Just as a reminder, those are the number of days that have elapsed since the imposition of the three Covid lockdowns in England. But today is the first day in almost two years when there are no laws still in place in England to prevent the spread of Covid-19. That is not to say that the pandemic is over by any means: there are still over 39,000 people testing positive in the UK every day and there are almost a thousand deaths each week of people who had tested positive within the previous 28 days. However, both of these figures represent an ongoing decline after a further peak in this country at the start of this year. Globally, the number of deaths from Covid is standing at almost six million: an appalling loss of life and representing a mortality level around 1.4% of total cases. One can only imagine what this figure might be if effective vaccines had not been developed so rapidly. According to the really excellent website of the John Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, there is now nowhere on the planet that has escaped the pandemic; there have been eleven cases in Antarctica and seven in the Marshall Islands. So, while in England there is no longer a requirement to isolate if you test positive and no longer a law stipulating that you should wear a facemask on public transport or in certain enclosed spaces, such precautions are still legally enforceable in many other countries and with public opinion in England very divided it seems highly likely that many people will continue to be cautious here as well. Medical advice seems also to be that such caution is wise. While the omicron variant of SARS-Cov-2 has resulted in less serious illness for the majority of those who have contracted it, it has proved to be more transmissible and only time will tell whether there are more variants yet to come.
If today’s lifting of restrictions was, as widely suspected, a largely political move to distract attention away from a Prime Minister whose own conduct during lockdowns over the last two years has increasingly come under scrutiny, then – as recent news makes clear – it may not have been needed. The media have been dominated in the last week by two other much more disturbing stories than ‘partygate’. Growing tension between Russia and Ukraine, with a threatened invasion that had been predicted towards the end of last week, finally resulted in bombing in the early hours of today and non-stop news coverage is already talking about the worst conflict in Europe this century. Under what sound like completely ridiculous pretexts – to prevent the genocide currently happening in the separatist eastern regions (there is none); and to halt the ‘Nazification’ of Ukraine (whose head of state is Jewish) – President Putin of Russia has sent some of that country’s very considerable military might westwards. The Cold War may have ‘officially’ ended on 26 December 1991 after almost 45 years, but something pretty sinister is heating up now.
The other worrying events in the last ten days have been to do with the weather, always a topic of concern in this country but justifiably so when the first ever ‘red weather alert’ was issued for London in the face of severe storms. Storm Eunice battered much of the country, bringing down trees and causing widespread disruption; all train services in Scotland were suspended and in Wales all schools were closed and trains cancelled. Eunice was followed in quick succession by Franklin and Gladys, raising questions about just how much weather patterns are being altered as a result of our failure to respond rapidly enough to the climate crisis. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a ‘code red for humanity’ in its Sixth Assessment Report last August and this year it is due to publish its Synthesis Report, providing ‘an overview of the state of knowledge on the science of climate change’ with an emphasis on new data since the previous Assessment Report was published in 2014. For the sake of everyone everywhere, we can only hope that its ‘Summary for Policymakers’ will be heeded and acted upon this time, because progress since 2014 has not been nearly sufficient.
While all this ‘big stuff’ is pretty grim and we can be left feeling helpless in the face of so much suffering and misery, it is worth acknowledging that we are in a very privileged position, with each day bringing things to be thankful for. Family members who were pretty unwell with Covid – ‘our’ first cases – have made good recoveries; spring flowers have survived the wind and rain and gardens are becoming greener and more colourful by the day; and while many regular events, such as our church services, are continuing to be in hybrid form, which is of significant benefit to those who are vulnerable or otherwise housebound, other things are back to ‘normal’ and my local choral society is meeting and rehearsing again in hopes that the Easter concert postponed from 2020 may go ahead, albeit two years late.
NB: Nicky's Blog 