I know I said that teaching English was the elephant in the room, but there's another one: our dear friend, COVID-19. I haven’t put off writing about this because it’s uncomfortable or insignificant, there just hasn’t been much to write about. I won’t go as far as to say COVID doesn’t exist here, but it has a drastically smaller presence here than in my life in the US.
And it’s not the case of the public choosing to ignore an ongoing issue; I genuinely think, for some reason or another, COVID hasn’t been as devastating here as other places. I have my own theories as to why, but I’m not an epidemiologist and I won’t pretend to be. All I know is that I live by the city’s largest hospital and have visited another large one and they don’t seem inundated with COVID patients. There is definitely an issue of under testing and underreporting, but even considering that COVID simply isn’t in the public consciousness, at least not in the places I've visited. People are following the cleanliness public health campaigns, but other than that, life seems….normal.
There aren’t many places in Abidjan that are confined to four enclosed walls with low air circulation, but the few that exist religiously require masks. This includes most supermarkets, banks, government buildings, and phone stores. Basically everywhere else is an open air space, and masks are optional with hand sanitizer always within reach. This means most days I can go without reaching for a mask yet alone hearing about COVID.
I am writing this now because I am quarantined awaiting test results after exposure to an asymptomatic, but positive person. With the vaccine and the nature of the contact, I feel confident in my health, but don’t want to risk being a carrier, especially considering that I work with so many students. This person was also an international traveler and had recently flown in from South Africa, where the Omicron variant was first reported but did not originate.
My roommate and I went to go get tested at St. Jean in Cocody. Remember how I mentioned that addresses aren’t really a thing here? That made finding the testing center a really intimidating task, but once we got on the main road strip, there was a large and clear sign designating the test center. There were tons of people sitting in distanced chairs outside, clutching travel authorization forms, but because we were getting routine testing, the guards allowed us to cut.
I was called in, they took down my information (I brought my passport along), gave me a sticker with a number on it, and then I waited. My number was called, a woman stuck a swab up my nose, and before I knew it, I was teary-eyed, but my sample had been collected and labeled. Getting this test was a lot faster and a lot easier than my pre-flight test in New York this September.
I was so used to bureaucratic hold up that I was still sitting in the chair after my test and the lady looked at me and said “you know you can leave….right?” There was a pretty big group of people there, but I would say we were in and out within an hour. I got my results that night via a text message and that was that. And it was free!
Many of my friends have called me worried about the Omicron variant, but quite frankly, if I hadn’t been tuned into Western news outlets, I may not have even known it existed. I think some people heard “Africa" and thought I fell under that, but South Africa is thousands of miles and a 17-hour plane ride away. I appreciate the concern and also recognize that there are many African nations struggling with COVID, but in my experience here so far, CDI simply isn’t one of them.
The vaccine is a bit more complicated. As far as I've experienced, you do not have to be vaccinated to enter public spaces, nor have I been asked to show my vaccine card anywhere beyond the airport. According to Google, only about 4.5% of the total population is fully vaccinated. I get the impression that many locals either don't trust the vaccine (which is well within their right, considering the historic medical malpractice that Westerners have brought to Africa) or they just don't think it's necessary. Either way, life in CDI seems to be churning on, despite COVID.
Comments