A letter from February 5th, 2021

Dear FutureMe, It is February 2021, almost a year into the COVID-19 pandemic. I am in my third year at medical school and I’ve just finished the first half of my placement. I got the first vaccination 6 days ago, but things are still very far away from being back to normal. It’s my birthday in a few weeks, but with my family and friends living 3 hours away and me being on placement full-time, I’ll be spending my 21st birthday only seeing people through a screen. At least it gives me a good excuse to make my 22nd birthday the big one instead! I hope when I read this in 5 years time, the pandemic is a distant memory. I hope the world learns from the mistakes we made this time round, and if (when?) another pandemic rolls around, we don’t see anything like the atrocities our healthcare systems have been dealing with this time. I am cautiously optimistic that humanity can and will do better. I hope I’m right