Reading BoJo’s leaked note from Oct and having seen the recently released comparisons of areas worst hit by Covid correlating very highly with the areas suffering child poverty and social deprivation going right back to the mid 19 Century, it became clear to me why Tories and neo-libs are so against restrictions in the face of compelling evidence that it isn’t a good idea. Whilst the propensity for infection may not particularly discriminate base on class, there would appear to be an asymmetry of outcome, with those worst off substantially more at risk of death or serious illness.

It’s easy to think of “freedom” and “victory” when ultimately the risk of a bad outcome for you, your colleagues, party donors and a huge chunk of your voting base is substantially less.

I completely agree, and the most sensible and responsible course of action would be if all parts of the UK were to adopt the most cautious guidelines.

However, I am aware that when an English person suggests a common approach across the UK what they often mean is "do as England does".

With all due respect, the two are completely different things.

Being told to self isolate has huge ramifications for people leading their daily lives and, depending upon what you do in your life, can be massively disruptive for individuals. It's much more like incarceration than anything else.

Wearing a mask is a pain, and something I intensely dislike, but it really doesn't affect how I lead my life. It's much more like the indecency laws - we entirely accept that we need to cover our private parts in public, so our mouths and noses are a stretch but not fundamentally different.

...and who knows, some fools might be isolating because they believe it's the right thing to do.

i was hoping you wouldn't go in this direction, and i did choose my words carefully not to favour any one set of laws/guidance over another.

my argument was only for common laws and guidance across the UK, something which I think people would expect might be sensible under the circumstances.

I tend to agree with you, it’s not a great outcome currently. But in order to achieve this practically, you’d need to repeal devolved powers. It is probably unrealistic to expect 4 different parties who are obliged to address the situation in their own country to arrive at the same solution. The EU are having exactly the same issue, albeit with a bigger number of players around the table.

Yep, all my calls from Track and Trace have been from cheerful sounding Geordies or Scousers. Oh, and one Aussie.

A crescendo of impenetrability for my ears! :D

Daily data:

Cases 46,558 (36,660 last Tuesday)
Deaths 96 (50)
Patients admitted 745 (565 on the 7th)
Patients in hospital 4,567 (3,415 on the 12th)
Patients in ventilation beds 611 (482 on the 12th)
People vaccinated up to and including 19 July 2021:
First dose: 46,349,709
Second dose: 36,243,287

The rolling seven day daily average for cases is now up 40.7% on the previous week and the same measure for deaths is up 60.6%. The rolling 7 day daily average for deaths is 48.9 today.

moral obligation, whats that???

there are also people who pulled their kids from school in advance of hols, because why risk a positive test before heading out??

Congratulations on the racial sterotyping :)

As someone who recovered from Covid only a week or two ago, is there realistically any chance I could catch Covid again in the next 4-12 weeks? Reinfection numbers I’m seeing coming out of Israel seem VERY low and I’m assuming the few cases would of been some delay between the Covid cases, or maybe a different variant. Throw in I’m also fully vaccinated.

Clearly I missed the UK being segmented into racial cohorts based on nationality. Are those Picts up to no good again?

Bloomberg news reporting now that Delta is now 83% of new US cases

Just ran a couple of errands in my local High Street shops in Chiswick and by my reckoning the % of people who have given up on masks has gone up to 30%, with almost half of the Waitrose employees unmasked. Maybe it’s a fluke, maybe it’s the demographics (Lidl over in Acton sees a very different crowd) but I feel that the largest cohort to go unmasked was 50+ in terms of age.

What can I say, I hope that this gamble pays off and we don’t go back to lockdowns…