Message might still be the same, but it’s clearly not working any more
WATCHING from afar as officials in China dragged suspected Covid-19 patients to quarantine centres, it was easy to write it off as an oppressive and heavy-handed response typical forthecountry.
Yet within a few months of the footage flashing up on our television screens, the government here announced a raft of draconian restrictions aimed at suppressing the novel coronavirus. Overnight, schools closed their doors, shops pulled down their shutters, even visiting the final resting place of a loved one was banned.
With a predicted death toll of biblical proportions and plans to replace community recreation centres with mortuaries, the mood was forboding. But, at the same time, the restrictions were almost embraced as a necessary evil.
Settling down for what most thought would be a couple of weeks at home, social media was flooded with photographs of children studying at the kitchen table and homemade bananabreadfreshoutofthe oven.
Craft kits, baking ingredients and home learning textbooks became almost impossible to source.
The world fell eerily silent except on Thursday evening when people would stand on their doorsteps, adorned with hand-painted rainbows, and clap for our NHS heroes. We were in this together.
Only, no one ever really imagined we would be in an arguably worse position after a year of restrictions, suffering and sacrifice — and patience is wearing thin.
Nowhere is this more obvious thanonthesamesocialmedia sites where families posted details of their stay-at-home activities this time last year.
Gone are the photographs of the latest craft creation, replaced instead with memes of frazzled parents pushed to the edge of sanity after another day of homeschooling with a dodgy internet connection while juggling the demands of work.
The official message is just the same – don’t leave your house without reasonable excuse and limit your contact with people as much as possible, but the pictures on social media of groups of friends and families from multiple households meeting up in parks and enjoying an afternoon on the beach are proof that the stay-at-home message isn’t working.
People seem happy to advertise their breaches to the world, either because they don’t realise they’re breaking the rules or — the more likely explanation — because they simply don’t care any more.
By this stage of the first lockdown, the end was already in sight — this time around, more time in lockdown has passed, it appears the vaccines may not be the silver bullet we hoped they would be and it seems like social distancing and restrictions could be with us for years to come.
‘People seem happy to advertise their breaches’