Ignoring the Cummings saga, which is clearly taking up all the headlines, and which will likely lead to reduced adherence to the current rules, why on earth is Johnson proposing to virtually end the lockdown in just 3 weeks?
Of the 5 tests he said would have to be met first, none of them could really be claimed to have been met.
This seems a guaranteed way to have a massive second wave.
I really hope I'm wrong - but all other countries which are successfully ending lockdown without a second wave are countries which HAVE met those tests, eg. Germany, Ireland, Denmark. We can't realistically compare ourselves to these countries when we have the highest death rate in Europe.
We should not be ending lockdown when ANY of these 5 tests remain unmet:
- making sure the NHS can cope and continues to have sufficient capacity across the UK - not the case in eg Somerset at the moment.
- a ‘sustained and consistent’ fall in daily deaths - in some parts of the UK they are not showing sustained falls. And recent changes to rules may soon show up in a rise in the overall death rate, it's too early to say.
- solid data showing the rate of infection is decreasing to ‘manageable’ levels across the board - ditto to number 2.
- ensuring that supply of tests and personal protective equipment (PPE) can meet future demand - this is still not the case. And opening up schools and workplaces will require vastly more PPE to be safe - where is this coming from? Testing numbers are still tiny compared to the total population.
- be confident that they will avoid a second peak that would risk overwhelming the NHS - with 1-4 not fully met, a second peak seems inevitable.
It's hard to escape the idea that Johnson is using the Cummings saga to bring forward ending the lockdown - which polls showed the British public wanted to stay - as a way of returning to his preferred 'herd immunity' (ie culling the elderly and vulnerable) strategy.
Let's not forget that far more people died in the second wave of the 1918-19 flu pandemic -
due to lifting lockdowns too early - than died in the first wave. It is too early to be complacent.