Signs up in shops telling people to keep their distance due to Covid-19 in Al Karama, Dubai. Chris Whiteoak / The National
Signs up in shops telling people to keep their distance due to Covid-19 in Al Karama, Dubai. Chris Whiteoak / The National
Signs up in shops telling people to keep their distance due to Covid-19 in Al Karama, Dubai. Chris Whiteoak / The National
Signs up in shops telling people to keep their distance due to Covid-19 in Al Karama, Dubai. Chris Whiteoak / The National


One year after the end of Covid restrictions, has life really changed?


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September 29, 2023

This week marks a year since the UAE announced the easing of several Covid-19 safety measures – including the ending of the mandate governing the use of face masks indoors, except in a few limited circumstances, a policy that was fully relaxed a few weeks later.

The September 2022 briefing by the National Crisis Emergency and Disaster Management Authority also reduced the home quarantine period, extended the validity of green status on the Al Hosn app and NCEMA said it would no longer report daily caseloads, as it had done for the previous two and half years. The announcement signalled once and for all that the country had reached the final stretch of the pandemic.

The physical architecture of the pandemic years also began to be dismantled soon afterwards – such as discrete entrances and exits to malls and public places – although there are forget-me-nots and reminders all over the country to this day: look over there and you might see a sticker on the ground offering guidance on social distancing or look over here and there might be a “stay safe” notice stuck to a wall.

If you drive along Muroor Road, past the main Mubadala Building and towards the Corniche in Abu Dhabi, there is now an empty plot where there used to be one of the city’s major testing tents. All that remains today is the single visual tell of a now superfluous welcome arch on the edge of the lot.

The same too, on Sheikha Fatima bint Mubarak Street, where a major on-island testing site sat before its relocation to Muroor. The old site, once a busy, 24-hour location which many residents will remember patiently queueing around its vast tent structure, is now also just an empty plot.

There are forget-me-nots and reminders of the pandemic all over the country to this day

It would be easy to paint a picture that suggests these now abandoned plots or even the small reminders on walls and floors are emblematic of the post-covid landscape, but that would provide an incomplete image. The question remains, however, as to what really remains from the pandemic years?

I suspect that the pandemic left something behind on all of us, whether that is how we view our general health and wellbeing, how we live our lives or how we organise our working days. Few of us can genuinely say the plot is truly empty.

While the framework of pandemic control measures has been dismantled, the habits of 2020 and later remain – which is why for those of working age, many offices still run operate in hybrid mode.

The debate over the merits of this remains current, with even Zoom now asking its employees to be in the office more often. Recent studies suggest global attendance at offices is still around 30 per cent below where it was before the pandemic.

Both sides – those who advocate for maximum flexibility over working arrangements and those who want more people in the office – will point to studies that show higher or lower productivity, depending on the point they are trying to prove.

Very few people enjoy commuting, which is one reason why work from home remains popular and effective, but also it is clear that workplace culture is harder to meaningfully foster if employees are scattered across the world and only meet infrequently in-person.

The nation’s schools are one month into their first truly “normal” school year since 2018-19. Pandemic control measures were first put in place in March 2020 and were adapted over the following two and a half years, with the push and pull of periods of distance learning punctuating the road to last year’s key NCEMA briefing.

Many parents and students may be profoundly thankful that things have returned to normal, but may also wonder and worry about any lagging impact. Again, it is hard to reach a definitive conclusion.

More generally, our lives may also be very different to how we once were. All of us had to be highly adaptable and rules-driven during the toughest phases of the pandemic and now we find ourselves living with fewer rules and less need to be highly adaptable in one sense and more in others, especially as the world grows ever more complex each day.

Masks remain as an occasional feature of our daily lives, largely through personal choice, especially for those boarding flights, taking public transport or attending conferences.

Perhaps, those opposing forces of absence and permanence are what we are really left with a year on. The infrastructure may have mostly disappeared, but the habits formed in those years and how we feel about personal responsibility have been hard-wired into us. The pandemic may well have made the merits of practising better self-care and keeping healthier habits much clearer.

Then again, the seeming randomness of the virus makes it hard to be absolute. In our household, three of us had the virus simultaneously early last year and each of us dealt with different symptoms and levels of severity.

In the end, that might be the most appropriate takeaway. The post-pandemic world has turned out to be as uneven and unpredictable as the Covid-19 years were.

Conflict, drought, famine

Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.

Band Aid

Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.

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Living in...

This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.

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What can victims do?

Always use only regulated platforms

Stop all transactions and communication on suspicion

Save all evidence (screenshots, chat logs, transaction IDs)

Report to local authorities

Warn others to prevent further harm

Courtesy: Crystal Intelligence

SERIES INFO

Afghanistan v Zimbabwe, Abu Dhabi Sunshine Series

All matches at the Zayed Cricket Stadium, Abu Dhabi

Test series

1st Test: Zimbabwe beat Afghanistan by 10 wickets
2nd Test: Wednesday, 10 March – Sunday, 14 March

Play starts at 9.30am

T20 series

1st T20I: Wednesday, 17 March
2nd T20I: Friday, 19 March
3rd T20I: Saturday, 20 March

TV
Supporters in the UAE can watch the matches on the Rabbithole channel on YouTube

Tips to stay safe during hot weather
  • Stay hydrated: Drink plenty of fluids, especially water. Avoid alcohol and caffeine, which can increase dehydration.
  • Seek cool environments: Use air conditioning, fans, or visit community spaces with climate control.
  • Limit outdoor activities: Avoid strenuous activity during peak heat. If outside, seek shade and wear a wide-brimmed hat.
  • Dress appropriately: Wear lightweight, loose and light-coloured clothing to facilitate heat loss.
  • Check on vulnerable people: Regularly check in on elderly neighbours, young children and those with health conditions.
  • Home adaptations: Use blinds or curtains to block sunlight, avoid using ovens or stoves, and ventilate living spaces during cooler hours.
  • Recognise heat illness: Learn the signs of heat exhaustion and heat stroke (dizziness, confusion, rapid pulse, nausea), and seek medical attention if symptoms occur.
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1.

United States

2.

China

3.

UAE

4.

Japan

5

Norway

6.

Canada

7.

Singapore

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Australia

9.

Saudi Arabia

10.

South Korea

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Benefits of first-time home buyers' scheme
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Updated: September 29, 2023, 4:14 AM`