Don’t blame the public for surge in Covid cases
Perhaps if there were fewer shops open, the stay at home message might be more effective (Police in England say they won’t enforce masks in supermarkets, 11 January). At the moment I’m in a small rural town, and there are a considerable number of shops still legitimately open.
People are out browsing cards, clothing, cosmetics, slippers etc. Surely none of these items are “essential”? If these shops are open they should only be able to sell items classified under a strict set of government guidelines that include the basic necessities to survive a lockdown. The rest should be blanked off or stored off the shelves.
It seems that it’s now up to consumers and retailers to decide what items are essential. One retailer told me she was able to stay open because she sold plugs – and then could sell everything else alongside, including balls of wool! Nice to have to stave off boredom, but not essential to survive. We all realise, sadly, that this will push everyone on to the internet, but what choice do we have in the extremes of this pandemic? Shannon Turner Chilcompton, Somerset
• It is fascinating how the current narrative from the government is slowly but inexorably making it the public’s fault that we have such a current crisis with the pandemic. I see the ground being prepared, so that when the inevitable accountabilities come home to roost, this government will simply say that lockdown rule-breaking was behind the surge.
Prof Stephen Reicher from the
University of St Andrews has continually said that compliance in the UK is between 80% and 90%, which is historically very high for such lockdowns. We must ensure that this government is properly and fully called to account for its management of the pandemic and that the public is not used as a scapegoat. The overwhelming majority of them have, in fact, behaved remarkably well over a protracted period of time. Eric Thomas Mottisfont, Hampshire
• Gabriel Scally is absolutely right (England’s crisis can’t be blamed on the new Covid variant alone, 11 January), but indecision, hypocrisy and confused messaging have also contributed. Prevention is always better (and cheaper) than cure, and Prof Scally is right to emphasise that public health (including public mental health) demands a different approach from the traditional medical individual treatment approach.
As any public health professional will tell you, there is never one single intervention that will provide a solution, and so vaccinations alone will not get us out of this mess.
The need for clear messages that people can understand, and to which there is voluntary adherence, is obvious, particularly when up to 40% of people with the virus can be asymptomatic. Enforcement of rules should not be an issue, whether this is by the police or environmental health officers. These failures by the government mean many have lost confidence in its handling of the pandemic, so it is no wonder that misinformation from dubious sources is too often believed – and this has consequences for public health. Dr Stephen Batters-by-Vice-president, Chartered Institute of Environmental Health
-• John Lynham (Letters, 11 January) is right to draw attention to the glaring lack of persuasive public health advertising about Covid, aimed at making behavioural changes in the public. Those of us who are old enough will remember the effective campaigns promoting seatbelt use and warning against drink-driving. In one, an image of a young man, seriously incapacitated and being spoonfed his dinner, was associated with the message “he didn’t think it was necessary to wear a seatbelt”. These and other advertisements brought about the necessary changes in culture. So, how about an image of a young person on a ventilator, with the caption “he didn’t see why he should give up mingling with his friends”? Dr Michael Quigley-Cambridge