To think this situation shows up the divisions in the UK

[Ihatecurtaintwitchers]

England's leaders seems to have responded with early denialism and delay, closely followed by a lockdown, constant constant WW2 references and a new and slightly disturbing deification of the NHS. Johnson's illness caused even critical press to become sycophantic cheerleaders, & the political focus seems to be on constantly harping on about how magnificent the government are, how they are leading the fight, how now is not the time to let up and a total inability to acknowledge the obvious flaws that have led to increased deaths.
I don't know much about Wales, but it seems to be Scotland and Northern Ireland have taken a far more pragmatic, scientific, European approach. Obviously the Republic of Ireland is outside the UK but it seems their approach in terms of politics and communication has been far closer to Scotland than to England. I can just see the English tabloids splashing a cigar chomping Johnson and partner and new baby on the front cover wirh headlines like "Britain's baby bounce" and ubiquitous WW2 imagery. Obviously England and Scotland already differed widely on Brexit, now it seems that public policy and the general way of thinking of the people and their leaders is further apart than ever. I

Again population of Scotland and how many care homes compared to England very very different

The death rate in England is proportionately higher than Scotland, the Tories were slow to react and also the public are not adhering to lockdown ie the scenes of overcrowded parks/public areas.

The failure to cancel Wales V Scotland before 3.30pm the day prior by which time Cardiff was teeming with Scots fans, and Cheltenham not at all, was absolutely absurd. Shame on the decision makers.

The pic of a jam-packed London Underground is an image I won’t forget. Distressing.

Such a lack of leadership by people who failed to heed scientists’ warnings. Inertia.

Honestly OP I think you have the mood wrong.

We’re in Scotland and DH and I have been saying how ‘in this together’ all the social media has been - all the clapping for the NHS at the same time as the rest of the UK etc. The news is very much whole UK and so on. My Twitter feed is often full of complaining SNP supporters and they have been pretty quiet during all of this.

And Scottish Independence is absolutely dead. There is no support in the business community and the oil price means all serious discussion is over.

Scotland were behind England on the NHS Volunteer thing just FWIW.

But Scotland weren't in lockdown either when Cheltenham went ahead

Easilyanxious

The ft has used the ONS figures

Ons figures do not show 41000 from this virus though ?

Sounds as if you want to re-join the EU?

Most of your post, to me does not make sense.

@Patch23042
As I said before the decision to cancel the Wales V Scotland match had fuck all to do with any politician. Try and blame the Tory Government as much as you like but it was out of their hands. The WRU made that decision not the Welsh Assembly or the Westminster Parliament. In my opinion the decision was made far too late but we in Wales know how greedy the WRU are. That fixture is worth about £5 million to Wales and that also had a bearing on the timing.

Many sensible countries stopped mass events, before then proceeding to lockdown, as and when deemed necessary. Stopping Cheltenham, Marathons, Football matches, large Concerts was a simple common sense precautionary measure that any half sane government which gave a shit would have done. THEN you analyse the pros and cons of total lockdown. That common sense thinking was behind this joke of a Tory government though ....perhaps due to total and utter incompetence or perhaps, in part, as their politics viewed 500k deaths as extendible in “Staying Open For Business” with their clever herd immunity strategy which they seemed to be actively pursuing 7ntil midMarch, while those silly Europeans all shut up shop. Who knows? But I do know I will never vote Conservative. An absolute parody of ineptitude. 41,000 dead (today’s FT analysis). The worst record per capita in the entire world.

ONS figures show an increase of 75% on deaths for this year, so with 20k being a normal figure for the month if you’ve got 60k deaths then what are the other 20k people dieting from?

And the point of your post?

Oooh. Scotland the brave.

@easilyanxious why on earth would it matter that Scotland has fewer people. Data collection is data collection. They still count and record deaths. They don't just decide not to bother because it's too hard there's too many people 🙄

You need to read the ft properly that is there prediction not the actual figures as of today and also taking into account other things , you can't read a headline and use that as fact
Wales and England figures are in together this shouldn't be about how much better Scotland is they closed down a couple days earlier but not many big events due they had played there rugby games apart from ones cancelled by someone else ,
And half there fans had travelled to wales and were there for the game due to it being cancelled so late and crowds were still mingling in the pubs etc

@runrunrunrunt
Of course it matters if you have to collect data for 50 million as opposed to 5 what do you think is easier
The data is collected in England and Wales from care homes but on ONS figures as it takes longer to get these
How many Carr homes do you think there is in England and Wales

The figures are collected and accounted for though just not i the daily figures

So because there are more people you think they just don't bother? Wtf 😳

The ONS data for England only gives figures up until 10th April so there is a 12 day time lag of deaths. The RNS figures for Scotland gives figures up until 19th April so are much more up to date

It's collected regionally and reported centrally. Even in Scotland. Of course they could do it they just don't want to because the numbers would be too upsetting.

Scotland handled it all much better. But the mumsnet 'we hate Scotland' brigade will all be out imminently. Because they hate 'that country' north of the border.

Every death from covid-19 is a tragedy. There are serious questions to be asked about how it has been dealt with.

Omg I’m in Scotland and I just want to set some balance that we aren’t all point scoring freedom fighters up here, if nicnic starts her crap about westmonsters I think I will have a meltdown, cmon we are all in this together let’s not use this as a political competition 😡 and ps my snp militant family have been extremely quiet 🤫 recently, thank fuck!

Nicnic 🙄

At no point did I say because there are more people they just don’t bother . I said it takes longer to collect the figures due to the numbers hence why they aren’t included in daily figures but are on ONS figures .

And Scottish Independence is absolutely dead. There is no support in the business community and the oil price means all serious discussion is over
What nonsense! Everyone we know in the business community who supported independence still does. In fact some who didn't support it and changed over Brexit, still support independence now.
The UK Government has completely mismanaged this pandemic and lots of business people are asking questions about their sheer incompetence and inability to either risk assess or implement emergency planning.
The tens of thousands of deaths are firmly the responsibility of the Conservative Government and people in the other parts of the UK (which didn't vote for them) will not forget that.

If they were organised enough they could do it. They don't want to. It's beyond sad and absolutely tragic but it's simple addition and reporting.