Why?

Boris Johnson has shown, again, that nothing he says can be believed, as he, again, has extended the period of removing basic freedoms from the British people for yet another month. But, the obvious question, in relation to this further period of lockouts, is why? Deaths of people even with as opposed to from COVID, on the day of the announcement, was just 3! The government seems to have surreptitiously adopted a policy of zero-COVID as its justification for continuing to deprive citizens of their freedom.

The number of deaths of people even with COVID, as against those dying because of COVID, at 3 is way below the number dying from flu, or pretty much any other cause you can think of! If that is cause to continue the restriction on liberty then a case for a perpetual restriction on liberty can be made, in order to prevent illness and death from pretty much anything else. We should stop people going out, driving cars, or being pedestrians because the thousands of people who die from car and road accidents now far exceeds the number of deaths from COVID, for example.

The government says that its actions are a result of the new variants, but the fact is that those that have been vaccinated are also very unlikely to be seriously ill from the new variants either. The increase in infections is almost entirely due to its spread amongst people who have not been vaccinated, which is an argument for ensuring that those people are vaccinated, not further crucifying the economy, and the lives of the vast majority, via further lockouts. The government also duplicitously says that a larger number of those becoming ill, and requiring hospital treatment are now younger, between 30 and 60, but that is not a function of the virus, but of the simple fact that the large majority of older people have now been vaccinated, and so, of course, are now not likely to be infected, or fall ill!

In terms of the number of infections, the government and media focus on the fact that it has increased from around 1500 infections to around 8,000 per day, but a) the number of infections is irrelevant, because it depends how many of those infected become seriously ill, and b) that 8,000 infections is tiny compared to the nearly 70,000 daily infections back in January. And, of course, what is different today compared to January is that the majority of adults have now been fully vaccinated against the virus. According to government data, around 80% of the population now have COVID antibodies either as a result of vaccination or from natural herd immunity.

The government also talks about protecting the NHS, and the number of hospitalisations, but the number of people now being hospitalised is again tiny. There are currently just over 1,000 people in hospital being treated for COVID, as against 39,000 in January. The number of additional patients being admitted is just 187, as against around 4,000 per day in January.

 

Moreover, if we are being asked to believe that the NHS cannot cope with just 187 additional patients per day, throughout the whole country, then we would have to conclude that the NHS no longer exists as a functioning health system! Listen to the actual representatives of the doctors and nurses, and they will tell you that its not currently COVID that is putting the NHS under strain – why would it, when it copes, every year, with millions of admissions, so 187 is not even noticeable – but is due to the fact that they now have to cope with the tens of thousands of people with serious and potentially fatal conditions, who have been side-lined, over the last year, as all attention was focused, instead, solely on COVID. Some of them will even tell you that some of those conditions they are now having to deal with are the result of the poverty, and deprivation that the lockouts and lock down caused over the last year!

So, the question is why is the government continuing this insane mantra over COVID, when the data so obviously contradicts the narrative it continues to purvey. There are a number of contributing or possible factors. Firstly, Brexit isn't done as the G7 meeting showed, and it is falling apart, as the fall in UK exports, the problems in NI, and so on demonstrates. It suits the government to have attention distracted away from the idiocy and failure of what was its flagship policy.

Secondly, the scientific advisers it has have been browbeaten over the last year, by the media and public opinion, to run a mile from any possible risk, for fear of being put in the stocks for any increase in infections, however minor or irrelevant. In turn, the government is loathe to ignore those advisers given that, if it does so, it will be attacked by an opportunist Labour opposition, and a media that lives on hyperbola and sensationalism. 

Thirdly, the government must see what everyone else sees that, even with the limited opening up of the economy that has taken place, there has been a surge in economic activity, resulting in labour shortages, sharply rising wages, and prices. The next consequence is going to be sharply rising interest rates, and a subsequent crash in asset prices, including the collapse of the huge house price bubble, which is a feature of support for the Tories from a large swathe of its core vote. Deliberately holding back the economy, in the same way they did after 2010, by imposing austerity, is one way of trying to mitigate that development. The cost, obviously, will be borne by the actual businesses sent to the wall by the lockouts, and all of their workers put on the dole, but, since at least 2010, Tories have been happy to do that in order to further inflate stock and property markets.