A bold gamble to stop this viral hurricane

eerILY deserted high streets. empty roads and railway stations. In the windows of countless shops, the hanging sign: ‘Sorry, we’re closed.’

Not scenes from a Hollywood zombie movie, but the bleak impact on our towns and cities of Boris Johnson’s draconian measures to tackle the deadly coronavirus.

Never in peacetime has the country experienced such a severe shutdown of everyday life – on travel, work, socialising and even family gatherings.

But the prime minister’s most eminent scientists insist the unprecedented curbs to our freedom, which will – temporarily – render Britain almost unrecognisable, are essential to fight the invisible killer.

Such is the ferocity of its spread, deep concern has seized the nation.

Last night, the number of deaths had soared to 71. and with the Chief Scientific adviser warning this grim toll could reach 22,000, it’s little wonder drastic steps are being taken to save lives.

Yet following hot on the heels of the most serious public health scare in living memory, the economy is in danger of plummeting off a cliff.

The picture is dire. Grounded flights mean the airline industry and holiday firms are on the brink of collapse.

Because people have been told to avoid going out, small healthy businesses – pubs, restaurants and shops – risk seeing their incomes plunge. Still to pay bills and staff costs, they are staring at extinction.

In turn, millions of workers, not forgetting the self-employed, may end up on the dole. Suddenly, they’ll no longer be able to afford the rent or mortgage, nor have cash for day-to-day spending – facing poverty and homelessness. mr Johnson is right, therefore, to put his Government on a war footing. Yesterday, he sent in the cavalry.

a week is, they say, a long time in politics. Last Wednesday, rishi Sunak used his first Budget to unveil (recklessly, some grumbled) £30billion of emergency measures to tackle the virus.

Six days later, the impressive new Chancellor administered another fiscal shot in the arm to our Covid-19 stricken country that might have made even Jeremy Corbyn’s free-spending marxist eyes water.

a £330billion government-backed scheme to underwrite bank loans to firms – helping them and their staff through the turmoil. a deluge of cash injections and loans for hardhit small firms, mostly in leisure, hospitality and retail. Scotland gets £2billion, which Nicola Sturgeon has pledged will ease the plight of struggling Scots businesses.

Banks offering mortgage holidays so struggling workers will not pay a penny while getting back on their feet (the least lenders could do after taxpayers saved them in the 2008 financial crisis).

articulately promising a ‘collective national effort’, mr Sunak said the huge bailout would ‘protect families, neighbours, friends, jobs’. Let’s hope so. The package saddles every member of the public with £11,000 of debt – a frightening sum.

This paper has always believed we should pay our own way in the world. We support a small state, the free market and fiscal responsibility – not loading an unmanageable financial burden onto future generations.

Yet those on the rack are hard-working Britons whose enterprises have been brought to the lip of disaster not by mismanagement, but a disease spawned in animal markets on the other side of the world. They have done nothing wrong.

The Government argues the gargantuan rescue package only matches the scale of the cataclysm wrought by coronavirus.

With luck, if the contagion is beaten swiftly, business can once again flourish. The Chancellor has made a bold, courageous move. Let’s pray he’s not throwing good money to the wind – and is, instead, stopping a viral hurricane hammering our economy into oblivion.