So I was wondering about two things now we’re in tier 4: schooling and shopping, given that the former is a massive vector locally and the latter is something that’s going to cause problems in terms of access.
Schooling, judging by the current rules, isn’t set to change at all. Guidance still suggests secondary pupils mask up only in corridors, because presumably COVID doesn’t actually hang around in the air, and secondary pupils no longer mix, thereby making for a bubble that can be anything up to 1.5k in size. Also, luckily, primary kids don’t get COVID, and so there are no extra measures; this will come as a shock to a friend who informs me 15% of his kid’s class were confirmed until the contact tracing shut off for schools.
Actually, I lie about there being nothing new: schools are “promised” more fast testing capabilities, so that’s OK then. A sensible solution that the govt won’t take: keep all schools shut for at least one extra week.
Shopping is an odd one. My parents have been doing click and collect from a local supermarket that has its shit together. Collections take place at the far end of an open air car park. There is no interaction with other people and plenty of hand sanitiser. It is very safe. But it’s also over LA boundaries and not the most local option. So I asked a councillor: should my ageing parents continue to shop there (an approx. 4.5 mile drive) or is that now illegal? The details, natch, do not permit a specific travel limitation.
His response was a wonderfully entitled “well, I just order locally from local firms because I’m a Tory and local firms are great, even if you have to pay more”. OK, thanks. That answers… nothing. He did at least admit it would be safer for my parents to continue using click and collect rather than braving the cramped, smaller and usually understocked supermarket in their home town. But this shouldn’t even be something you have to question — you certainly don’t if you’re living in Spain or France, because they stipulate the specifics. You know precisely how many times a day you can leave your home and how far you can travel.
Meanwhile, the number of local truthers continues to skyrocket. Lots of people running with “I don’t see why we should lockdown when the survival rate is over 98%”. Yes, let’s forget the survival rate is heavily reliant on hospitals being able to help those in need, the random nature of the degree in which symptoms affect people, the long-term effects of COVID that a large percentage of people are still very unwell months later, and the increasingly high likelihood that you can catch a form of this more than once. Well, that and 2% of the UK’s population being well north of half a million people.
I thought with Brexit the UK had plumbed the depths of human arrogance, selfishness and idiocy; apparently not.
