Yesterday, Monday, April 6 was the beginning of the second week of the Great 2020 Lockdown. A week yesterday, this country put its big toe into uncharted waters. We only knew from raging vapours that the water was hot; how hot we did not know. To be honest, we still are not sure. But we have survived.

The lockdown, which is for two weeks, began with a presidential address and at midpoint on Sunday, the President again spoke to his people. Let me hasten to say that the President has shown exceptional leadership in this crisis.

He has behaved as we should expect from the Commander-in-Chief. Meeting with the leaders of the other political parties was a good thing and they all deserve praise for treating this crisis with good sense and a united front.

Last Sunday’s speech was a clever one. The real purpose was hidden like piercing pins in the middle of fluffy cushions. A lot of it was good news. You know all of that so, I don’t need to repeat that — for now. What you may have missed is the bad news. Even that came with a sweetener.

More tests have been carried out. That is good. However, inevitably, the numbers of infected people will rise. If we take the statistics of what we know as a model, it means we may find the number to be in the high hundreds if not more.

This in itself will come as bad news but, indeed, it is good news. More tests should be good news but the better news is that more infected people are being discovered through contact tracing. This means that people who would otherwise be silent carriers are being discovered. The best news would be if most of them are well even after testing positive. That means they can either self-isolate or be quarantined outside hospitals.

At the end of the first week, what is the assessment? I don’t know what the official verdict is, and I have previously commented on how the absence of a trusted national opinion poll undermines policy formulation and assessment in this country. We ought to be able to measure what people think and did in the first week. This will guide the government about what to do next.

To be brutally honest, the main problem we face in this country is not only poverty but inequality. Our country is now several times richer now than it was at independence but the condition of poor people has worsened because there are more poor people sharing the small proportion of the national cake that gets to them. It is this inequality that has been so sorely exposed by this crisis and it must have been the government’s main headache as it has struggled to get a grip on this pandemic.

Meida space

Traditionally, the poor don’t get much space in our media because the allocation of space and airtime are determined by the direction of the country’s political and economic structures which are woefully anti-poor.

So, what appears in the media or even social media may not help us to know what conditions are like in conditions of extreme poverty. These are difficult times for everyone but it would help to know precisely how poor people have fared in the first week of lockdown.

This is important because the medical case for lifting the restrictions, maintaining or even extending them may be established while the conditions on the ground may dictate a different approach. This is why the news, especially on the numbers this week, will be so critical.

At this point, the government may not be able to change the living conditions of the poor overnight, and to be fair, it is obvious that they have not neglected the impact of the lockdown on poor people.

Some of the measures already taken are mitigating the worst conditions; as we prepare for the worst, the government as well as corporate Ghana and philanthropic organisations and individuals must be primed to respond with the biggest heart so far.

We shall overcome.

Enjoy a happy lockdown weekend.