Zooming the Pandemic Episode 1

We are, as they say, cursed to live in interesting times. As Covid-19 continues to rage throughout the world, one might say we are living through a time that history will record as one of the greatest pandemics man has ever battled. But as we also know - the tales of history are usually portrayed by the words and deeds of the important men and women who make that history. The leaders, for better or worse, who set the pace and declare the tools to fight the battle. 

These speeches and proclamations will become the stuff of legend. But there is another way to see history, one that is often left behind in our textbooks. In the years to come, we may see that history is best portrayed by the ordinary people who struggle to understand and hopefully do more than just survive. 

With that in mind, Canadian writer Deni Loubert has chosen to create an intimate diary of life during the time of Covid-19. She writes from the perspective of an ordinary citizen in New Westminster, a mid-sized town in British Columbia, Canada. It is both her own personal diary during a pandemic, and a record of those around her.

In this bi-weekly series she looks at the people who surround her neighborhood. She talks with them to get insight into the struggles they go through in their daily lives. Together they explore what it means to be living through such deadly history. For like the pandemic itself, the reality of what is needed to face this dangerous virus changes daily.

This first ten-minute episode looks at the question of health. It reveals how New Westminster hopes to face the trials of a pandemic that in its earliest stages leaves few clues on how to fight it. As the battle progresses, the citizens of New Westminster must find new solutions to an invisible enemy that can strike at any time and anywhere.

From conversations with her local family care doctor to her growing awareness of her neighbors that work in nearby Royal Columbian Hospital, discussions are recorded of how New Westminster faces the new world created by a worldwide pandemic. She looks beyond the simple question of slowing the spread and shares the feelings of isolation and panic that so many are struggling to conquer in her native town.

She muses on the nature of our emotions in a time of stress, looks at B.C.’s local heroes and asks how we are coping with this new-found reality. The daily newspaper may be filled with hard cold numbers, but she knows there are real people behind these numbers.

For while the impact of Covid-19 is worldwide, this series seeks to show how the changes to lives are often played out in an arena that is close by and intimate. They are both her own reflections on the changes she sees around her and what these conversations reveal of the shift in all our everyday lives.