RESUMO
In 2020, the new coronavirus disease has seen many countries adopt mitigation activities to interrupt human-to-human transmission, radically changing daily life habits with secondary effects on the environment. The aim of this article is to comment on these events from a systemic point of view, referring to systems theories and the non-linear causal relation between human behaviour and the environment. As Bateson stated, linear thinking has led human beings to exploit the environment, causing an ecological crisis and disequilibrium within the system, because the mutual interrelationship and homeostasis mechanisms between humans and their environment were ignored. Taking into account the pandemic and its effects, the new coronavirus provides an opportunity to see otherwise invisible or obscured relational phenomena, such as the mutual relationship between humans and their environment.
RESUMO
The heterogeneity of COVID-19 experience and response for each individual is irrefutable; nevertheless, similarities can be observed between countries with respect to people's psychological responses. The main aim of this Commentary is to provide a cultural perspective of the sources of trauma, at the individual and social level, in three different countries: Italy, US and UK. The evidence from previous outbreaks, such as SARS, H1N1 flu, Ebola, and the ongoing Italian, the US, and the UK experience of COVID-19 shows that COVID-19 has introduced not only an individual trauma but also a collective trauma, that researchers should attend to now and in future global emergencies. Future clinical interventions should aim to reconnect dissociated parts both in the individual and in society. This commentary discusses four potential sources of trauma: high-stakes decision fatigue in healthcare professionals, traumatic grief, and bereavement in people who have lost loved ones, loss of roles and identity, and social divisions related to economic shutdown.