I'dWhat do you think of the English government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic so far?

[Twinklelittlestar1]

Following on from a previous thread I'd really like to know what you think?

Poor

Too much dithering and trying to please too many people or rather not upset too many people

Should have been two weeks earlier with tighter restrictions like in other parts of Europe

Many more people should have been tested and track and trace should have been used from March

Dire.

Basically shit.

I guess they've handled it as badly as possible, judging by the death rates and completely fucked economy. There's not a whole lot else to measure it by or a whole lot else to say is there really

It could not have been handled more badly ...

Very poor.
They give the impression of running to catch up. There's also a lack of understanding of how many people live - you can have 6 people round for a barbeque. Fine, if you've got a garden.

They were too busy worrying about the economy, that they locked down too late and now we are in a worse position economically than if they had locked down earlier and controlled the spread better so we could have come out sooner

Shit and tragic.

They've made a lot of poor decisions.

Worst thing is they aren't deviating from the party line that they out their arms around the people and are developing world beating and leading systems.

No one gives a shit about any of that. They just want a system that works and as many lives as possible saved.

Corrupt. Self serving. Bordering on genocidal in care homes.

Some of his closest allies are turning on him. And rightly so - the worse possible PM at the worse possible time.

www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/06/12/honeymoon-boris-johnson-needs-find-old-fighting-spirit/

According to one source: "When he’s not working in Number 10, Carrie [Symonds] wants him with her. She's suspicious of what he's doing all the time. So he's in this very demanding relationship which puts pressure on him. When he was with Marina, it wasn't like that."

Montgomerie suggested the absence of Mr Johnson's ex-wife Marina Wheeler, who he described as "his anchor" and "unafraid to dispense home truths", may have affected him, and a former aide said: "There is no doubt that Marina was his intellectual underpinning and hinterland."

There is a sense that Ms Wheeler would never have allowed the PM to become so over-reliant on Mr Cummings – who in turn is unwaveringly supported by Downing Street's director of communications, Lee Cain, considered by many Tories to be "out of his depth".

Should have been two weeks earlier with tighter restrictions like in other parts of Europe

Evidence for this? Scientists have said a week earlier.

How would stricter restrictions have helped? For example, how would it have stopped me spreading the virus if I had only been allowed to run 2km from my home like in Ireland? Or if children had been kept indoors for six weeks like in Spain?

Or how would it have stopped the virus if my mother had not been able to go out for exercise because she wasn't allowed to drive anywhere flat and safe to walk?

Oh and he left 'this rock' and mother of their 4 children when she had cervical cancer and had silently stood by him despite all his numerous affairs and children. By their deeds shall ye know them a shocking and pathetic excuse for a man in every respect.

There's also a lack of understanding of how many people live - you can have 6 people round for a barbeque. Fine, if you've got a garden

You can't have 6 people round. The most you can have is 5 if you live alone. If you are a family of 4, you can invite two other people.

And in the UK most people do have gardens or backyards even if they are tiny ones. We are a nation of house dwellers, not flat dwellers although there are obviously a lot of flats in cities.

I think their main failing was in relation to track/trace and they could have closed the borders to non-essential travel earlier. The care homes wasn't entirely their fault - at any normal time hospitals are overwhelmed by bed-blockers, it wasn't unreasonable for them to send asymptomatic people back to their homes, it's hard enough for them to find places for elderly people to go so if they actually have a care home place already they're going to send them there. Care homes charge massive fees, they should have protected their residents and most did.

No opinion.

It seems very confusing and very open to Interpretation

@lljkk

No opinion.

Why have you no opinion?

Terrible, going to get worse.
January is going to be shit.

Regardless of the science and the economy vs lives, the communication strategy has been a disaster. Was it guidance or rules? You must or please would you? Stay at home or zip off to Durham? Self isolate or do what you need to do? Fear of appearing too authoritarian has led to a ridiculous wishy-washy mess of self-righteousness, confusion and opprobrium. Add into the mix the week to ten days of faffing at the start, the silly faux-Churchillian rhetoric and mixed messages of "unfortunately may of you will lose loved ones" against hospitals and public health experts advocating testing and tracing from the start... It's been appalling. Other countries have been clearer, firmer and had a visible long term strategy. And fewer deaths.

Crap.

Following public opinion & pressure rather than facts.
Spineless shits.

On Monday, in my frontline HCP job I have to wear a mask at all times.

I've spent 10 weeks in that same 8m x4m room with an ever changing cast of 8 to 10, drawn out of a pool of 17-18. With no masks.

Somehow, magically, it all changes next Monday.

The term 'farce' could hardly be more English.

Oh and I agree with the poster above who said genocidal on care homes.

Despite abundant evidence that this virus is most harmful to the elderly, they deliberately sent infected patients to care homes in order to empty beds in hospital for younger patients they were expecting (but never materialised to the extent feared). That's almost biochemical warfare type tactics.

It has always been said of Johnson, he sees which way the Public Mood is heading, then rushes ahead to appear to be leading it.

It's been a scandal from start to finish.

Total and utter clusterfuck

This article is mostly about other stuff, but Fiona Hill has some interesting observations on why Russia, the UK and the US have had problems managing CV19. (Fiona Hill is the rather razor-sharp woman from Bishop Auckland on the US National Security Council, who gave evidence during Trump's impeachment.)

'Trump thought I was a secretary': Fiona Hill on the president, Putin and populism
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/12/fiona-hill-trump-putin-populism-interview?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

“It’s a story really about how the US, UK and Russia have all ended up in the same spot weirdly, not just in terms of Covid-19 but also populist politics and many of the same out-of-control inequalities,” Hill said.

In her view populist governments are useless at handling complex problems of governance, almost by definition. If leaders are fit to govern, they generally don’t need populism to get elected.

“It’s all about style and swagger and atmospherics, with superficial solutions to things, with lots of sloganeering, and obviously dealing with a pandemic is pretty methodical and boring. It requires an awful lot of planning and logistical organization and you can’t just sort of do it on the fly with an ad hoc coalition.”