You’re at home, relaxing, when suddenly you realize the kids are screaming. Wait, they’re shouting that the house is on fire! You’re about to respond when a menacing voice says, “Stick ‘em up,” and you feel an intruder’s cold knife pressing against your throat. You are shaking with terror, but luckily, your martial arts skills kick in fast. You disarm and disable the intruder. That seems like enough excitement for now – but until the fire is out, you’re not done.

The kids have made it clear: the changing climate means our house is on fire. But now, a global pandemic is posing a much more urgent threat. An overwhelming wave of loss and misery is heading towards us. Millions of lives are at stake, with low-income people, people of color, older adults, and people with disabilities at greatest risk. We need to act immediately to slow the spread of disease.

And we are. On an unprecedented scale, we have mobilized our personal, institutional, and governmental resources to respond to this threat. Around the world, people are doing what they can to protect each other and prevent the collapse of our medical systems. Individuals are staying home without pay, shuttering their businesses, and checking on their neighbors. Exhausted healthcare providers are caring for the seriously ill despite inadequate equipment. Local and state governments have sprung into action, activating emergency powers, tracking the disease, and working to reduce the human harm and suffering.

We are in the middle of this response right now, and our actions today are saving lives – of people that we love and people that others love. Our failures are unfolding in real time too; our slow response to the early warnings, the racism, corruption, and ineptitude of our human institutions, our lost chance to contain this epidemic.

When the knife is at your throat, you need to focus your resources on staying alive. But soon – maybe a few months, maybe next year? – we will have disabled the intruder coronavirus, and yet our house will still be on fire. But there’s something that we are learning right now that will help us put out the fire, something that the hero of every heart-pounding action movie learns: we are survivors. Now we know that we are willing to make massive sacrifices and radically upend our way of life to protect each other. We do what it takes because we care ferociously about the lives we are fighting for – our friends, our neighbors, and our fellow humans around the nation and the globe.

As individuals, businesses, and government, we can learn lessons from today’s fight that will help us win tomorrow’s. We have had no choice but to try new things – and these new things are part of what will save us. Reluctant employers are finally conceding to telecommuting. Improved air quality from reduced traffic is saving thousands of lives that would otherwise be lost to asthma, heart attacks, and lung disease. Our short-term policy responses could become long-term ways to protect our communities: investing dollars in local businesses and green infrastructure, shielding renters from eviction, and closing bicycle networks to motor vehicles, to name just a few.

While we are preoccupied with coronavirus, our house continues to burn. But now we know that when we must, we can make extraordinary changes and sacrifices to protect each other. Instead of waiting until millions of lives are threatened by climate catastrophe, we can continue and advance those personal and policy changes that will help us survive and thrive. Today’s lessons can help us put out the fire and save our tomorrows.