Two Month Assessment

Bournemouth Gardens are in full bloom. The weather during ‘lockdown’ has been glorious, which helps. The gardens are just a 30 second walk from home, and we stroll through them often. Not so often this year, because they attract too many other people out for a stroll. But it looked too lush yesterday to simply pass by. So we strolled on through.

Walks offer time to ponder the world. I’ve been pondering the UK government response to the pandemic.The government has gotten some things right and other things wrong. Economically, the furlough scheme was a good, purposeful device to try and preserve jobs. Five stars for that. They’ve brought medical experts on board as partners. Another five stars. Extra capacity was added to the NHS quick sharpish. A hat trick of five stars. And Boris has thus far avoided recommendations to inject disinfectant. Well done him.

The shambles with PPE was a disgrace. It’s become apparent to even the most faithful Tory that the NHS has been a victim of negligence at the hands of their party. But to my mind, the biggest disgrace is the total lack of basic preparedness for a pandemic. I’m not talking about the expensive stuff, like ventilators and ICU beds. I’m talking about having a coherent, effective plan.

Vietnam led the way, reacting quickly to news of the virus, going into hard lockdown and employing a basic but tried and tested, effective contact tracing system. It worked. Yes, they have experience with incoming novel viruses. But it’s long been clear that a serious pandemic will make its way round the world. We should be learning from others experiences, not just our own. We should be sharing best practice.

This could, potentially, have been stopped before it had much of a chance to get started. The government was found asleep at the wheel.