I am trying to get a grip on my response to Covid19 and the lock down. Some of you may be aware that I commented relatively early on about the response from Government on Facebook with a view that it was too little too late . I am still of that opinion and everything HMG has done since that time has only reinforced my understanding of their incompetence and an almost religious adherence to saving the economy above the people.
The latest change of 'emphasis' with the new slogan and amended advice is seemingly designed to do one thing, make us each responsible for the failure or success of the 'Fight against the Virus'. Government are abrogating the responsibility for our public health to us as individuals and no doubt will soon lay the responsibility for care homes and schools at the door of Local Government, more blame to go around. Government must not be allowed to get away with making the public responsible for their mistakes and failed ideologies. They continue to dissemble about their role in this chaos and, as individuals within Government simply lie about what has been said and done.
For myself the old adage from Socrates' Apology seems apt;
“... that what (which) I do not know I do not think I know ...” [from the Henry Cary literal translation of 1897]
The one overriding aspect of this virus is that we still have so much to learn. Anybody who states they have the measure or the solution to this pandemic is a fool or a liar. This returns us once more to the performance of our Government. Throughout, the Government have adopted the usual Johnson/Cummings approach of 'Lie – Lie – Run away'. Their narrative on the comings and goings of “The Science” have been contradictory and misleading. The very agency intended to provide independent advice (SAGE) was effectively suborned by political influence and considerations and the Government experts rolled out for the cameras were soon undermined and exposed as parroting the establishment story, attempting to present the Government approach to the Pandemic as reasonable and measured. This is no better typified than by the debacle of whether the Government was following the 'Herd Immunity' strategy or not.
It was very clear from the beginning that the Governments key aim was protection of the economy (and their corporate supporters) rather than the safety of the populace.
We, as a country had the opportunity to be ahead of the game when we saw the devastation being caused across Europe as the virus took hold. Our Government and the other authorities failed us.
Difficulties of dealing with a 'novel' virus – how our knowledge continues to evolve
We have from the start failed to give enough attention to that one little word that prefixed the first comments about the virus – 'novel'. As a novel Coronavirus it should have been quickly identified and widely discussed as a very different form of a well known type of contagion. We are all familiar with the common cold and the flu, also coronaviruses, but placing this new virus in these familiar terms was a damning and dangerous rhetoric to reassure a worried populace. It made the thing seem less scary and more manageable.
Whilst it was still far away in 'foreign parts' we could comfort ourselves that it only really had consequences for the old and those with underlying medical problems. Those risk groups would die through complications familiar to pneumonia, drowning in their own lungs and by the fatal overstressing of their previous conditions. So the older population was deemed disposable, ill older patients (probably some infected with Covid19) were dispatched to nursing and social care homes to spread the virus in their own age group and restrict the impact on the economy and the NHS.
Then we found that younger people were suffering both from the same symptoms and also dying from unexpected blood clotting issues causing Heart Attacks & Strokes. Surely they already had health issues. Well I guess if you call being 'frontline staff' in the health service or hailing from the Black and Minority Ethnic population a 'health issue' you could be onto something but this just showed a vector for the spread of the virus and the deaths were across the board.
At least the children were safe, the virus seemed to skip affecting them, or did it? A new and disturbing series of deaths in children suffering some form of multiple organ failure (similar to Kawasaki's Disease) has spoiled that theory. Further recent stats from the Office of National Statistics indicates that the rate of infections is similar across all age groups and, at the very least, this means children are infection vectors for Covid19. The more we uncover about the way this virus spreads and the impact throughout the population the clearer it is that we cannot rely on the old way of doing things and we must be very aware of the impacts of Government policy aimed at protecting the economy before the population.
The Pandemic – what is our exposure?
So what is our exposure? This is another thing we do not know. It is possible that in the early days when this Government did some testing we might have had some idea about our levels of contagion. Since widespread testing was stopped (probably because the figures were too scary) we have no definitive proof of our exposure to the pandemic. Oddly in Sheffield we have a better idea as our local Health agencies tested more than any other area of the country, which lead to the city being seen as a bit of a hot spot until it was explained that, the more you test the more you discover infected people. Yet even now we still have poor community testing programme and the infrastructure to 'Test – Track & Trace' is way behind where it should be.
As a result the Government figures for infections are widely disbelieved and even the figures for deaths (we only started counting deaths in care homes a matter of days ago) is believed to be seriously under-reported. Only those tested count for official figures and my own household has one, potentially two, people who were infected but did not require medical intervention (therefore not counted).
Official Figures; ONS Figures; Unofficial Figures;
Effectively this is another area where our knowledge is incomplete or flawed and yet decisions of national impact and of Life & Death are being made using the most optimistic of these figures. (The black line)
Test & Trace?
Another part of the puzzle that our Government chose to avoid and is only now very late in adopting is the idea of Test & Trace. It has been clear from the off that those countries which responded early to the need for testing and chose to trace contacts of infected persons have had a lower impact from the pandemic. The World Health Organisation has supported this approach from the early stages and it is the only thing that will allow us to really understand our susceptibility to a long and deadly series of additional waves of Covid19.
We are, in this country, in a 'debate' about opening up our schools again. A comment from Government did say that testing and tracing would be available to any child or teacher that started to show symptoms after the return to classrooms. I'm going to let that sit for a moment. … Symptoms show only several days after infection and during which pause the person is contagious to all around them. Government (Boris & Gove) talk about the great British Common Sense, I see none of that in this approach. I see a Government sacrificing teachers and children to their God of the economy. Teachers should not be expected to put their lives on the line for the sake of getting their pupils' parents back to work. The evidence of the impact from one Bristol school should be enough to kill this idea stone dead.
Even the Governments plans for tracing are falling apart, as first they tried to get one of Dominic Cummings pals to create the system and then it became clear that the public do not trust our Government to keep our data safe and therefore will not adopt the 'Phone App' system.
Comparisons – useful or not?
The UK has recently recorded the highest death toll in Europe (not the EU but the continent) and, as a result our Government has now stopped showing the UK figures in comparison to our European neighbours. Is this a cynical attempt not to look bad in the press and to the populace or are comparisons not really that useful? I would simply ask what use are a set of isolated figures if you have nothing to measure your efforts against?
By comparing what we do to combat this pandemic and the results of those efforts against other countries allows for two things. One we get to see how what we do, whether similar or different, changes the impact on the pandemic. Two, we can learn from those that have better or worse results than we do and therefore save more lives.
Conspiracy Opinion – a danger to us all?
A healthy scepticism of the motives of Governments is a good thing in a democracy. Falling for every hare brained conspiracy leading down a rabbit hole of social media opinion is a different matter. (Yes I am aware I mixed a hare metaphor with a rabbit metaphor) So far the Covid19 pandemic has been blamed on 5G phone tech, the Chinese, The Americans and probably if I looked hard enough we would find the Illuminati and Aliens in the mix. The evidence for all these 'beliefs' is sketchy at best and outrageously comical at worst. The key word there is belief, since by admitting to a belief most people will never be disabused of the righteousness of that belief. It triggers a response of cognitive dissonance, known as belief disconfirmation ;
“The contradiction of a belief … causes cognitive dissonance that can be resolved by changing the challenged belief, yet, instead of effecting change, the resultant mental stress restores psychological consonance to the person by misperception, rejection, or refutation of the contradiction, seeking moral support from people who share the contradicted beliefs or acting to persuade other people that the contradiction is unreal.” (Eddie Harmon-Jones, 2002) or to put it on shorter and pithier words; “The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent full of doubt.” (Bertrand Russel)Yes, there are conspiracies in this world but I would be surprised if any of the actual conspiracies are openly touted on Social Media. Spreading and giving oxygen to theories that lack credible evidence or even basic substance is dangerous in times of global tension and a deadly pandemic so, be careful what you believe and be even more careful what you promote. You have complete license to believe any dangerous conspiracy you want but you have no right to inflict harm on others as a result of that belief. 2000+ years of religious wars anyone??
The second wave? & When will it be over?
The idea of the second wave (and possibly more) of Covid19 is one that was established early, one of the few things we can be confident about, following the evidence of the 1917/18 Influenza pandemic. The release of lock down conditions will result in a second wave of infections and deaths. In the Influenza pandemic this was in many cases worse than the first wave and the result of relaxing restrictions too early. Yet we seem to have learned little judging by the Governments approach. Even before the incidence of deaths has dropped to the level where the lock down was imposed are they talking of starting to ease restrictions. With parts of the country still experiencing infection rates above Government targets the economy is being championed and people who can sit safe in their mansions are urging people back to work and into harms way for the sake of the corporate economy.
As for all this chaos being over? That may never happen. If a vaccine is discovered then there is the opportunity to radically reduce the impact of the pandemic but we have not yet found a successful vaccine for a coronavirus. It may be that we have to accept a new 'mutation' of the virus on a regular basis and the search therefore for a new vaccine. Influenza requires a shot every year, partly to aim at the most likely strain for that season, and partly to address the fact that one shot confers only a limited window of immunity. How might this change our society in the long term?
Last word
As a last contribution I reiterate my words from the beginning of this piece; “Anybody who states they have the measure or the solution to this pandemic is a fool or a liar.” We are still learning what this virus is and what it can do. We should not underestimate it's 'novel' nature and that science and society is struggling to catch up. One thing I would like to think is that we will arrive at a society that replaces the religion of economy and money with a society based on recognising that we have enough for all in this world, if only we are willing to share. I have no confidence in that outcome but I will keep working for that in my own city and region so long as I can usefully do so. So remember and beware;
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