CORONA SUPREMACY

Corona is a noun in the English language (plural noun: coronae) which has different meanings in different fields.

In Astronomy, corona is the rarefied gaseous envelope of the sun and other stars. The sun's corona is normally visible only during a total solar eclipse, when it is seen as an irregularly shaped pearly glow surrounding the darkened disc of the moon.

In Physics, corona is the glow round a conductor at high potential but is also used to denote a small circle of light seen round the sun or moon, due to diffraction by water droplets.

In Anatomy, corona is a part of the body resembling or likened to a crown while in Botany, it is the cup-shaped or trumpet-shaped outgrowth at the centre of a daffodil or narcissus flower. Corona is a circular chandelier in a church. A part of a cornice having a broad vertical face is called corona in Architecture. 

The expression “Corona Virus” hit the ignorant like me as a jolt of lightening just when we were stepping into the third decade of the 21st century.

According to WHO; Corona viruses (CoV) are a large family of viruses that cause illness ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS-CoV) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS-CoV). Corona virus disease (COVID-19) is a new strain that was discovered in 2019 and has not been previously identified in humans. Corona viruses are zoonotic, meaning they are transmitted between animals and people.  Detailed investigations found that SARS-CoV was transmitted from civet cats to humans and MERS-CoV from dromedary camels to humans. Several known corona viruses are circulating in animals that have not yet infected humans.

As COVID-19 begins to shut down India and drives home the idea of a 3-feet social distance between humans; a new reality is emerging.

In the short-term; children and students may not go to school; there may be no movie shows; pubs and restaurants may have no patrons. Welcome to the new world order – where people have time at hand but nothing to do. Quick gains will accrue to the mobile-data providers and satellite-TV providers due to a spurt in media consumption but quick losses will be for petrol pumps and companies; shopping malls, and providers of discretionary health care. Elderly and parents with small children will be less visible outside their homes.

As the video clip from an IIT showed the students there celebrating no classes and no exams; students in technical education will take tests at home, using on line system or an off line assignment. No one will fail, at least in the short run.

Life for an ordinary worker in manufacturing, farm, construction or mining would however go on as usual.  There is no face-mask, no hand-rub sanitizer, no isolation or no quarantine for them. COVID-19 does not discriminate between the rich or the poor, literate or the ignorant, young or old, white or black, male or female, believer or the atheist.

Unfortunately however, COVID-19 virus seems to infect the children of globalisation more than others.

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*The motivation to use the expression came from the title of the novel “The Bourne Supremacy” written by Robert Ludlum in 1986. Jason Bourne is the main character and the protagonist in a series of novels and subsequent film adaptations created by novelist Robert Ludlum. He first appeared in the novel The Bourne Identity (1980), which was adapted for television in 1988. The novel was adapted into a feature film of the same name in 2002. The character originally featured in three novels by Ludlum, released between 1980 and 1990, followed by twelve novels written by Eric Van Lustbader since 2004. There is a video game as well.

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CORONA SUPREMACY was first published on 15 March 2020 on Face book and a lot of mayhem has since been created by corona virus.

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