A virus in retreat?
Twelve weeks after Britain went into lockdown, the number of people dying from coronavirus fell this week to its lowest level since the restrictions were imposed. Fifty-five people died in the UK on Monday after testing positive for Covid-19 – the fewest in a day since 21 March. There were no deaths at all in London that day, and Scotland and Northern Ireland reported zero new deaths on both Sunday and Monday, leading Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, to declare that the virus is now “in retreat”. However, on Tuesday, 286 UK deaths were reported.
The Government dropped plans to reopen primary schools for children of all ages before the summer holidays, after accepting it could not be done safely (despite warnings that up to 700,000 children have done no work at all in lockdown). But ministers said all shops can reopen from Monday, as can places of worship for individual prayer.
What the editorials said
It’s time the Government got some credit for its handling of the pandemic, said the Daily Mail. Undeniably, there have been costly mistakes along the way – the fiasco over testing; the shortages of PPE; the “appalling” failure to protect our care homes – but Boris Johnson’s primary aim of flattening the coronavirus curve has now been achieved. The rate of new infections is down nearly 30% in the past week, and the NHS never buckled under the strain.
But Britain’s response has hardly been worldbeating, said The Times. The “staggeringly high” official death toll now stands at 40,000: on one day last week, Britain suffered more reported Covid deaths than all 27 EU member states combined. And there’s still no sign of a viable test, trace and isolate system, while the contact tracing app being tested on the Isle of Wight has “sunk without trace”. The PM is “gambling with the health of the nation”, said The Guardian. Having been too slow to implement lockdown at the start of this crisis, he now appears “hell-bent” on lifting restrictions before the country is ready.
What the commentators said
Hurrah! said Trevor Kavanagh in The Sun. “Covid lockdown is being lifted early.” The PM, spooked by warnings of an impending jobs meltdown, is reportedly planning to reopen pubs, restaurants and hairdressers by early July. And to save our hospitality industry, his next step should be to abandon the “absurd” two-metre distancing rule. The dithering over a return to work must stop, agreed Dominic Sandbrook in the Daily Mail. After all, we now know far more about how the virus behaves. There’s evidence that seven out of ten people who have it don’t even show symptoms; that 91% of those that die have at least one pre-existing condition; and that it kills the over-60s at least 27 times the rate it does the under-40s. We also know more about people’s susceptibility to infection, said Dr John Lee in The Spectator. A recent study found up to 60% of people have some level of pre-existing immunity to Covid-19 after contracting other, milder coronaviruses – which would explain why the first wave didn’t infect more of us, and why a second spike is now “much less likely” than first thought.
If only that were so, said Dr Rupert Beale in The Guardian. It’s true that the virus transmits less well outdoors – which is why I don’t fret too much about pictures of crowded beaches – but there’s still every reason to be cautious about reopening shops and restaurants. Official data shows a “great majority” of us remain susceptible to the virus, and its R number (or rate of reproduction) is still perilously close to 1, above which it spreads exponentially. The warnings of a second spike are now deafening, said Tom Whipple in The Times. And the evidence suggests we should heed them: the UK remains “fertile” ground for infection, yet our test and trace system still isn’t fully up and running. In the short term, “we may be saved by summer”, as warm weather curtails the virus’s spread. But after that, we’re back in high-risk territory. Relax too soon, and we may lose all we’ve gained during three long months of lockdown.
What next?
The Government was facing more pressure to get pupils back to school this week after doubts were raised over whether secondaries would reopen in September. Those doubts emerged despite scientists concluding children under 15 are more likely to be hit by lightning than die from coronavirus. But zoos, safari parks and drive-in cinemas are set to reopen from Monday.
A comparative study by the OECD of Covid-19’s economic impact has concluded that the UK is likely to be hit harder than any other major economy, with an 11.5% slump in GDP forecast this year alone.