Let’s return to normality
Faced with unusual challenges and changes both locally and globally, like all people around the world, the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina have been seeking a return to normalcy and imagining what ...
Faced with unusual challenges and changes both locally and globally, like all people around the world, the citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina have been seeking a return to normalcy and imagining what life will look like after the pandemic. And, while we can imagine what that normal life may look like, it is necessary to take all the necessary steps to ensure a secure future. Team Europe, ie., the EU and its member states, have so far delivered more than 1,300,000 doses of vaccines to Bosnia and Herzegovina in order to increase the number of fully vaccinated citizens.
Anisa Olovčić, a nurse at the COVID department and one of the undoubted heroines of our time, shares her experience of vaccination and the importance of taking this step for the safety of all citizens. “I was vaccinated a month ago, like all my colleagues, first because of the job I do, and then because of my family. It’s hard to work in this department. When you love people and when you love patients, it is hard for you to watch their struggle for air and for life every day. My colleagues and I make great efforts to help patients and alleviate their pain, and this leaves psychological consequences on us as well. Since we do not have a sufficient number of health workers, we see salvation in vaccination, because we do not have the luxury of getting sick with potentially no one to take care of patients, ” Olovčić points out.
Medical workers and staff, as well as everyone else who went to work every day even in the most difficult moments, made sure that everyone received particular care and necessities, so that we could buy basic groceries, receive mail, and have clean parks in order to be able to enjoy precious moments in fresh air. Along with countless others who have never interrupted their obligations so that everyone else can continue to live normally, they need support.
Anisa Olovčić is one of many who avoided contact with family, the elderly and risk groups until vaccination, “After vaccination, fear still exists due to the nature of my job, but now I can at least enjoy coffee with my family. I still have the desire to hug and kiss without fear. To bring my daughters and spend time with my grandmother as in the good old days is my ultimate wish.”
Although the future is uncertain, by listening to the advice of experts and taking care of your loved ones, especially at-risk groups, normality can be realised and not just imagined. “After the third wave and with the beginning of mass vaccination we dream of going back to pre-pandemic life, but we medics need more time to recover. We are still thinking about the patients who died. I can’t forget them. I want to, but I can’t. We lived through hell and saw whole families disappear. When I come back from work, I imagine going on vacation with my family to some distant destination, making sand castles together and swimming in the sea. After vaccination, that image in my head is now more and more realistic. Vaccination is no longer a matter of the individual, this is a matter of the masses and that is our only salvation,” adds Olovčić.
The European Union has provided a total of 95 million euros in grants to Bosnia and Herzegovina to help battle Covid-19. In addition to 13.7 million euros from the EU4Health grant for vaccines and related equipment, the EU provided 7.76 million euros to cover medical needs (more than 6 million pieces of personal protective equipment, 66 ventilators, 75 ECG monitors, 20 portable ultrasound devices and other equipment). 73.5 million euros has also been set aside to support socio-economic recovery.
