Gerard Howlin: Covid-19 has temporarily halted our pervading culture of convenience

Always-on entertainment, and the entitlement to be entertained, is the antithesis of social distancing, writes Gerard Howlin

Gardai on patrol as a group of people drink outside the Dame Tavern pub in Dublin city centre.The gyration of closing-down, opening-up and closing-down again is unsettling. There is edginess in the air. Picture: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews.ie

What will matter most when it’s over, assuming there is an end, is the permanent change caused by Covid-19. I have a sense we are not even at the mid-point of this, and that all estimations will have to be revised, and revised again. 

In the last 10 months, a million people have died. I assume that is a rough estimate. There are countries where the dead are not counted. Tuberculosis and hepatitis are now replaced as the world’s most infectious diseases, and Covid-19 is still gathering pace.