She's a bit better today. It would be better if it was the virus, then she could come and live and work here for a while and do our shopping when she's fully recovered. But who knows.
I'd have to say it would appear Boris Johnson has pretty much abstained from taking key decisions as PM. Sky have reported he only closed the pubs and restaurants when Macron rang him from France. The supermarkets have been left to their own devices where an order from government to limit how much of each item shoppers can buy would have done a power of good. I still hear Boris 'advising' people to social distance. FFS. In the Blitz would he have 'advised' people not to show lights in the black out, and then say back and watched a bunch of selfish pricks go ahead and leave their lights blazing. Yes, he would because he is frightened of taking unpopular decisions. Thank god we had a better level of politician in WW2. Boris has failed along following the advice of a bunch of scientists at odds with the rest of the planet. Now we know the virus is out of control, yet still the multitudes wander about in public. Given the state of the NHS this will end very badly. I'm not posting in hindsight. Italy cannot dispose of it's dead fast enough. In Spain, the elderly are being taken off ventilators as the doctors have to choose who to save. That's the future and it's coming fast. Compare how Europe has reacted to covid-19 and the politicians all reacted slowly. But Boris is Nero, fiddling while Rome burns. Can't the Tories find a statesman worthy of the name? Because the UK needs leadership now, not some bumbling loaf who grins a lot and dodges questions.
Personally, I think Boris has done a good job thus far. This is an unprecedented situation and one that will no doubt bring down a multitude of nations. But not the United Kingdom. We'll come through this with our social structures intact. And Boris will be at the helm throughout, I'm sure.
I'm not sure any leader, whatever their party, would have done any different. They would still be taking advice from the same people. I doubt whether either of the previous 2 chancellors would have released as much cash as the present one to keep the economy moving. But this has a long way to run, the government is changing course, and time will tell if it is wise to do so. I do hope that this crisis signals a sea-change in the country's attitude to the public services.
I think they could do more to assure the self-employed and those on hourly pay, but like @The Penguin says, it's not exactly easy. All we can do is be responsible for own behaviour.
I reckon a lot of it is mild increases from everyone. Obviously you get some idiots that get on the news buying their 100 toilet rolls etc but they're thankfully the minority. I contributed to it by buying about a tinned soup in my shop that I normally wouldn't, harmless on its own but amplify that behaviour across the population and there's an issue.
Exactly this. When Italy and Spain went into lockdown, they treated it as extra holiday. Parks, beaches,markets etc etc were full. We don't appear to be doing that atm!!
Don't know about Italy, but untrue in Spain. The beaches are closed. The police have handed out a lot of fines, so there is a huge swathe of uncivic types, but to describe the beaches and parks as full is simply wrong.
Lockdown started a week ago (and that's not a beach ). What you are looking at there was a feminist demonstration, against domestic violence and abuse. The government have been rightly criticised for allowing it to go ahead, and a whole bunch of politicians contracted coronavirus as a result, but it doesn't really prove your point. In contrast, social distancing was sadly forgotten yesterday by huge numbers of covidiots in the UK, travelling to the coast, the New Forest and Snowdonia.
Unfortunately, even with the best reason in the world, you cannot take most of peoples' freedom and social lives away in a few days, and expect everybody to just accept it quietly. The restructions of WW2, and even rationing (which went on well into the 1950's) are now nearly beyond living memory. Pretty much everyone today in the UK and Western Europe has spent their whole lives taking freedom to choose for granted. I'm not excusing the worst excesses of panic buying, or queues of dim witted tourists blocking the roads around Mount Snowdon. It's going to take a little time for the reality to sink in with a lot of people. Our collective sense of duty towards each other has faded almost to nothing. It's a hard lesson to learn from scratch, especially for the rather spoilt younger generations. In the meantime, we should all do our bit to relieve pressure on the NHS and essential services. Our doctors, nurses, care workers and the like are going to save our society during this coming year, as well as thousands of lives. Once this is over and life begins to return to 'normal' I hope their courage will not quickly be forgotten.
this guy posts on twitter each day the totals in each country. our trajectory has shallowed thanks to the changes made. but, seeing as it takes a while for the virus to affect, we can only really tell how good the government has acted in a week or so.
We have a high population which is crowded into cities mostly. That counts against us. But I think we have fewer very old folk than in Italy. Lets hope the new measures will see our increase begin to ease off in a week or two. And lets hope people don't fool themselves into thinking that will mean everything is then OK and they can start socialising again. We will need to keep our distance for months and months, in order not to overload the NHS. Eventually doctors, nurses and care workers will need to take a bit of time off. If they work flat out they will be broken by the stress.
If you look at the numbers on the left, there is the same distance between 100 and 200 as there is between 500 and 1000, and again between 1000 and 2000. If the numbers aren't regularly spaced, the curve is false.
well yes and no. in that the same spread is also applied to all countries. if you did it to scale, it'd just be a taller graph.
