Virus not about to go away

Following Sunday night’s updates to the lockdown by the Prime Minister, I would say that little has changed in practice. Significant numbers of us are not working who otherwise would be and are being drip-fed part of our income via various schemes.

It would seem that many people are afraid to come out of their cocoons for fear of catching this infection. We know that older people and those with underlying health conditions such as diabetes and obesity are the most at risk. Even amongst those groups the risk of hospitalisation and death are extremely small.

Indeed the most likely place to catch this virus is ironically within hospital or a care home.

There is no guarantee that a vaccine will be discovered for Covid19 or indeed a cure. This virus is here and we must learn to live with it. Despite allegations to the contrary this virus is not about to disappear, any more than HIV, Norovirus or any other of the 6,000 viruses that exist in the environment.

The government’s approach to this is guided by fear as much as the science or lack of it. However it is pragmatic and we should give them credit where it is due for managing an extremely challenging situation. It is easy to shout from the sidelines that they should have locked us down sooner, harder and for longer. However, those same voices in the near future will also be screaming at the government to provide jobs for the millions of unemployed and for increases in public expenditure despite the massive national debt that we are running up and that our grandchildren will be paying off. In my view the only way forward is to accept that this virus must make its way through the population until herd immunity is achieved. This must be done by keeping infections at a level that the NHS can cope with and also by getting people back to work as soon as possible to protect the economy.

Neil Cox