CAMAGUEY.- Time flies, we say a lot in Cuba, and it's true, the hectic nature of life makes it seem to us that days and months go by faster. This month is the second anniversary of an event that has changed our lives, the arrival of COVID-19 in Camaguey. From then on, things were never the same again.

The distancing, isolation, red zones, restricted hours for mobility, school courses stopped to the point that our children delayed their grade pass or their entry to school for a year, adapt ourselves to give fewer kisses and hugs, things that have never been experienced and that mark entire generations.

I wish this pandemic were already history. I would also like to take off my mask and walk in the street like before March 2020, but I don't do it to take care of my family, because COVID-19 is still there, making people sick and leaving consequences that have yet to be studied. For some, this disease may no longer represent any fear, either because of     confidence in the vaccines or because of tiredness, but is it worth taking the risk now that the situation is better, after we got face the worse stages of this pandemic? Does it make sense to run the risk of ending up in therapy, in the best of cases, now that the worse appears to be over?

Although the variants of COVID-19 that predominate are no longer as aggressive and our vaccines have shown efficacy, not only with the original strains, but also against the new ones, the responsibility not to get sick and not spread the disease further it is still of each one of us.

COVID-19 continues to be a worry to much of the international scientific community and people around the world.

We have to be consistent, because there have been two years of waste... yes, waste of talent, of benevolence, of passion, of love for the other, there have also been fear, failures and deaths, those that hurt us and let us with the “what if he hadn't gotten sick” think.

In April 2020, it seemed like a dream that less than a month after the arrival of the pandemic, people were already beginning to think about having their own vaccine. Two years later, history records that we Cubans made the first vaccine in Latin America. Abdala appeared to the world with 92.28% efficacy after clinical trials, then Soberana would come with 91.2%. Both, together with Mambisa and Soberana Plus, achieved a perfect team against death. Many of us already carry a booster dose on our shoulders.

We were also among the first in the world to vaccinate our children, and almost 600 Camagüey’s children put their arms forward so that Abdala could be tested as safe and effective.

Altruism has been another word that we have had to use a lot in the last two years. Only five days after March 11th, when the disease was still not well known, the Breamar cruise ship arrived in our waters with confirmed cases of the virus and whom no one in the region had wanted to receive.

The solidarity of this Archipelago did not stop there, we shared our doctors with the world and just on March 22nd a medical brigade left for Lombardy, the first of many that would leave later, to face what was then the world epicenter of infections.

We only had 49 cases in Camaguey during that first outbreak. Then the scenario would bring numbers of sick, serious, critical and deaths that are well worth keeping in mind so that they do not repeat. Few are the people of Camagüey who have not been close to COVID-19, few are the families who haven’t had to suffer the death of loved ones or the desperation of having someone seriously ill.

I do not conjugate the verbs in the past tense because this is a matter of the present. Keep in mind that beyond the 20 daily cases reported by the province, there may be hundreds of asymptomatic people spreading the disease on the street.

Bad decisions, ineffective measures, but above all, irresponsibility, both individual and collective, let us in this circumstances and although we are more protected now, we must continue taking care of ourselves.

The majority may already pass the virus like a common cold, however, around us there are people with illnesses and vulnerabilities that could end up in more complex situations and even die.

Let's also think long term, SARS-CoV-2 is still new. Its effects in 10 or 20 years are unknown, we totally ignore what the future of the children who got sick or the pregnant women who acquired it will be like, and that is why the best option will always be not to get sick.

We still have battles to fight, milestones to mark, brave people to highlight, this is a disease that has shaken the ground for the whole world, but here, thanks to so many people, to the Health personnel, to a system that puts life first, to a government that fights for the Cubans, to the vision of the leaders of the Revolution and above all to that Cuba that has taught us to stand tall when the effort seems difficult, we can feel immense pride we have stood up to a virus that kills.