation to Greece, led by Prime Minister Boyko Borisov. As it is known, shortly before its departure on Wednesday, one of the accompanying journalists coughed up and was removed from the plane in no time. Just in case, although she was known for being a chain smoker.
Fear is the mind killer. I don't even try to think what would happen if we started coughing massively? Especially in front of the Parliament and the Council of Ministers? Not in the form of protest, just like that!
It is not excluded that we are to be quarantined, though difficult. But if Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev intervenes – only God knows.
From the point of view of social and political reality, a nationwide quarantine in the conditions of a violent coronavirus would have a somewhat positive effect. Geshev will solve the problem of domestic crime instead of looking sternly from under his cap while catching petty thieves across the country. The money of the Treasury, which MPs are allegedly spending on meeting their constituents, will be saved. The expected electricity price rise will go painlessly, without mass protests and the traditional demand for government resignation. The MPs will not hide when they write their laws, the “backstage” will come to light. And tales of a creeping or prosecutorial dictatorship will halt all of a sudden…
In general, the advantages of quarantine over dictatorship are greater. Especially when they don't have to lie to us that it's in our favor.
