As our healthcare and political leaders cast doubts on the chances of people holding holiday gatherings this year, public morale appears to be wearing thin. Symptoms of our collective exhaustion include: the ubiquitous conflicts on social media, vitriolic comments on news stories about the pandemic, and anti-mask protests.

There’s an old saying that warns, “The cure is worse than the disease.” The implication is that the solution for a problem causes more harm than good.

Funny you ask me, Facebook… what is on my mind?

I am sitting here writing this letter at 10:00 p.m., utterly exhausted. However, despite how tired I am, I can’t help but feel grateful—grateful that my community has some pretty amazing people in it, including a Hutterite colony just south of us.

All over Facebook, you’ll see these posts by well-meaning, health-conscious people: an inspirational photo, perhaps a river, or a forest, or a sunset—something peaceful. It catches your eye as you scroll through your feed, not just because of the image but because of the words, superimposed overtop, something like “Nature is the best antidepressant.”

During this time of COVID-19, we’ve seen a broad range of responses to the quarantine, the economic crisis, and the uncertainty caused by the pandemic. In many cases, people have responded as those in the medical and scientific community have hoped: they quarantined, they social-distanced, they wore masks. And all of these interventions have helped to slow the spread of the virus. Especially in Manitoba, we’ve been very fortunate.