This has been very frustrating, not
only because of the loss of personal opportunities, but also because it
inhibits reaching out to help people who have been even more adversely affected
by the virus’s medical and nonmedical effects. So far the way not to feel
completely useless has been to consider that “We also serve who only stand and
wait.” By sheltering in place and without guests we not only protect ourselves
but also others whom we might infect if we happened to be carrying the virus
without symptoms. Furthermore, even in protecting only ourselves, we free up
hospital personnel and beds and ventilators for others.
But this is not very emotionally
satisfying, and anyway there is much more that we could be doing even in our
constrained situation. And not only for victims of this virus but for people
having other needs that pre-existed it, since the world’s woes are beyond
counting and more pervasive than even the coronavirus. And there are not only
people and other animals suffering and dying now but also those whose pain or
death might be prevented by timely interventions.
So suddenly it occurs to me that
many of the people and causes we already assist by volunteer work of various
kinds can still be helped, sometimes in the same ways, sometimes by innovative
means, even though direct physical contact with others may be blocked, and in
some cases even more effectively than before the pandemic.
That is because, first as noted, so
many of us now have some extra time on our hands. But second, because the
present crisis suggests technological applications and innovations to increase
our capacity to help.
Thus, I can’t help but wonder if
some kind of crowdsourcing could assist in the critical mapping of the virus’s
spread. The scientific community has been training citizen scientists to analyze
data online for years.
At a less exotic yet still highly
effective level, a simple Volunteer at Home app could be developed that links
any computer or smartphone user to organizations in one’s own community that
could use your help from home, perhaps via that same computer or smartphone.
And I’m sure many nonprofits would appreciate technical help with providing
their clients and volunteers with new interactive capabilities. The
possibilities seem limitless.
Needless to say, this kind of work
… both developing such software and the rest of us utilizing it, as well as, of
course, countless “low tech” ways of helping others elsewhere while we stay at
home … has its rewards for the volunteer too, and the benefits for all could
last well beyond the present pandemic.
Why just shelter in place when you
could also volunteer in place (VIP)? Be a COVID-19 VIP!
-- from an upcoming op-ed in the New Haven Register
