Too little and too late
I applaud the speed of Covid vaccinations, as well as the work of the NHS staff and others involved, and the scientists who developed the vaccine.
However, the British public deserves to be deeply angry at our Government's response to the pandemic.
It has acted too little, too late and this is why the UK has around the highest number of Covid deaths per head of population in the whole world; there are nearly 200 countries better than us.
Take Australia, a country with just under half our population, strict, drastic action has been rewarded with a mere 909 deaths since Covid started.
Last week there was one new Covid case in the city of Perth. The state's response was to close down the whole area - 100% lockdown.
Due to the lack of vision and timidity of our leaders, our situation is so tragically different; not only their failure to limit incomers and to act swiftly on the advice of SAGE, failure of quarantine and track and trace, lockdowns too little and too late; there are also underlying factors.
These include a preCovid poverty level of
22%, (14.4million people), 320,000 homeless, the huge gap between the rich and poor, the lack of properly financed care for the elderly, and the lamentable display of the NHS not being safe in their hands – this in a country with an economy fifth in the world.
These are all things which our government should have addressed in their 11 years in office, but have been too interested in pushing their own dogma to be able to understand the plight and needs of the society they look down on.
The PM Boris Johnson's fine words and bluster cannot conceal the fact of 110,000 deaths, which can be laid at the door of his lack of decisive action when our country needed it most, and failure to address social problems in the past. Michael L Smith. Sent via email.