Boris Johnson's press conference concerning his Covid plan was a staggering debacle yesterday.
First, there is as such no plan. All that is actually happening is that the government is denying that it has any further responsibility for managing Covid risk. Doing so will now be at our cost and is all down to our common sense. It's as if all those years of learning about public health taught us nothing. It's also as if the government had now abandoned all responsibility for flu, or measles, or heart disease. And it's as if they had decided free at the point of use was no longer a characteristic of the NHS.
Second, the inability of Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance to handle the contradictions in their positions was painful to watch. After sharing responsibility for all those excess deaths they cannot leave their posts. Simultaneously they know what they are being asked to endorse by their presence is unsustainable and without any scientific support.
Third, it is apparent that Sunak's inner sociopath is in full play. Rather than provide the NHS with the £5bn it thinks it needs to manage Covid and begin to beat waiting lists he denied the funding. Millions will suffer, and some will die because he is dedicated to a false economic dogma of balanced budgets and simultaneously cannot comprehend waiting because his wealth means he never has to.
Fourth, there is, of course, no need for this rationing: modern monetary theory makes clear that if the healthcare backlog can be cleared then we can afford to clear it by creating the necessary money to do so. That's why it is so painful to watch what Sunak is doing.
Fifth that is why it is so hard to also see him impose a new health tax from April, with testing kits to be paid for by families who will not be able to afford them and who cannot afford to take time off if they are ill in any case. Journalist after journalist pointed this out to Johnson. He ignored this further cost of living imposition. As Patrick Vallance noted, Covid has fed off inequality. He failed to add that the government is fuelling it.
Sixth, as Johnson noted, Covid is not over. New waves will happen. More people will die. The next wave could be more or less deadly, we simply do not know.
But whatever happens we have a government that now is seeking to say that it washes its hands of all responsibility for Covid. It is abandoning testing. It's supposed dependence on anti-viral drugs cannot work as a result. And it has said that the economic consequences of whatever happens now is down to others to bear as it will spend no more.
Politically, medically and economically this is incompetent. It is as if all the effort to address this issue is now deeply regretted. The message from Sunak is very clear: he thinks we should have let it rip all along. The fight to save life, businesses and society was all in vain, he obviously thinks (because I think he is the source of this policy). Eugenically, those who were dying should have been allowed to, both in human terms and with regard to the economy.
This is where the Tories have taken us. To a place where we are on our own when only collective action still make sense. Worse, we are in a place where those who cannot afford Covid healthcare are simply abandoned to their fate.
How did such profound corruption came to power in the UK?
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I would presume that part of Sunak’s thinking is a desire to create a very thriving private healthcare system and to undermine public support for the NHS as those that can will pay for operations that they need. From his perspective another Covid gift, along with its distraction from Brexit impacts. We move ever closer to Ayan Rand’s desired society; (til she needed something different of course).
The whole charade was nothing more than another cheap scam by Johnson in the “plan” to save his job (the only ‘plan’ Johnson has ever had); by throwing red meat to the rude mob of witless bullies on the green benches behind him, braying “freedom”; a word that does not have any meaning at all, but is used as a club to beat anyone within their reach into weary senselessness.
What is the difference between the current Conservative Party and the threat from a virus? We now have vaccines for a virus.
Why was this not Kier Starmer’s reply to the PM yesterday? Thank you, Richard, for saying what is needed. But so very sad.
What I’m seeing is pure insouciance.
I think many are not convinced – I can only hope that Johnson is making a big mistake but this society of ours is very good at absorbing cruelty and getting used to it – being ‘beaten down’ as the Americans say.
The portents are not good are they?
“How did such profound corruption came to power in the UK?”
That idiot Thatcher started it and this quote of the gormless one set the tone for the next 40 years:
“The state has no source of money other than the money people earn themselves.”
Pathetic in its incoherence, filthy-rich Sunak continues on this path……furthermore, Liebore/Reeves have swallowed it – because they lack the intellect to make a counter argument that resonates with UK serfs.
“because they lack the intellect to make a counter argument that resonates with UK serfs.”
I’d be very grateful if Mike could detail the counter argument that *would* resonate with UK serfs. Having castigated others for not having the intelligence to make it I assume that he has developed one.
It would be useful to know of such a counter argument that has any effect because I have tried and tried, every which way I can, to explain it to the ‘serfs’, both on line and in person, and they mostly either don’t believe it or are not interested.
In view of my, albeit limited, experience I don’t blame Labour for not touching it because I think it would be political death in any GE.
I still think that ‘don’t scare the horses’ is wise because my experience (limited though it might be over 50+ years) tells me that once people have voted a party into power most of them really don’t seem to care much about how the party implements its policies. After all, they’ve swallowed QE without question and are now swallowing the belief that it has to be ‘paid back’ without question…
I think that quote comes from the 1983 Conservative Party conference. Here is a longer version:
“Let us never forget this fundamental truth: the State has no source of money other than money which people earn themselves. If the State wishes to spend more it can do so only by borrowing your savings or by taxing you more. It is no good thinking that someone else will pay—that “someone else” is you. There is no such thing as public money; there is only taxpayers’ money.”
Source: https://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/105454
That is, I think, the dogma at the heart of the current economic orthodoxy. A convincing argument to refute that contention will advance things greatly, if it obtains some traction.
I think that quote comes from the 1983 Conservative Party conference. Here is a longer version:
“Let us never forget this fundamental truth: the State has no source of money other than money which people earn themselves. If the State wishes to spend more it can do so only by borrowing your savings or by taxing you more. It is no good thinking that someone else will pay—that “someone else” is you. There is no such thing as public money; there is only taxpayers’ money.”
Source: https://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/105454
That is, I think, the dogma at the heart of the current economic orthodoxy. A convincing argument to refute that contention will advance things greatly, if it obtains some traction.
I can only hope later today Nicola Sturgeon doesn’t follow this route, but of course with Westminster’s financial boot on our neck, she can only do so much.
If I was ScotGov I would just spend what was necessary and challenge Westminster to prevent it. Would require a Ministerial Direction to force the civil servants to ignore Treasury rules on spending controls, etc. The FM tells the public her government will do whatever is necessary to protect public health and safety even if that means breaking the rules, blowing the budget and going into the red. Challenge the Tories to prevent her by e.g. imposing direct rule, jailing her for abuse of funds, etc. The public will be totally on the ScotGov side and we win either way. Either she becomes a martyr to the cause and everyone can see that Scotland has been trampled on by London, or they back off and we have won de facto self-rule. Of course she won’t, because she is a lawyer that has to follow all the rules and keeping her job and so forth is more important.
I like your thinking
If I may, Dr Tim, don’t the civil servants up there though actually work for Westminster down here? I recall a couple of years back it was suggested in these very columns after it was noted that a busload or two of Westminster’s civil servants were inexplicably en route for Holyrood that the reason for their being sent was to ensure there was a strong cadre up there loyal to down here, their presence intended to be an obstruction to Independence. Have they gone native now?
Reply to Bill Kruse’s post: Yes there is no separate Scottish Civil Service; all civil servants in Scotland are employed by the UK Civil Service and are ultimately answerable to Whitehall, but work on behalf of the elected government of Scotland. As a result it is widely suspected in Scotland that a fifth column is either already active or has the potential to be active within the Scottish Gov ( I wonder what odds the bookies might give on these two options). There is a notorious photo supposedly taken in Whitehall of some Holyrood civil servants who were given awards for services to the UK for their role in the 2014 referendum (I use the caveats as I’ve never seen proof of authenticity or indeed a source reference). Sadly I didn’t save it at the time.
My assumption is that the timescale of police action/full release of information about ‘Partygate’ is now known, hence the early removal of restrictions and testing. This current wave of the pandemic is on a downward tack (in terms of hospitalisations and deaths) and is likely to remain so for another month or two at least. We’ll have to wait to see where waning of efficacy of boosters and last infections leads.
By dropping any restrictions now, Johnson has guaranteed himself the support of the logically-challenged ERG/CRG group when he’s found guilty. With the further backing of the right-wing media, this will be enough to keep him in place for now.
The ‘we have to get back to normal’ narrative has been pushed so hard by the media (including the BBC) for so long now that they’ll get away with it, barring the rapid emergence of a more virulent strain. People have become inured to tens of thousands of deaths a year and they’ve been repeatedly told it’s just similar to the flu (which is nonsense)
I suspect they’ll dump Johnson in a trice if a proper inquiry is ever carried out into decisions made during the pandemic, but that particular can will continue to be kicked down the road. The ONS has taken the politically motivated (I assume) choice to include 2021 in their 5 year average when calculating excess deaths for 2022 which allows the government to claim excess deaths are currently far below the average.
Possibly the most nauseating thing yesterday was Hancock’s toadying in and his ludicrous claims about us ending the pandemic. Obviously keen to get his snout back in the trough and, with this bunch of charlatans seemingly immovable, it will obviously work for him.
The worst thing is that the disinformation of the right-wing media backing the GBDers has ‘won’ the war of words, so to speak. It would take a catastrophically dangerous variant to lead to the reinstatement of proper public health measures once again so we’ll instead see tens of thousands of deaths a year with few real attempts at mitigation. This doesn’t even consider the longer-term concerns about increased risks of heart disease, strokes and so forth which are now emerging. Not to mention Long Covid, of course.
My brother in law works for us and is clinically extremely vulnerable. Not sure where he can go from here and I know his teenage son is desperately worried about inadvertently infecting his Dad. We’ll have to see if we can work out some sort of testing regime for work but I’m not sure the economics will allow this to be possible.
The last para is your most telling – and one far too many have to face with a government that does not care
Those graphs of excess deaths were just shocking. Seventh and eighth here.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1056215/2022-02-21_COVID-19_Press_Conference_Slides__PUBLICATION_.pptx.pdf
How can you compare 2022 to a five year average including 2021 and say that baseline is “expected deaths if the pandemic had not happened”? You’ve just increased the baseline by 20% of the excess deaths last January and February. Well, duh, we don’t have the same peak this year as last year. Instead, we have had slow car crash out of 100 to 200 deaths every day for the last six months. And as the graph shows, that is all excess. Without that false baseline, the excess deaths are continuing.
It is deliberate statistical manipulation
From your link, the 7-day rolling average is 144 per day: per day! Extrapolate that annually would be north of 52,000. Of course it will fall in summer, but even at 50% that is 25k+ per annum. At 40% it is still >20k (a very, very bad flu year), and if the average flu year is circa 10k, that represents an annual average under 20% of the current 7-day rolling average; at least that what the stats appear to show.
I have been monitoring excess deaths every month since the beginning of the pandemic (my original training was in medical microbiology). I have used the England and Wales ONS data from
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/monthlyfiguresondeathsregisteredbyareaofusualresidence
I’ve plotted excess deaths month by month from January 2020 onwards, but instead of 5 years, I chose the 9 years 2009-2019 for comparison.
There were no months without excess deaths ….. and there were 169,912 excess deaths in England & Wales compared to the previous 9 years from my analysis of the data up to Dec 2021.
The Continuous Mortality Investigation of the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries has a lower figure based on ONS data. They adjust the number of deaths to control for changes in the size, age and gender distribution of the population over time – which I could not do ….. (But they also “disclaim any liability from use of or reliance on these calculations”…. !!)
https://www.actuaries.org.uk/system/files/field/document/Mortality%20pandemic%20monitor%20Week%2048%202021%20v01%202021-12-14.pdf
If there is no requirement to register a positive Covid test by either LFT or PCR, then the only time Covid will be mentioned on a death certificate is when a doctor establishes it as a direct or indirect cause of death.
Until the pandemic has subsided to zero, I’m sure that when deaths are registered, there will continue to be a significant excess compared the pre-Covid period.
Thank you
Might you share the data?
I said in a comment to one of your blogs two weeks ago that this would be Witty and Vallance’s Deborah Birx moment (i.e. Trump’s Covid coordinator who famously stood there when he rambled on about bleach and light treatment for Covid and then lacked the ethical backbone and professionalism to resign in disgust). And so it came to pass. As with Birx with Trump, that’s their professional standing rubbished on the alter of Johnson’s ego and saving him from having to resign if the outcome of the police inquiry in “Partygate” goes against him (he won’t, anyway, regardless of what happens).
The short answer to your last sentence is a few very privileged and rich people took notice of writers like Mises and Hayek, funded think tanks to create a body of teaching; selected politicians were targeted and funded and certain media were told to support and propagate the teaching over 40 plus years.
Varoufakis made an interesting comment. He says the left agreed to leave the structure of capitalism in place as long it paid for its social programmes. Thus we had New Labour and Clinton’s Democratic party.
That arrangement collapsed in 2008. The left failed to destroy capitalism, he adds, but capitalism is now destroying itself.
As you often say, Richard, we need a new approach to economics but equally we need to change the morality. Adam Smith knew the two go together, even if the moderns who invoke his name don’t realise it.
I agree
Indeed, his Theory of Moral Sentiments was published a full 17 years before the Wealth of Nations.
And a more important and insightful book it is too.
Though not read or understood by anyone at the Adam Smith Institute
In a sane and normal democracy, an elected government’s has two critical duties in return for being voted in by the electorate: defence of the territory and public health. These are so long-standing and obvious that they don’t always get discussed in detail in election campaigns. However, it now looks like the Tories have abandoned both: our armed forces are now so reduced in both size and equipment (aircraft carriers without aircraft?) that any resistance they could offer against a determined aggressor would be token. And now it looks like management and control of public health is to be sacrificed too. It’s been obvious for too long that the current UK Gov is both corrupt and incompetent, but how long will it take before the public show they’ve had enough and mean to do something about it? If ever there was a reason for mass public demonstrations, the abandonment of effective public health control has to be top priority.
The Quockerwodger is either doing this to try and get some positive press and deflect attention from the law breaking antics or the extreme right of the already extreme right Tory party is holding his feet to the flames to get their way or it is a bit of both.
Whichever it is, there is no way that idiot is following scientific evidence/data/information.
I just hope enough of the electorate remember what has happened whenever the next General Election is.
Tories Don’t Care. Now there is a three word slogan I can agree with.
Craig
I have a practical problem.
Sajid Javid:
Today I have accepted the advice from the independent Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) to offer, from spring, an additional COVID-19 booster jab to people aged 75 years and over.
Government website:
If you have a COVID-19 positive result, when can you have a booster?
You will still need the booster but you should wait at least 4 weeks from your COVID-19 infection.
How is an over 75 to know when four weeks after a positive result is if there is no regular testing?
You just highlight the absurdity of this
“ How did such profound corruption came to power in the UK?”
Because England voted for them to get THEIR Brexit, & Labour voters backed them. As a Party Labour have been hopeless as an Oppostion, & will be just as bad as a government IF they ever get a shot again.. Dr Tim Rideout is right about what Scotgov “should” do but it won’t as they are no longer a party of INDEPENDENCE.. Tories have f****d up the U.K., But Sturgeon has done the same to Scotland, she has had many reasons since 2015 to get us out Of this Colonial Status that Tories are now making clear Scotland is.