A civilised society does not make Christmas prisoners of lonely people

SIR – I live in a low-covid Tier-1 rural area and have been really careful since March. For the same length of time my Mum, who is 86, has lived largely as a recluse in a small rented flat.

Our plan is that she will come to my husband and me for Christmas, 60 miles away. Unless I am arrested en route to collect her, that is what will happen. Making prisoners of lonely people is a terrible way for a civilised society to proceed, and I for one will no longer tolerate it.

We are not planning a rave. We just intend to have a small family Christmas at home. And we will.

Sandie Lewis

Seend Cleeve, Wiltshire

SIR – You report (November 18) that a chapter had to be dropped in Nigella Lawson’s new cookbook “when inviting people for supper was placed on the Government’s list of banned activities”. That is the most depressing sentence that I have read this year. Paul Streeter-jewitt

Bath, Somerset

SIR – Civil liberties are for life and not just for five days of Christmas. Russell Margerrison

Great Horwood, Buckinghamshire

SIR – Has anyone given thought to travel over the expected few family days at Christmas? Trains will be rammed, and social distancing impossible. Tickets will be hard to come by, and trains don’t usually run on Christmas Day and Boxing Day.

For us oldies who are desperately missing their grandchildren, particularly those like myself who live alone, are clinically vulnerable by age, and whose family live at the other end of the country, I certainly can’t see any light at the end of the tunnel.

Shirley Westwood

Headcorn, Kent

SIR – Frederick Forsyth and others (Letters, November 18) make a misleading comparison of vaccination and medical experimentation.

Aged three, I nearly died from bilateral pneumonia after a bout of measles. (In 1954 there was no vaccine against measles.) We were all vaccinated against diphtheria, tetanus, and polio, unless there was a medical contraindication. In my clinical practice I have never seen an acute case of diphtheria, tetanus or polio.

Those against vaccination usually lack a scientific education and are likely to be ineducable in such matters. John M Scott FRCS

Aspley Guise, Bedfordshire

SIR – On ringing my GP surgery on Thursday on another matter, I inquired about having a flu vaccination, given the announcement of free inoculation for the over-50s.

The polite receptionist advised me that, while I was fully entitled, there was no chance, as they had no stock and no idea when more would come. It was suggested I try a pharmacist.

It is not a good look for the health service or its contractors, let alone those of us who pay for it.

Nick Brown

Knowle, Warwickshire