COVID-19 Pandemic 2021 Part 8
It is now ten months since The World Health organization declared a global pandemic. The UK is now enduring its third lockdown. The only difference this time is that we are now facing several new strains of COVID-19 and the public is divided over the restrictions. The Government has consistently failed over the last year to take any meaningful action and the country effectively finds itself back at square one. To date, the UK has no functional test and trace system in place, nor are the country’s borders fully controlled in an effective manner. Flights from certain countries are banned but connecting flights can circumnavigate this problem. Only now are passengers tested for COVID-19 on arrival. PPE and glass vials are in short supply. Post Brexit “administrative issues” now threaten to delay stocks of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine. The National Health Service is struggling to cope. All these issues are further exacerbated by a partisan press and a population that appears to be at war with itself.
Now it is a common refrain from certain quarters not to “politicise” the response to the ongoing crisis. However, such a claim is risible and staggeringly crass. The UK Government is currently led by a strong Conservative Party majority. Furthermore they have been in power continuously since 2010 and have therefore shaped the political landscape of the country during that time. Hence not only are they directly responsible for their immediate response to the pandemic, which has clearly been driven by their political ideology but they are also responsible for the national services and infrastructure that are currently failing to cope. It would appear that a decade of cuts, politically driven underfunding and semi-privatization has left many institutions woefully under equipped to deal with the current situation. Let us not delude ourselves. Government policy and the Prime Minister himself are directly responsible for where the UK finds itself at present. A country with the third highest COVID-19 death rate in the world (weekly average deaths per million).
Sadly, how we got to this point is far from a mystery and is the inevitable consequence of decades of political, educational and sociological decline. If this pandemic had struck during the seventies or eighties, I believe it would have been handled better by both the governments and the population of the time. Politicians, public institutions and a sense of society were all more robust back then. However, hindsight does not really alter where we are now. The important issue is what happens next. Vaccinating the nation is the top priority although it doesn’t immediately resolve the problem of COVID-19. Even if everyone in the country could be vaccinated by tomorrow, it would take a while for infection rates to fall. However, rolling out the vaccine is proving problematic at present and the Government has made a controversial decision regarding the time period between doses. Pfizer, the manufacturer of one brand, recommends 21 days between doses. The UK Government has elected to change this to 12 weeks to ensure more people initially receive the vaccine. Again, we find UK policy at odds with other countries.
The question on everyone’s lips is obviously, what happens next? Well for the immediate future, I suspect just more of the same. I do believe that the UK population will eventually be fully vaccinated, although I think that may not be until the end of the year. There will be a percentage of the population that will choose not to do so and therefore there will still be regional, localised COVID-19 outbreaks. I suspect that the virus will become something we have to live with, like seasonal flu. Beyond controlling pandemic, the UK is facing a worsening economic recession. Unemployment is rising and will continue to do so. Inflation is now becoming an increasing worry. And then there is the ongoing fallout of leaving the EU. At some point the cost of the pandemic has to be addressed so there is the threat of increased taxation and a return to austerity. If the postponed Council and Mayoral elections are held this year (and it remains to be seen if they are), then I suspect there may be a strong protest vote. For those hoping that 2021 will be an improvement on the previous year, it may be wise to revise your expectations.
