Covid Rules Collapsing

[the other bob wilson]

This is the problem though TOBW, what you say isn't correct. You may want them to be politically, but they aren't. I'll repeat them again:

On deaths; as of yesterday the UK is 31st in the world per capita for Covid deaths. We are 23rd in Europe. And it's worth noting that Covid probably hit us sooner than most in Europe

https://ourworldindata.org/explorers...BR~CAN~DEU~FRA

On vaccines; whilst the vaccine rollout is harder to come to a definitive opinion on, it is generally recognised that in terms of development and roll out we are world-leading. Others have caught up, but as is generally recognised, speed matters in these things, and the percentage of our population booster vaccinated is even now a good 10% above the EU average.

https://ourworldindata.org/explorers...BR~CAN~DEU~FRA

On economic support; again, this is harder still to compare, but I see very little evidence that the UK has underperformed here. At the very least we have spent £199bn on supporting peoples jobs.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-52663523

And thats not mentioning the speed of coming out of restrictions, or economic growth or numerous other factors to take into account.

No one should give the UK Govt, or the Welsh Govt, or any Govt a free pass, and ALL have made mistakes, but it's important to look at the data and come to a rounded conclusion, rather than starting with this partisan party-political position and then skew the facts to make it fit that.

You can lecture me as much as you like, but, as always, you omit to say that the huge majority of those thirty European countries you mention are old Warsaw Pact countries that, even after all of this time, have struggled to overcome the financial effects of Soviet bloc control. For me, a true like for like comparison is with the countries we have most in common with economically and politically. That’s why I specifically mentioned Western European democracies and the last time I looked only Belgium, Italy and Gibraltar had a worse death rate than us.

I’ve never been critical of the Government when it comes to vaccine roll outs (although there does seem to be a Johnson factor now which is leading to falls in the numbers being jabbed), it has been the big success for the Government in the past two years.

As for financial support, I would expect the same, if not more, if there had been a Labour or any other non Tory Government in power at the time - it was their duty to provide that sort of support in the gravest national crisis of most of our lifetimes.

Anyway, this thread was started with a specific subject in mind and I repeat that the time for Covid rules to “collapse” is not when a thousand or so people are still dying every week. I read at the start of all this whenmany of those now arguing that “we should move on” (to use Tory speak) we’re saying Covid was just a version of the flu that 20,000 deaths a year from flu was considered to be a bad year with a very strong strain of the virus. With current figures, we’re heading for 50,000 deaths a year from Covid and that’s with at least a double vaccine for the vast majority of people. I just think that we’ve fallen into the trap of “freedom days” and talking of the pandemic in the past tense before - there seems no logic in dropping all Covid rules when so many are still dying and so, in the absence of any logic, you have to look for other reasons and a PM still under severe pressure and fighting for his political life would appear to be as good a reason as any.