As all Thammasat University students know, social distancing, or physical distancing, is a set of infection control actions intended to stop or slow down the spread of a contagious disease. The objective of social distancing is to reduce the probability of contact between persons carrying an infection, and others who are not infected, so as to minimize disease transmission, morbidity and ultimately mortality.

Following government and university COVID-19 prevention guidelines, all are familiar with basic rules to observe. The National Health Service (NHS) of the United Kingdom also offers advice on its website about this subject:

What is social distancing?

Social distancing measures are steps you can take to reduce social interaction between people. This will help reduce the transmission of coronavirus (COVID-19).

They are to:

• Avoid contact with someone who is displaying symptoms of coronavirus (COVID-19). These symptoms include high temperature and/or new and continuous cough
• Avoid non-essential use of public transport when possible
• Work from home, where possible. Your employer should support you to do this. Please refer to employer guidance for more information
• Avoid large and small gatherings in public spaces, noting that pubs, restaurants, leisure centres and similar venues are currently shut as infections spread easily in closed spaces where people gather together.
• Avoid gatherings with friends and family. Keep in touch using remote technology such as phone, internet, and social media
• Use telephone or online services to contact your GP or other essential services
• Everyone should be trying to follow these measures as much as is practicable.

We strongly advise you to follow the above measures as much as you can and to significantly limit your face-to-face interaction with friends and family if possible, particularly if you:

• are over 70
• have an underlying health condition
• are pregnant
• This advice is likely to be in place for some weeks.

The Commonwealth of Australia Department of Health presents further relevant information on its website:

Social distancing for coronavirus (COVID-19)

Everyone must practise social distancing to slow the spread of COVID-19.

Keep your distance

• One way to slow the spread of viruses is social distancing (also called physical distancing).

• The more space between you and others, the harder it is for the virus to spread.

In public

Social distancing in public means people:

• stay at home unless is absolutely necessary
• keep 1.5 metres away from others
• avoid physical greetings such as handshaking, hugs and kisses
• use tap and pay instead of cash
• travel at quiet times and avoid crowds
• avoid public gatherings and at risk groups
• practise good hygiene
• See important information on restrictions on public gatherings.

Households

Steps for social distancing in all homes include:

• stay at home unless going out is absolutely necessary
• keep visitors to a minimum
• reduce visits to the shops — instead, buy more goods and services online if you can for pick-up, pre-order or delivery
• carefully consider what travel and outings are necessary, both individual and family
• regularly disinfect surfaces that are touched a lot, such as tables, kitchen benches and doorknobs
• increase ventilation in the home by opening windows or adjust air conditioning

If someone in your household is sick, you should:

• care for the sick person in a single room, if possible
• keep the number of carers to a minimum
• keep the door to the sick person’s room closed. If possible, keep a window open
• wear a surgical mask when you are in the same room as the sick person. The sick person should also wear a mask
• protect other vulnerable family members by keeping them away from the sick person. At-risk people include those over 65 years or people with a chronic illness. If possible, find them somewhere else to live while the family member is sick.

At work

• If you can, work from home. If you cannot work from home and you are sick, you must not attend your workplace. You must stay at home and away from others.

Steps for social distancing in the workplace include:

• stop shaking hands to greet others
• hold meetings via video conferencing or phone call
• put off large meetings to a later date
• hold essential meetings outside in the open air if possible
• promote good hand, sneeze and cough hygiene
• provide alcohol based hand rub for all staff and workers
• eat lunch at your desk or outside rather than in the lunch room
• regularly clean and disinfect surfaces that many people touch
• open windows or adjust air conditioning for more ventilation
• limit food handling and sharing of food in the workplace
• avoid non-essential travel
• promote strict hygiene among food preparation (canteen) staff and their close contacts
• consider if you can reschedule, stagger or cancel non-essential meetings

In schools

If your child is sick, they must not go to school or childcare. You must keep them at home and away from others.

To reduce the spread of viruses or germs in schools:

• wash hands with soap and water or use hand sanitiser when entering school and at regular intervals
• stop activities that lead to mixing between classes and years
• avoid queuing
• cancel school assemblies
• have a regular handwashing schedule
• regularly clean and disinfect surfaces that many people touch
• conduct lessons outdoors where possible
• consider opening windows and adjusting conditioning for more ventilation
• promote strictest hygiene among food preparation (canteen) staff and their close contacts…

Reading while social distancing 

Currently in Europe, some novels about pandemics are finding new popularity. TU students may prefer to read amusing books after they have done their academic assignments, to relax and enjoy instead of worrying about serious matters. However, others may appreciate gaining an historical and literary perspective on current events. These students may even find a subject for a future thesis or academic research project in some of the rediscovered books which are available in the TU Library collection.

One of these is the novel The Plague by the Nobel Prize-winning author Albert Camus.

The Plague was published in 1947. It is about an epidemic in the French Algerian city of Oran, but asks many philosophical questions about human destiny and life. The characters in the book, including doctors and tourists, demonstrate how the threat of infectious illness affects a population. The TU Library collection has copies of The Plague in the Fiction Stacks of the Boonchoo Treethong Library, Lampang campus and the Fiction Stacks of the Pridi Banomyong Library, Tha Prachan campus.

Here are some brief excerpts from Camus’ novel to give an idea of its contents:

• On the whole men are more good than bad; that, however, isn’t the real point. … the most incorrigible vice being that of an ignorance which fancies it knows everything and therefore claims for itself the right to kill.

• When a war breaks out, people say: “It’s too stupid; it can’t last long.” But though the war may well be “too stupid,” that doesn’t prevent its lasting. Stupidity has a knack of getting its way; as we should see if we were not always so much wrapped up in ourselves.

• Yes, there was an element of abstraction and unreality in misfortune. But when an abstraction starts to kill you, you have to get to work on it.
• In Oran, as elsewhere, for want of time and thought, people have to love one another without knowing it.

Another book on a similar theme is from the 1600s, A Journal of the Plague Year by Daniel Defoe. The author Daniel Defoe is famous for having written the novel Robinson Crusoe. A Journal of the Plague Year was donated to the TU Library by Professor Benedict Anderson and Ajarn Charnvit Kasetsiri. It is shelved in the Charnvit Kasetsiri Room of the Pridi Banomyong Library. As might be expected in a book donated by two distinguished historians, this edition of Journal of the Plague Year has a preface by the noted English historian J.H. Plumb.

The TU Library also owns other books by J.H. Plumb.

A Journal of the Plague Year is generally accepted as a fictionalized version of the year 1665 in London, when an epidemic struck that has been called the Great Plague of London.

Although Defoe was only five years old when his story takes place, he offers so much convincing detail that some readers may feel that they are reading history, and not just fiction.

(All images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)