Covid-19 is not the only threat to our lives

The worst is yet to come Democracy must win day

WHY is it that the Prime Minister is taking the coronavirus threat so seriously with daily COBRA meetings, broadcast press briefings, and discouraging mass gatherings when he doesn’t get it about the climate emergency?

Of course, the big issue is that people here have started dying and, to his credit, the PM acknowledges that many, many more are likely to do so in the near future.

The prediction of 260,000 potential deaths is dreadful, as is the closure of the economy with people destitute (especially the selfemployed) with months of not being allowed to go to work or work drying up.

But globally, as was pointed out recently,

this disaster is dwarfed by the daily death-rate from poverty.

And the daily death-rate from environmental degradation isn’t just people, it includes hundreds of species which may be overlooked (as bacteria, microbes and invertebrates) yet play an essential but hidden role in life.

People have become aware of the threat to bees and insects from chemical and industrial gardening and farming and without them our food supply may be irrevocably damaged.

Surely this dreadful threat merits a COBRA meeting and action?

B. Ish-Shalom, via email

The spirit to overcome

PERHAPS I am being over optimistic, but hopefully the current Covid-19 crisis will ultimately bring back the community spirit we acquired during and after WWII.

I doubt whether people who stock-piled at the expense of the rest of us will embrace that spirit, but we can all help each other in so many ways, especially our neighbours.

Dream on, Malc...

Malcolm Maginn, Macclesfield

ANYBODY over 70 (I am 74) or with health issues has been told that they must self-isolate and stay in their own homes for the next threeto-four months in the battle to try to contain coronavirus.

This will mean we will come out of ‘hibernation’ sometime in the summer (July/August).

By then will we have developed an effective vaccine that we could be given? Answer. No. Then the worst of it must be over? Answer. No.

In fact the virus, according to scientific prediction and modelling, will be at its peak.

The situation will, almost certainly, be much worse.

We are more likely to catch it then than we are at present simply because many more people will have it and the NHS could be so overwhelmed by the millions of sick people that it is unable to offer any real help.

So what can we do but go back into isolation for another four months or better eight months, by which time we just might have produced an effective vaccine?

If anybody thinks that in four months time the situation will be better and the worst will be over then on present evidence that seems to be a serious mistake to make.

Let’s hope predictions are wrong and things turn out to be better than seems likely at the moment for all our sakes.

What’s the answer? Who knows? Best of luck everybody in the coming weeks and months.

Colin Morrison, Whitefield

STATES will not virtually shut down entire national economies over any virus.

My wife (who has respiratory problems) and I are in our mid-70s, and considered very vulnerable to Covid-19.

That said, the vast majority hit by Covid-19 are only mildly affected and recover.

Somehow, Western democracies must come up with means/methods to protect the vulnerable, as best they can.

Italy is already an economic basket case, along with Germany’s economy faltering under the unnecessary weight of renewable energy/green regulatory nightmare legislation.

The likes of states such as China

A serene view of Worsley Dam, by Trevor Lawrence, of Davyhulme. If you have a stunning picture, then we’d love to see it. Send your photos to us at viewpoints@ men-news. co.uk, marking them Picture of the Day and North Korea, along with ‘fake democracies’ like Iran, Turkey and Russia, will not take economic hits (starting with sky-rocketing home mortgage interest rates) in proportion to the West – rather, they will be in the box-seat to commercially and/or militarily, colonise/takeover energy-rich, and high-food production countries.

Not to mention militarily dominating vital trade route sealanes.

H. Hutchins, via email

now. I’m climbing the walls but reading this kind act of humanity has given me the drive to continue. Well done.

Wendy Davies

How kind is that. We need more like you. Bless you.

Barbara Thompson