THE POSITIVE PROFESSOR

CMO of Rutherford Cancer Centres and Former Director of WHO Cancer Programme

SOCIAL media’s voice of calm Karol Sikora has been signed up by the Daily Express. Readers can now enjoy his soothing advice in these troubled times that have won him hundreds of thousands of followers on Twitter. If you need reassuring everything’s going to be all right read Professor Positivity.

WE have the pleasure of our granddaughter staying with us for a few months, so she is officially part of our “household”.

It’s great to have her with us and really makes me appreciate being able to see her, unlike so many grandparents in the country.

Earlier this week I took her to London for the day and out for dinner in Piccadilly, the Hard Rock Cafe.

Her choice of restaurant – nice burger, dreadful music!

What struck me, though, was just how quiet central London was for the time of year.

Not quite deserted, but the lack of people was eerie.

Normally there would be queues for restaurants, but they were virtually empty everywhere.

I was fortunate to go out for dinner twice this week, because my wife’s birthday was a couple of days after that.

Similar story there: a fantastic local restaurant but totally deserted.

It isn’t just London and the surrounding towns, in fact I imagine they are doing better than many corners of the country.

A friend in the South- west said they were out for dinner on a Friday night at a popular local Chinese – the only two people in there all night!

If we are going to have an economy to return to, then we really need to have a rethink.

Either there needs to be substantially more support available to these venues, or some of the sillier rules need to be tweaked.

Certainly it should be possible to go to a bar for a drink without needing a substantial meal.

It’s too easy for professors and politicians to close down hospitality and just expect them to somehow struggle through.

It doesn’t work like that, and they need to get their heads around that quickly.