Deserted cities, shuttered businesses, canceled flights. Empty squares, streets with no one around... what seemed impossible has happened. If it is hard for us to adjust to this new routine, for children, the shock was even greater. Overnight, they were deprived of school, spending time with friends, outings around the city, parks, and squares. They were confined indoors.
On March 22, an article appeared in the Spanish newspaper *El Confidencial* called “The Disappearance of 7 Million Children.” With this somewhat dramatic title, philosopher César Rendueles warned of the social, psychological, and developmental problems these children were suffering by being confined in apartments without sunlight, fresh air, and nature. In the text, he says that “we are used to expecting children to be invisible, not to get in the way, not to make noise,” and states that the way we deal with the crisis is extremely “adult-centric”: children have completely disappeared from public space and “are now exclusively the business of their families.”
