It would be disingenuous, to say the least, to withhold thanks and praise from our deliverers until only after the moment of our deliverance and not during the long hard struggle, when those engaged in the mighty battle against the foe toil tirelessly to save us.
History recalls the 21st of August 1940, at the height of the Battle of Britain in which, a small, but vital Royal Air Force engaged in life-and-death aerial dogfights against Nazi warplanes bombing and strafing London.
Hitler’s air war sought to gain British subjugation and so soften defences to enable a German invasion. On that hot day in August when the British Prime Minister delivered his review of a very hot war not yet a year old, he offered sincere thanks to those who risked their lives so that the British people, Empire and Commonwealth might endure.
We are at war now. Not against aggression but to repel a relentless enemy that respects neither colour nor class, continent nor country. We are engaged in an almighty struggle against the microbial, not the military.
It is therefore fitting, if not already past due, to offer gratitude to our land and coastal guardians for their efforts which continue daily, often unremarked and too little rewarded, to protect the healthy and tend to the sick, whether stricken by viral infection or not.
The delivery of health care also continues, as must the battle against the usual suspects of ill-health in our nation: diabetes, cancer, hypertension, heart disease, stroke and the like.
These guardians must continue to minister to our needs, even when they, too, are as near to enemy lines as those health care providers and security officials could be to the COVID-19 frontline.
In our rush to safeguard our own personal and family situations, amid the panic buying, the hoarding, the ceaseless doubts, the conspiracy theories, and the affronts to reason and common sense, we tend to lose sight of the line, thin but true, that interposes itself daily between safety and disaster.
We have had to cope with challenges to our Barbadian way of life, the parallels of which are yet to be found, even in the darkest days of the last Barbadian century, through riots, world wars and hurricane devastation.
We simply cannot do as we like, how we like and when we like. The simplest freedoms and liberties are themselves potential gateways to doom. But we are at war. And we must endeavour to do the right thing as a people.
While we do that, we must also show, however we can, our deep appreciation to those men and women who are on the streets and at work while the rest of us should be off the road and in our homes.
Port health, immigration, customs, Police, Army, Coast Guard and reservists, firefighters and air and seaport workers – all have been engaged in maintaining new rules and old law and order.
But for those of us who may yet fall ill to this terrible disease, we can, without asking and certainly without paying, rely upon the valiant efforts of nurses, doctors, auxiliaries, emergency medical and laboratory technicians, ancillary staff, engineers, maintenance workers, janitors, drivers and Ministry of Health officers, who, together with other government ministries and department personnel, from the Barbados Drug Service to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to the Attorney General chambers to the Office of the Prime Minister, are working to ensure abundant protection, adequate therapeutics, competent personnel and capable facilities.
During this pandemic, Churchillian rhetoric does not always succeed in stirring listeners to amend their behaviour and contribute to the common good. Empty, partisan speeches certainly have no place at a time like this. Heartfelt appreciation does. And unlike the citizens of New York and London, we may not shove our heads out the window and give voice to our appreciation with nightly cheers and applause, as we have seen there. But we should do all we can, individually and collectively, to thank our health caregivers and guardians for their service. Now, not later.
We are minded to see parallels between our present struggle and the Battle of Britain, when on the 21st of August 1940, Winston Churchill rose in the House of Commons to rouse his nation’s support and give thanks. Now is our time to, like him, do the same.
If we may paraphrase the ‘greatest Briton’, speaking to his greatest generation, we say to ours the following:
The gratitude of every home in our island goes out to the Barbadian guardians who, undaunted by odds, unweakened by their constant challenge and mortal danger, are turning the tide of microbial war by their prowess and their devotion.
Never in the field of human endeavour in this country was so much owed by so many to so few.
