Today is the festival of Holi in India. So, naturally, I had to think about the word holistic. I don't remember when I heard the word first, maybe in the 80s while doing my M.B.A. Some other words from the same period were Value Engineering, M.R.P. (later turned into E.R.P.), Positioning, and lots more.
Returning to holistic, that's a view of anything, a more rounded, broad view. So if one were to look at the Corona pandemic, a holistic view would include all stakeholders, including government (worldwide) which learnt (hopefully) that welfare of its people, including healthcare and hygiene, comes before economics, no matter what the Pink papers have to say. Hospitals and healthcare industry, which learnt that R and D has a major role to play, and many frontiers remain unconquered.
The common man in many countries learnt how responsive his government (elected, in democracies) was to his pain. We all learnt to live digitally, order food online, educate our kids online, and work from home. Pollution on roads and in factories declined, weather improved as a result, and some positive effects on health were felt in urban areas.
We also lived with no major congregations for any reason, proving it can be done. Also without international travel- discretionary- and it did not affect us as much as we imagined. Of course, the tourism industry took a hit, and the hospitality sector. And airlines-but most of the airlines always have a yoyoing life, economically, even without a pandemic.
The biggest negative was not being able to meet classmates, colleagues (those we like and dislike!), teachers, and relatives and friends, whenever we wanted to. A big loss! Hopefully we will get back!
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