'You start to think, it's scary out there': England's shielders on stepping out
After what will be more than 100 days in isolation, people with underlying health issues, who are most at risk from Covid-19, are preparing with some trepidation for 6 July when life will begin to return to normal for many who have been shielding in England.
“I’ll probably go into the supermarket on the day with a big sigh of relief, though I will still be very careful,” says Sue Lamble, 74, a retired graphic designer from London.
She has an auto-immune condition that makes her lungs more vulnerable to infection and does not intend to mix with other people – although she has been going on distanced walks with a friend regularly – for the foreseeable future.
“You get used to the idea of not going out,” Lamble adds. “You get somewhat institutionalised and think, ‘Ah, it’s scary out there’, and I know a number of my friends feel like that. We’re viewing public transport with alarm.”
Esther Quaintmere, 32, a mechanical engineer from Cottingham in East Yorkshire, has been shielding because she has a low white blood-cell count that leaves her susceptible to bacterial infections. She spent 60 days without leaving her home before going on walks with members of her household who shielded with her.
Now, she is preparing to visit friends’ gardens, but after being made redundant she is acutely aware that there will be no swift return to normality. “It’s exciting to be able to plan and just think about seeing people,” she says. “But we don’t know the ins and outs of it.”
Shortly after Quaintmere spoke to the Guardian on Tuesday, a letter arrived through her door signed by the health secretary, Matt Hancock, and the housing secretary, Robert Jenrick. “For now you continue to be advised to follow the shielding guidance rigorously,” it says, adding: “From 6 July, you may, if you wish, meet in a group of up to six people outdoors … while maintaining strict social distancing.”
Quaintmere said it left her none the wiser and described the letter as “a waste of taxpayers’ money” because it did not appear to say anything different to what was previously said: “We’ve just got to interpret the advice now, though I’m a scientist – not a biologist or a medical doctor.”
From August, Quaintmere and the 2.2 million other high-risk people in England should no longer have to shield, the letter confirms. But Idris Rees, 78, who has a heart murmur and atherosclerosis – a potentially serious condition where arteries become clogged – is glad he lives in Wales.
“What Boris [Johnson] says doesn’t always apply to us,” he says. “So until we get something from [the first minister Mark] Drakeford, who has been a bit more cautious on the whole, I would be very reluctant to come out of shielding.”
Rees says that although he walks on the coast each day near Cardigan, south of Aberystwyth, he has not set foot in a shop or any building aside from his own home since March.
“I don’t feel the virus is under control and I don’t trust the government or their scientists,” he adds, saying that while he appreciates that a continued lockdown could have ever more damaging affects on the economy, he is worried about coming out too soon.
“My concern is coming out too early if it risks precipitating a second spike which could be much worse than the first. If I caught the virus that would be it.”