[quote Yellownotblue]@Goosefoot, I agree this is not easy or straightforward. But Asian people (don’t want to generalise, but true of many Asian countries) just seem to be so much more sensible about precautions.
I lived in Hong Kong until this summer, and in January, literally overnight, everyone started wearing masks everywhere, and mostly staying home. They didn’t need to be made mandatory (for political reasons, the government couldn’t do that - because they tried to make masks illegal during the protests 🙄) but everyone just wore them. And they were easy and cheap to buy too - after the initial few weeks when worldwide stock was low. I brought back a stock of thousands which I distributed to friends here, including a GP friend, who also advised me to bring back lots of antibiotics and other drugs, as the NHS stocks are running low.
Having gone through 2 waves in Hong Kong, I was completely terrified when we landed in London and saw people without masks everywhere. I spent the summer telling my London friends to beware the next wave, that it would be worse than the first. People here were very nonchalant - packed high streets, people standing next to each other, loads of shoppers in stores not wearing masks. Mumsnet is packed with threads full of people proud to be non compliant.
The tories have completely messed up their messaging, with Johnson constantly making a show of how much he abhors imposing restrictions, how he admires the Jaws’ mayor who keeps the beach open when there’s a man-eating shark around. All he has done is fanned the flames of a libertarian base who think only of their own immediate gratification.
This is not the right message, or policy. It lacks empathy and care and foresight. It is a pity that there are no strong female voices in the cabinet who would be listened to.
Even now, every press conference has a mandatory ’sweet hereafter’ section, where we’re told about the moonshot/world leading app / ramping up testing /vaccine about to be ready. This just dilutes the message. People only want to hear the positive bit, and forget the rest. They don’t get how grim things are.
For me, what just petrified me was when, back in March, Johnson came out and said ‘if you’ve got symptoms, stay home, don’t get tested, don’t seek medical help, don’t go to a hospital unless you can’t breathe.’ I get that this is because there were no tests, no beds, no ventilators and no PPE. But it is hard not to see this as a huge moral (and operational) failure.[/quote]
What a brilliant post. I would like to see Boris read it aloud on national t.v. And then slowly repeat the sentence about lack of meaningful women's input. Repeat it by the same number of times as the males outnumber females in his senior minesterial and advisory posts.