To incarcerate people solely on age grounds is an outrage

As Boris Johnson returns to Downing Street, I reflected on Winston Churchill’s return to Office in 1951. The significance being that by then he was in his mid-70s at a time when three score years and 10 was more of an aspiration than the expectation that it is today.

What would he have made of discrimination on age grounds in plans for the nation’s recovery from Covid-19? Can you imagine him declining to come to the Dispatch Box in the House of Commons?

When coronavirus first broke out it soon became clear there was a genuine need for the whole nation to rally to the call for careful “social isolation”. Unfortunately, this has been interpreted by some as “incarceration” so there have been people who thought that they simply couldn’t leave their home.

Some had good reason. One and a half million people were asked to self-isolate in a complete lockdown because of an underlying health condition. It turns out that some were wrongly informed and others, who had a dangerous condition, were missed. These things happen when you’re dealing with a crisis and you’re in a rush.

I was amused last week to hear an “expert” pronounce that there was substantial evidence that age and “mortality” (that’s death to the rest of us) went hand-in-hand. Well, what a revelation.

Of course, as we get older we become more vulnerable to dying. Dying from all kinds of ailments that afflict older people and more vulnerable to things such as flu and pneumonia. In fact, in my childhood, pneumonia used to be called “the old man’s friend”.

But, since my childhood, lifespan has increased dramatically.

Only a year or two ago, the Government and experts were all rejoicing in the fact that people will live to 100 in much larger numbers than at present, and that the majority of people can expect to live comfortably into their 80s and 90s.

All of this has now gone out of the window. Age, rather than health, is now being pushed as the benchmark for whether people will be allowed to return to some sort of normality. A presumption that would not be tolerated for a moment if it were applied to aspects of our history, ethnicity and vulnerability.

To put it bluntly, if someone suggested that your ethnicity would determine whether you were going to be allowed to return to some sort of normality, the world would implode.

Discrimination against older people because “they’re old” is equally totally unacceptable. We are what we are. Half a million over 70s are in paid work.

Many more, in fact millions, volunteer or give family support in some way or another. Many in their 70s are supporting people in their 90s and others are caring for neighbours or contributing to the wider community.

As younger people, why would you be concerned about this piece of gross inequality? Well, it will cost you. And it will cost you a lot.

Even before the pandemic, social care was already under massive strain.

Local authority budgets as well as the National Health Service were at breaking point. On the whole, however, most people got the support that they needed including younger people with severe health conditions.

Just think for a moment of the impact of keeping millions of people in semi-isolation for month after month? Yes, the magnificent response of the public as a whole over the past six weeks has been impressive. But think for a moment about when the sun is no longer shining (we’ve had the best weather in April since records began) and when the gloss comes off the intensive commitment to others.

In other words, as I said in the online version of the House of Lords last Thursday, St George’s Day, we may have slain one dragon only to find that yet another long-term formidable beast appears on the horizon.

We have ample evidence to confirm that a major cause of mental and physical deterioration is isolation and the lack of stimulation.

Over the past 20 years, all the evidence from every form of expertise has told us that activity is the best way of not only remaining fit, but of staving off the impact of ageing. As the vice president of the Alzheimer’s Society, I know that exercise, social contact and engagement can delay the onset of dementia.

In every sphere of our lives, both with our physical and mental health, it is clear that social interaction, positive activity and keeping our brains alive, keeps us alive.

Take that away and you will have a devastating impact on a growing, ageing population. The financial cost to you all will be enormous. The cost to the individual could be to effectively finish their lives.

But there is another impact in addition to the pressure on social care in the future. The simple matter of independence. I have had good reason over the years to treasure the simple matter of welcoming help without being dependent on others in my everyday life. I wish that to continue.

For society to want to save life and do everything possible to achieve this in defeating Covid-19 is one thing, but it would be an outrage to then move to action which would have such a devastating outcome.

That is why maintaining social isolation and ensuring that we adhere to sensible advice on steps to protect ourselves and others makes sense. Doing so on age grounds does not. Perhaps it is now time to set up an alternative body to the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, with a wider group of expertise and a greater understanding of the alternative impact of what we do.

Perhaps a Recovery Advisory Group for the emergency could draw in a very different type of expert?

The book by Matthew Syed, Rebel Ideas, sets out real-life examples over recent years of the way in which highly intelligent experts have got it wrong because they reinforced the views of those around them with similar expertise, ethnicity, background and experience, and, of course, their professional prowess was reinforced by this.

In universities it’s called peer group review. In life, it’s called “a very similar group of people reinforcing their own preconceptions”.

In other words, in lifting the lockdown we need to consider the law of unintended consequences.

Lord Blunkett was Labour’s shadow health secretary (1992-94) and home secretary in Tony Blair’s government (2001-04). He is a former chairman of social services in the city of Sheffield.