With respect, which I doubt if you deserve, Mr Handsy Hancock, what you should have said is that we are one of the first countries (it’s a bit of an exaggeration to say that England is a major country globally) to remove all restrictions and trust to “the good common sense of the people” regardless of how misplaced this may be.
Extraordinary that PM is refusing to commit to publishing the scientific evidence & risk assessments on which he’s based the decision to abandon free #Covid tests & legal requirement to self isolate in England – decisions which many health experts have called premature & unwise
Johnson said, in reply to a question asked by Dr Whitford in the Commons today that a variety of different sources had been consulted but that ministers had made the decisions. I would have been more confident if Whitty or Valance could be seen to back it. But no one seems to have seen or heard from them…an astonishing situation when such a decision is being made. So far I have seen no medical backing for this.
**********
Wasn’t he the bloke that told us that we couldn’t expect his army to keep on helping out our health service at the height of the pandemic when it was doing so in England?
You know, it’s almost like our taxes don’t go towards paying for their army, and our people never fight in it.
I wonder if the politicians making disparaging and untruthful comments like that for a cheap laugh from their backbenchers, ever take into consideration just how much damage they are doing to their precious union and how much dislike they engender here and probably in Wales too.
**********
**********
**********
**********
MUNGUIN'S NEW REPUBLIC 
Just seen this:
Pippa Crerar
@PippaCrerar
Chris Whitty sounding much more cautious than PM, talking of a “gradual, steady change” over coming weeks, warning of new variants which “could cause significant problems”, and saying that next winter will be “tricky”. Clear message that we’re not out of the woods.
Seconded by Patrick Vallance who warns: “The virus is continuing to evolve… it will continue to do so quite fast probably for the next couple of years… The next variant could be the same severity as Omicron or it could be more severe”.
So, regardless of politics, I’m going with Nicola, Mark and the Irish.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Andrew Gregory
@andrewgregory
·
1h
Breaking: The British Medical Association,
@TheBMA
, says removing all restrictions, testing, sick pay and isolation payments in England is “premature”, “incredibly concerning” and “completely illogical”, adding that it “neglects” and “fails” those most at risk from Covid-19.
LikeLike
The message from London is that now that we are mostly all fully vaccinated,we can treat Covid as if it is just the same as flu.
From what I have read,it is not and as is being pointed out could easily mutate to something that evades present vaccines and has more serious effects.
A gamble,again,from Johnson based on political expediency.
One thing is for sure,the Tory elite will suffer no consequences from his actions but we the plebs will have to.
LikeLiked by 2 people
One of the worrying things is this so-called Long Covid, the extent of which seem to be being kept quiet, but I see a lot of people talking about it on social media.
It’s a post viral fatigue, which can have devastating effect on people’s lives for weeks, months or even years. I know, I’ve had it (not from Covid but from Glandular Fever).
Professor Whitty is telling people to self isolate, but, if tests cost more than many people can afford, how do they find out if they are positive?
As usual, Johnson has made a complete *** of it.
No one really knows what they are doing, the Civil Servants are trying to keep to the government’s line while trying to add some common sense… but coming up against the ERG.
Britbin strikes again.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Another point is that these vaccines will have a limited life and if new variants come along, which they will, they may be less effective.
LikeLiked by 1 person
LikeLike
Here’s a wee laugh though…
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FMCoDq7XoAowIYZ?format=jpg&name=small
LikeLiked by 1 person
A quote from Dr Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO Technical Lead on COVID-19
“We cannot end the pandemic and have the virus become – quote, unquote – endemic in one country while the rest of the world deals with the pandemic. That’s not how this is going to work.
But how we come out of this – and we will come out of this because this pandemic will end. When it ends is really up to us collectively so we not only need to increase vaccination coverage among those who are most at risk in every single country, not just in some, we also need to take measures to reduce the spread and we have tools at hand. We’re just not using them as effectively as we can.”
From the transcript for
https://www.who.int/multi-media/details/who-press-conference-on-coronavirus-disease-(covid-19)—12-january-2022
LikeLiked by 2 people
The word “collectively” doesn’t exist in the lexicon of the far right who are presently in government at Westminster.
LikeLiked by 2 people
There is no such thing as society, sort of thing?
LikeLike
Absolutely, as many people have pointed out over the last year or so.
Until you stamp on a pandemic everywhere, it’s still there.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Call it out. L.B.Js actions will kill people. He, along with his fellow travellers, don’t give a whit about real peoples lives. Unfortunately, because of Westminster’s boot on our neck, we can only mitigate his murderous intentions to a degree. I just hope later today, the First Minister listens to the scientific advice, and follows it as much as she can, given the financial restrictions imposed on us by the uncaring regime in England.
LikeLiked by 2 people
The problem is the English Govt which calls itself the UK Govt doesn’t like to be defied which is why there’s this persistent backlash against the other 3 countries doing things differently. The English Govt believes we should all be towing their line regardless and it really irks them when they refuse and it doesn’t just apply to the Tories when in power. We should never lose sight of that. It really is a colonial mentality, arrogant, nasty and with hints of threat. Sadly, there are still too many Scots who are prepared to keep on accepting the ‘master’s diktat’ because they cannot extricate themselves from the ‘we are inferior’ mindset. There are others, of course, who happily ride the gravy train, accept all the baubles for loyalty and will go along with anything their masters order, too scared or stupid to resist when it’s absolutely necessary even if only for the sake of their own self respect. Pathetic.
LikeLiked by 2 people
‘toeing’, not towing the line.
LikeLiked by 1 person
🙂
LikeLike
I’ve just seen this:
James Felton
@JimMFelton
·
24m
Come to Britain, we have foie gras and the plague
LikeLike
True. They are saying, if you want to go on testing, you have to find it yourself.
Not that it matters but I’d say, well OK, if you fund CrossRail, HS2, and pretending to be important, etc etc, by yourself, we’ll take that!
LikeLike
I have every confidence that Mark Drakeford and Nicola Sturgeon will do their best (at the moment it’s hard to know what the NI will do, but to be fair they appear to have been so far in line with Scotland and Wales),
but it’s going to be a struggle for various reasons.
Obviously the first one is finance. None of us can borrow like England can. But we also have people who, like Kaye Adams, say out loud that they can’t see why they have to wear a mask when the prime minister says it’s OK not to.
The Tory, English-owned newspapers are against anything we minor countries do. And of course, because they will stop reporting figures to do with infections/deaths (if they stop testing) we won’t even be able to look at a fair comparison of how it’s going in our various countries.
Boris will make it go away by not reporting it.
The scientific community is our only hope.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FML7RHXXIAA6q3Z?format=jpg&name=large
LikeLiked by 1 person
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FMMZxR2XMAMQpzF?format=jpg&name=large
LikeLiked by 1 person
If you want to breed a bug youput it onto a prepared petrie dish.kepit warm.
What better than anice human to kepit warmand fed?
Then it can multiply and breed away and as mogg saysabout the fish,be happy.
LikeLiked by 1 person
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FMMZyCyXsAAgF7-?format=jpg&name=large
LikeLike
Great weezdoris.
You get reported as a covid death IF a positive result in the previous 28 days.
No test,NO listing.
By May the reports will be so low as not worth reporting, Even If they death rate is high.
Was watchingthe NationalGrid lastnight. It was veryclose to the maximuminstalled plant and was importing from Europe AND burning coal.
Then read that 200,000 homes in engerland were without powerdue to the floods.
Dug out the picnic stove and the spark ignitor.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Ewww, European electricity? Is that not inferior to Good Solid Great British electricity?
Mr Johnson is determined that having had a world beating death toll so far, he’ll have a world beating lack of deaths, even if he has to lie… I mean it’s not like lying didn’t come as second nature to him.
LikeLiked by 2 people