MY CONSISTENT MESSAGE - LIVING WITH THIS VIRUS SHOULD NOT BE THE CHOSEN PATH

 I wrote to friends this week repeating my mantra about this pandemic. To paraphrase Oscar Wilde ('Conformity is the last refuge of the unimaginative'), if consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative than I am truly dull. Here is the evidence of my commitment to repeating the same message:

To my friends:  'All around are repeating the official mantra that this virus is one we just have to live with now. I don’t share that view and tell anyone who is listening that I want to see a zero Covid strategy put in place over say a four month period. There are scientists out there who tell me and others that if there was the political will that could be done. It won’t happen. However, a more deadly mutation somewhere in a world that is not being vaccinated adequately will be highly likely to occur. And then we are back to square one. I am still super-cautious despite our vaccination status; I haven’t set foot in town past the surgery since March of last year. The car that was acquired just before lockdown has just over 3,000 miles on the clock to date, almost exclusively for weekly trips to Penzance for grocery top-ups  and dog supplies to supplement the weekly home delivery of shopping.'

COVID-19 - the source of the global pandemic 

To my blogpost readers on July 10 this year: 

'FREEDOM DAY' ON JULY 19? - IN YOUR DREAMS - IT'S A RECIPE FOR MORE COVID-19 DISASTER

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To my blogpost readers on July 17 this year: 

MONDAY 19 JULY 2021 WILL GO DOWN IN THE HISTORY BOOKS AS THE DAY THAT OPENED THE GATES TO CATASTROPHE

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To my blogpost readers on August 2 this year:

IT'S THAT JEREMIAH TIME AGAIN - BETTER I TOLD YOU SO THAN NEVER KNOWING

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And so we are where we are, as they say these days. Exactly where that is may seem a little confusing at times. The media seem to be subject to nudges from that special unit at 10 Downing Street which is focused on bringing the people into an acceptance of government policies, however contrary they may be to the interests of the many. Last weekend (7/8 August), the 'i' headline proclaimed: 'Delta fears fade as Covid rates fall'. Inside, on p.10, the cover story headline was 'Coronavirus cases fall but scientists urge people not to relax'. And on p.11, the health column was headed: 'Contingency plans for further lockdowns have been drawn up'.

It would be a strange dereliction of duty for a government not to have such contingency plans in place when capacity attendance at all football matches has been allowed from this weekend onwards and when nightclub events are back on the agenda for the young. Super-spreading the virus with joy. 

Jacinda Adern - the PM of New Zealand - a reminder that there has always been another way, another strategy. The zero Covid path has been New Zealand's glory. Where would you rather live?    

Who will be over the moon at the lifting of restrictions in a fortnight's time when the symptoms of viral infection begin to kick in and the admission to a hospital already cracking under the strain of a second year of this pandemic becomes the new reality? 

I shall, as I said in my letter, continue to be super-cautious. My vaccine immunity is probably down from 90% to 75% efficacy - and fading who knows how fast? I do not want to be caught in the next wave of victims who are laid low by this murderous devotion to the economic nonsense of Tory neoliberal ideology. People will always matter more than the mad pursuit of profit at any price.