Reasons to be pessimistic

Posted on

This has been a difficult year. We all know that. Almost all of us will be wishing 2022 might be better. That, though, requires a competent government. We do not have one. The clearest evidence comes from their actions as we approach the New Year.

The government is saying there was no evidence of a need for more Covid restrictions only a few days ago. However, that same evidence was apparently sufficient to require the building of overflow wards in car parks. But that is happening just at the time that the NHS has a major crisis in staffing existing wards. Where staff for the overflow units will come from is anyone's guess. At the same time, pubs are still open and people are told they can party so long as they have tested themselves, but Covid tests are unavailable.

There is nothing coherent about this, at all.

What we can say for certain is that cases are rising at present, exponentially, as some of us always expected.

What we also know is that the number of cases in older people is rising fast now, and that is what was also expected as Christmas became the super spreader event to move this from children and their parents, where it was prevalent, to older generations where previously it was not. So, things are going to get much worse as older people always suffer worse.

And so far, not much suggests that this version of Covid is mild. It is just different, with some evidence that it might have much greater long term impact on some of those who get it.

If I could work all this out on the basis of the evidence that scientists were producing then why couldn't the government? That is the question that needs answering, except there will never be a reasonable answer to that. Only wilful blindness can explain the government's inaction.

There are 2,300 admissions a day now in England, with a seven day doubling with the peak not expected for another 10 to 14 days. That is sufficient to crash the NHS. This was always foreseeable but apparently this was acceptable, as will the resulting deaths be accepted by the government.

As bad, the basis for the next mutation might be being laid by this course of action.

This is the government we have as 2022 arrives. It is unable to appraise data. It cannot assess risk. It is reckless in the face of warnings. Its policies are utterly uncoordinated. They do not take real constraints into account. And they are indifferent to the deaths and suffering that will flow from this.

Am I optimistic for 2022 with this government in charge? No, I am not. Not at all.


Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:

You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.

And if you would like to support this blog you can, here: