Five years ago this month, the horrific virus took hold in West Cork and our lives changes almost overnight. Robert Hume looks back on the local coverage and how the pandemic panned out across the region.
‘People don’t know what they are dealing with… there is a big fear factor at the moment,’ John O’Driscoll of Motor Factors, Skibbereen, told The Southern Star on March 14th 2020, as he tried coping with a massive demand for anti-bacterial wipes.
West Cork supermarkets witnessed a run on tissues and toilet rolls, and panic-buys of pasta, tinned and frozen food – enough to get through lockdown or self-isolation. Staff at Clonakilty Distillery were redeployed to make hand sanitiser.
Emer Downing from Skibbereen, a teacher in virus-stricken Bergamo, felt ‘shut-off’ during Italy’s national lockdown, fearing arrest if she ventured outside for a walk.
The world was about to be engulfed by an unprecedented public health crisis, a pandemic.
Ireland had reported its first case of Covid-19 on February 29th in a young man just back from Northern Italy.
One person had since died, and twelve now had the virus in West Cork.
As people rushed to get tested, swab kits and personal protective equipment ran out at the Dunmanway centre.
Large gatherings were avoided: St Patrick’s Day parades were called off (although Bandon’s parade by car went ahead), the Skibbereen Lions Club dinner and the Fastnet Film Festival were cancelled, as was a popular teen disco in Clonakilty – judged ‘unwise in the extreme’.
Sporting fixtures were axed, and playgrounds and skating parks closed. On March 13th, schools shut until further notice, and masses were discontinued.
Doctors adapted their practices: one ‘walk-in’ clinic in Bantry told patients to stay in their car until their appointment time. Prescriptions were sent directly to pharmacies, sick certificates e-mailed out, house visits replaced by telephone consultations.
Many activities, including yoga and workouts, were staged remotely. Fr Bernard Cotter even managed to screen mass live on Facebook from his Newcestown home. For the first time in its history, Southern Star staff held an editorial meeting remotely on Monday 23rd.
Four days later, Ireland’s first lockdown was introduced. It turned out to be the longest in Europe, crippling hospitality and retail industries. All non-essential travel and social contact was banned, and those most at risk were told to ‘cocoon’.
These unusual times involved frequent handwashing, wearing facemasks on public transport, sanitising hands before entering shops, ‘social distancing’ behind protective screens, continuous testing and contact-tracing.
With Easter on the horizon, gardaí warned that anyone attempting to travel to a holiday home in West Cork would be turned back. Bere Island specifically asked visitors to stay away. Three health workers locked down in New Zealand struggled to get back to their West Cork families.
Not everyone complied with the requirements to stay home and socially distance. On the weekend of March 21st/22nd, crowds gathered on Long Strand and Garrettstown beaches. The ‘complacency’ of some people is ‘mind-boggling’, said one West Cork nurse. ‘I can’t decide whether it’s lack of knowledge or defiance.’
By May, ten Covid-related deaths had been recorded at Clonakilty Community Hospital, and five at a nursing home in Macroom.
As it entered its third month, the pandemic was bringing out the best in people.
Timoleague, Rosscarbery and Ardfield residents collected shopping, medicine and fuel for those unable – or too terrified – to get out.
Dan Holdsworth and Mazzy Holder, locked down in their motorhome in a lay-by near Glengarriff, received from their YouTube followers a surprise package of beer and chocolate.
In Rosscarbery, an online tea party was hosted by a lady eager to ‘inspire the nation with the universal power of the cuppa’.
But lockdown also brought out the worst in people: a 40% increase in cases of domestic violence in West Cork.
Plans started to be made for a return to ‘normality’.
To help get the town trading again, Kinsale proposed café pods for groups of six people, while the local tourist industry prepared for an influx of ‘staycationers.’
When bars were told they must remain closed until September, publicans fumed about their ‘lost summer’.
Following a surge in cases, another national lockdown – excluding schools – was imposed in October, and West Cork resigned itself to a socially-distanced Halloween and Christmas.
Then came the welcome announcement that a Covid vaccine had been approved and would soon be released.
Vaccines began to be rolled out from December 29th, starting with all frontline health workers and the over 85s.
But progress was slow, and was described as an ‘omnishambles’ in remote rural areas such as Castletownbere, where some medical practices were left short, others got unexpected excesses.
The emergence of variant strains led to schools not reopening after Christmas.
Many West Cork businesses were forced to shut for ten days while staff self-isolated. A
Kinsale GP tweeted: ‘We are seeing community spread of Covid across all age groups’. In Bantry, one shopkeeper said the virus was ‘spreading like wildfire’ and in another area, 20 cases seemed linked to a single West Cork pub on Christmas Eve.
In February 2021, testing and quarantine rules were imposed on travellers coming into Ireland. Although infections fell sharply, that same month a Bantry nursing home announced 11 Covid-related deaths.
Schools finally re-opened in March, and the lockdown was gradually lifted from May. People could go to mass and have a haircut. The Clonakilty museum, the Michael Collins House, and the Skibbereen Heritage Centre reopened, but hotels remained shut.
The arrival of the delta variant caused infections to rise in July, though there were fewer deaths. During the autumn they spiked again because of the Omicron variant, and proof of vaccination was required to enter most indoor venues. In December, a Bandon grandmother who told a judge she didn’t think Covid existed, and that face masks ‘didn’t work for her’, was sentenced to 30 days in jail.
After Christmas, cases fell sharply, and from the end of February 2022 social distancing and facemasks were no longer compulsory. Spanish cooking evenings resumed at Kinsale Community School, and ‘barstool beer and cheer’ returned at Pad Joe Deasy’s Bar in Timoleague … and throughout West Cork.
Five years later, Covid-19 rarely makes the headlines today, and the virus is now thankfully much milder.
