Denmark and Norway last week became the first European Economic Area nations to end all restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic, with Copenhagen saying it was no longer “a socially critical disease” and that it had to be treated as endemic. A day later, Sweden and Spain joined the move toward no longer classifying COVID-19 as a pandemic that needed special restrictive measures. These moves are highly welcome, especially in countries whose vaccination rollouts have progressed to a reasonable level and where those who remain unvaccinated are almost entirely by choice, rather than due to a lack of availability of vaccines. The strict restrictions imposed over the past two years were initially justified due to several factors. First and foremost, it was a new disease that the world was totally unfamiliar with. Combined with its novelty was the unprecedented contagiousness of the virus, which spread across the entire globe and infected hundreds of millions of people within months. And while the governments of various countries generously funded pharmaceutical firms and labs to conduct urgent research into the virus and to develop vaccines, it was perhaps justified to impose certain limits on people’s social lives. This was the objective of the restrictions, but some clearly went overboard by locking down whole countries and their economies, putting hundreds of millions of families at risk of poverty. Many governments, especially in the rich world, did compensate, at least partly, for the loss of wages for most people in an attempt to minimize the economic burden. However, the poor in countries across the world have been seriously affected by the pandemic and the restrictions imposed as a result of it. As the pandemic evolved, the governments in most countries tried to balance, with little success, the easing of restrictions as case counts fell with reimposing them when the virus hit back. However, in the second half of last year, when most of the developed world had already been jabbed with vaccines — not once but twice and in some cases even three times — it was perhaps the right time to comprehensively review the use of restrictions as a means to control the virus. Most of Europe and many other rich nations, as well as countries like China and India, have now reached the stage where a large majority, if not 90 percent or above, of the population has been fully vaccinated, meaning there is little reason to keep people at home or to impose restrictions on their social and economic lives any longer. The last two years have been very tough on practically every single socioeconomic class, perhaps with the exception of the multimillionaires and billionaires, who have seen their wealth explode. Though the affluent have managed to stay relatively economically unaffected by the pandemic, the same cannot be said of a large majority of people in every country. Their lives have been turned upside down and, even now, are in a kind of standby mode, with great uncertainty surrounding their future. This uncertainty over the short, medium and long terms — along with the deprivation of their social lives — has played havoc with people’s mental health. Hence, it is time to end the restrictions, while perhaps maintaining just some very basic rules, notably on hygiene, which may already have been imbibed by almost everyone anyway. The prolonged closure of schools has also been traumatic for children and has played havoc not just with their present lives, but ineffectual online classes have led to a serious degradation in the quality of learning and significantly enhanced the gap between the fortunate few and the rest. It is time for governments to reopen schools and vigorously help students catch up with their missed education so that the pandemic does not lead to long-term gaps in the learning and skills required to develop a proper career path. Moreover, easing the restrictions on socializing will not only help the majority of people in terms of mental health, but it will also offer a major boost to the global economy. Travel, tourism and hospitality need to really roar back to life from the near-death experience of the last two years. The travel, tourism and hospitality industry is one of the largest employers in the world and its workers have been among the worst affected by the pandemic. Thus, by ending all restrictions on movement, the developed world can play its part in kick-starting the developing countries’ moribund economies. Many of these countries survive on income from tourists but, for now, millions of people continue to be unemployed due to border closures. The poor in countries across the world have been seriously affected by the pandemic and the restrictions imposed as a result of it. Ranvir S. Nayar As the rich world begins to ease restrictions, it also needs to look at the developing nations, mainly those in Africa, which are still struggling to get hold of vaccines. Perhaps, instead of offering a fourth or fifth dose for their citizens, the rich countries could start to produce or procure vaccines only for the developing world to help end the glaring vaccine inequity that has been one of the hallmarks of this pandemic. As of last week, low-income nations had managed only 14 doses of vaccine per 100 people, compared to the high-income nations’ total of 190. Another way to look at the inequity is that two of the largest African nations, Nigeria and Ethiopia, are still struggling, with just 7 percent and 8 percent of their population, respectively, having been administered even a first dose — a long, long way behind the US and Europe, where every eligible person who wants to receive the vaccine has been administered at least two doses. Ending restrictions is the way ahead for the countries that have vaccinated a significant portion of their population. They should also gift vaccine doses to the developing world to ensure, if nothing else, that their own citizens will be safe when traveling to these less-fortunate parts of the world. Ranvir S. Nayar is managing editor of Media India Group. Disclaimer: Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Arab News" point-of-view