Motho ke motho ka batho. Sadly, too often, we pay lip service to such maxims, which hold simple truths, but require a certain level of empathy to translate from mere words to action. We lose a connection with our humanness and, as a consequence, the connection to the collective is also strained and frayed.

Recently, chatting to my children, nephews and nieces, who range between the ages of nine and fourteen, one of the kids asked me how long I thought they would have to wear masks for. I told them, to their dismay, that they would probably be wearing masks well into their late forties, at a minimum, which is my current age...