THE World Health Organization is encouraging countries to take advantage of e-payment systems as an alternative to cash-based transactions. This is to limit the use of cash in making transactions, since cash itself is a potential agent of transfer of the COVID-19 virus. Accordingly, several central banks, including the Bank of England, the Bank of Korea and the US Federal Reserve, have resorted to burning cash or at least mandating banks to sanitize their cash holdings and place them in quarantine for 14 days.

EACH CRISIS is disruptive and instructive.

My daughter Monica, who was less than 10 years old during the martial law years, asked me if life in today’s lockdown is like life in those days. “Not quite,” I said. There was fear and anxiety in the beginning -- fear of indiscriminate arrest and anxiety over what the government in the hands of military officers would be like. But after Marcos had political enemies, journalists critical of him, and militant labor and student leaders arrested, things normalized. Business resumed, schools reopened, and people moved about freely. The shutdown of Congress, the judicial system, and the independent media had little impact on the life of regular folk during the days of military rule.

This column will briefly tackle two discoveries related to the Wuhan/China virus, a.k.a. SARS-CoV-2 which causes coronavirus disease 2019, better known as COVID-19. Take note that global deaths from regular flu, pandemics not included, is between 300,000 to 646,000 per year.

Today, the world is moving so fast and yet, Filipinos can’t even venture big time in the tech space. There are a lot of tech-savvy Filipinos who have brains and ideas. But they lack capital and the stomach to just do it. It’s hard, especially if one lacks access to capital markets, bank loans or other debt instruments. It entails hundreds of millions of pesos, and there are only a handful of VCs (venture capitalists) here to seed. All financial institutions, at least on the creditors side, want collateral, and it takes a lot of effort and size to issue notes, bonds, etc., if you’re not a big conglomerate. But the future is around the tech space, that’s why even though the telco project is so challenging, we are deeply inspired by it. We are hungry to see it succeed. Is it easy? No. Is it financially challenging? Yes. But can it be done? Why not?

WE ARE ALREADY in the middle of a stealth contagion. We just do not have enough testing capacity to show it.

“When evening had come...” (Mk 4:35). Pope Francis stood alone on a canopied platform just outside the doors of St. Peter’s Basilica, fronting St. Peter’s Square. He peered into the enveloping dusk, perchance to see the usual throng of some 300,000 or more devotees waiting for the traditional Urbi et Orbi blessings on Christmas Day, Easter Sunday, or on the installation of a new Pope -- like when he first blessed the flock as Pope in March 2013. But previous Urbi et Orbi blessings were given in the clarity of daylight.

The enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) in Luzon, although necessary to contain the spread of COVID-19, has resulted in the grave vulnerability to hunger and poverty of households reliant on non-regular forms of employment and with no savings and little or no access to social protection. Programs intending to alleviate the impact of the ECQ should target them first.

Kailangan ng taong pumunta sa palengke para bumili ng pagkain, sa botika para bumili ng gamot, at sa ospital para magpa-check-up o magpa-opera. Paano makararating sa ospital ang buntis para manganak at si lola para magpa-dialysis kung walang pampublikong transportasyon? (People need to go to the market to buy food, to the drugstore to buy medicine, to the hospital for a check-up or an operation. How can the pregnant women get to the hospital to give birth or the grandmother for her dialysis if there is no public transportation?)

MAYBE what’s uncomfortable about quarantines and lockdowns of borders of whole cities and countries, aside from the obvious impeding of the freedom of movement, is that there seems to be no difference between authoritarian regimes and democracies in addressing the contagion risk. Even the scenes of empty streets and masked stragglers come from the same horror movie. What the government decrees is automatically imposed and followed, yes, for the good of the community. Maybe the democracies moved a little bit more slowly fearing resistance from the governed. But they followed the early movers anyway.

COVID-19 PH4, Carlo L. Navarro, a 48-year-old tax lawyer, visited Japan in February with his wife, Evie and only daughter, Gia. Throughout their trip, they wore protective masks, gloves, and incessantly used alcohol on their hands. Seven days after returning home, Mr. Navarro showed mild signs of COVID-19. A responsible citizen and father, he immediately insisted on being tested for the virus at a private hospital. His infection was confirmed within two days. He was the first Filipino to be found positive in the country. He was quickly confined to prevent its spread. His family, household members, and contacts have all tested negative.

With over 500 cases in the Philippines, the COVID-19 threat is already serious enough to concern everyone. But its unwanted presence has also further exposed Filipinos to the authoritarian virus that to this day has survived the 1896 Revolution, World Wars I and II, the EDSA civilian-military mutiny of 1986, and the untiring efforts of human rights defenders, independent journalists, committed artists and academics, civil society organizations, and social and political activists to combat it.