Shutting the stable door after horse has bolted

Our Kadoma bureau had quite a sad story today about how Kadoma City Council has been battling Covid-19 since last year – roughly just before the year ended.
They had plans to reopen their offices by January 4 but have had to shelve those plans due to an increase in cases among the council’s staff. Also, the alarming national figures have not made things any easier.
According to reports – the city fathers have decided to have every staffer tested and offices disinfected before “normal” business can resume.
This is the case with a number organisations, companies, and urban and rural councils in Zimbabwe including Chitungwiza. The Municipality this week temporarily closed its Zengeza administration office for full disinfection after a member of staff tested positive for Covid-19.
Chitungwiza municipality acting town clerk Dr Tonderai Kasu on Monday advised residents of the closure and said Zengeza residents could make payments and inquiries at the head office for the time being, or at any other suburban office.
As of today, Chitungwiza revealed that seven of its City Health Department staffers had tested positive and one had already died. They revealed that 21 are in isolation while an entire clinic in the dormitory town has had to be shut down.
While Harare and Bulawayo remain ahead in terms of the grim Covid-19 statistics – it is becoming evident that the disease has spread to every corner of the country and will continue to wreak havoc if urgent action is not taken.
Companies may be complaining about loss of business while people mourn about how their livelihoods have been affected by the lockdown – but the truth is that everyone is now seeing what is happening and cannot afford to let their guard down.
As they say, the numbers, which seemed distant in the past few months and weeks have turned into names and the names into family members, neighbours and friends.
Reality has now hit home.
No one is clamouring for their child to be sent to school or tolerating their teenage son or daughter talk about “going out”.
Things have changed.
Even Government is now planning to put health personnel at checkpoints and roadblocks to ensure that screenings are done even on the roads in a bid to capture every case.
Police are talking about an operation after realising that they were still people ignoring calls to abide by the lockdown regulations.
But is this not a case of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted? Can the situation still be salvaged? What more can or should the people and Government do?
Truth though, is that the generality of the populace has realised that Covid-19 is real, they are scared but also desperate to survive. So, what should be done?
Nhau/Indaba