News and current affairs > The Coronavirus and Covid-19
The Government's mishandling of the Covid-19 epidemic.
Angelo222:
A horryfying extract from a piece in The Daily Telegraph. If you have the time, read it - as this condemnation of the Government comes from its biggest fans. It is truly shocking.
From Ambrose Evans-Pritchard who is International Business Editor of The Daily Telegraph., Evans Pritchard is as right wing as they come, he wrote a book about Bill Clinton and when he left the USA the administration said that's another British Invasion we could have done without.
"I have been silent on Covid-19 for a while. There was little to be gained from harrying the Government once it had abandoned the misadventure of herd immunity and was at least trying to get a grip. Much of the belated media onslaught is reflexive gotcha-journalism (where were they in February when the mistakes were made?), or hides an ideological agenda.
But claims by both Downing Street and Public Health England that they “got it right” cannot be allowed to stand. Nor can the pretence that each stage of the containment policy is being fed out at just right time and at just the right calibration under the Jupiterian guidance of behavioural theorists.
There was never anything to be gained from delaying the lockdown once the brushfire had slipped control due to lack of testing/tracing. Each three days of prevarication meant a doubling of the infection case load. It was to sink deeper into the quagmire. Nor did the SAGE committee ever have a sufficient grasp of the basic facts to fine-tune the timing, let alone to play God.
The facts will out but it is hard to escape the conclusion that this secretive body – neither institutional fish nor fowl, with opaque responsibilities – gravely misjudged the speed of contagion long after the danger was obvious to virologists, immunologists, and epidemiologists across the world, and indeed to anybody paying attention.
Why does it make sense to impose a two-week quarantine on foreign arrivals at this late stage (excluding Ireland and France), rather than having done so when imported cases were first causing an explosion of infections in a virgin host community?
A Covid cardiologist at a top London hospital – friendly to Boris – has been so incensed by the daily charade of bogus omniscience that he vented his spleen in an email to me on Sunday night. It is a poignant indictment, so I pass along a few snippets.
Basically, every mistake that could have been made, was made. He likened the care home policy to the Siege of Caffa in 1346, that grim chapter of the Black Death when a Mongol army catapulted plague-ridden bodies over the walls.
“Our policy was to let the virus rip and then ‘cocoon the elderly’,” he wrote. “You don’t know whether to laugh or cry when you contrast that with what we actually did. We discharged known, suspected, and unknown cases into care homes which were unprepared, with no formal warning that the patients were infected, no testing available, and no PPE to prevent transmission. We actively seeded this into the very population that was most vulnerable.
“We let these people die without palliation. The official policy was not to visit care homes – and they didn’t (and still don’t). So, after infecting them with a disease that causes an unpleasant ending, we denied our elders access to a doctor – denied GP visits – and denied admission to hospital. Simple things like fluids, withheld. Effective palliation like syringe drivers, withheld.”
The public has yet to realise that the great quest for ventilators was worse than a red herring. The overuse of ventilators was itself killing people at a terrifying ratio and behind that lies another institutional failure.
“When the inquiry comes, it will show that many people died for lack of oxygen supply in hospitals, and this led to early intubation,” writes the doctor. “Boris survived because they gave him oxygen. High flow oxygen wasn’t available as a treatment option for all patients.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2020/05/12/governments-handling-covid-19-british-disaster/
barrier:
The hindsight experts will have field day,trouble is it's probably justified, history imo will judge Johnson has a one trick pony in getting brexit done real governance in this crisis will be seen to be lacking.
Brietta:
--- Quote from: barrier on May 17, 2020, 06:26:11 AM ---The hindsight experts will have field day,trouble is it's probably justified, history imo will judge Johnson has a one trick pony in getting brexit done real governance in this crisis will be seen to be lacking.
--- End quote ---
Well said Barrier; but I don't think it is just a case of hindsight proving that the government got much of it wrong. One inept ministerial briefing after another was building a picture which many were picking up on from early days and giving warning about.
Eleanor:
There is nothing to justify. Some people live and some people die, for whatever reason. No Government can ultimately control this. So it would be extremely unfair to expect this.
Where do you want to start? Penalty Points for getting Fat? More Points for being unable to cope? And oh Yes, more points for being Unemployed or Unemployable. That is Society.
Some of us just aren't all that good at anything. This is the Human Condition. We are all everyone's Father, Mother, Sister or Brother. And some of us are better at it than others, but only by the grace of some God or another.
The Corona Virus? I have decided that I am not having it, but only because I have opted out of society. But then I did that a very long time ago, so no odds to me. Same old same old. Stay Away.
I don't like people. And I can't say that I am all that wild about the dog either. Rotten Little Swine. But at least he is nice to me. He looks as though he likes me.
None of this will make any difference to me. I will live or die. But not just yet please God.
Carana:
Has anyone found a credible reason as to why the UK and the Netherlands are the only European countries that don't have figures as to how many have recovered?
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