The Times - UK (2020-07-31)

the times | Friday July 31 2020 1GM 27

Leading articles

will miss them if they can zoom a doctor from

home.

At least that is the hope. Any minister who

attempts to digitise the health service is being bold.

Historically, technology projects in the NHS have

begun with good intentions and ended in expen-

sive failure after lengthy delays. That is a large part

of the reason its office infrastructure has resisted

wholesale modernisation so stubbornly. But the

pandemic, as in other arms of the state, has shown

there is an alternative. Only 10 per cent of GP

appointments are now face-to-face, compared

with 61 per cent via phone, 6 per cent by text and

4 per cent by email. Surgeries have adapted to the

new reality of social distancing with commendable

speed. Only one in ten does not offer remote con-

sultations. Long may this state of affairs continue.

Mr Hancock likens the pandemic to sheet

lightning on a dark night, illuminating the NHS’s

successes and failures. If anything he is too

generous. The shortcomings were plain to see well

before the pandemic. Strained by the demands of

a rapidly ageing population, general practice is in

crisis. On average, patients get nine minutes with

a doctor. If they see one at all. Punitive taxes on

pension pots incentivise GPs, already free to opt

out of weekend and evening duty, to work less and

retire earlier. A&E departments thus end up over-

burdened.

Going digital will relieve some of the strain and

ensure there is no longer such a thing as out of

hours for primary care. The changes make sense

for doctors too, as reflected by the cautious

welcome Mr Hancock’s remarks received from

GPs. Much of their time is wasted on paper-

shuffling at the expense of patient needs. It is right

that the government will consult them on what

red tape might be cut. Recent events have demon-

strated that even an unwieldy supertanker like the

NHS can move nimbly when circumstances

demand it. Ensuring it stays that way will require

Mr Hancock to make good on his promises to blast

off its bureaucratic barnacles and shift power to

doctors, who should set aside their suspicions of

the health secretary’s evangelism for technology.

Nobody is proposing that elderly or acutely sick

patients be banned from seeing their GP in person,

as some fear. While the difficult birth of the

government’s tracing app for the coronavirus is a

cautionary tale, we know that technology can

make remote consultations work. As with many

chronic illnesses, changes of habit have proved the

best treatment for the NHS’s underlying

conditions. Its doctors should embrace them.

lem is international and the figures are startling.

Businesses globally paid out about $25 billion

(£19 billion) last year to settle ransom demands by

cybercriminals. Businesses in Britain accounted

for $277 million of that total. Only this week, the

smartwatch-maker Garmin disclosed that it had

suffered a cyberattack. The culprits are believed to

be a Russian criminal gang called Evil Corp and it

is thought that they demanded $10 million in

return for a key to decrypt the infected files.

Though the company has not revealed whether

it paid the ransom, it has been able to access its files

once more. Cybersecurity experts have told The

Times that this would not be possible in the

absence of co-operation by the attackers. Another

company, Blackbaud, a US software provider for

many British universities, admitted last week that

it had suffered a cyberattack and paid a ransom

demand to have it lifted.

Cyberattacks undoubtedly pose an ethical

dilemma for businesses, as well as being a com-

mercial nightmare. The techniques used by the

hackers involve introducing a virus into the

computer networks of companies, which then

encrypts the firm’s files. The urgency of getting

access to the files is not just a commercial

imperative. The hackers also threaten to leak the

information online. The victims have a powerful

incentive to protect the privacy of the information

as well as be able to resume operations. And the

mere disclosure that their data has been compro-

mised may deter future customers.

There is only one reputable answer to the

dilemma, however. It is to refuse to pay a ransom

demand, whatever the short-term cost. Britain has

a long and commendable diplomatic record

founded on this principle. Most recently, when

terrorists from Islamic State kidnapped and

murdered foreign nationals as the group spread

mayhem and oppression through the Middle East,

David Cameron’s government campaigned

among the G7 not to accede to ransom demands.

The reason is not only the principle that crime

must not pay but the pragmatism of ensuring that

it stops. If ransom demands are met, the perpetra-

tors are not satiated. They have the funds and the

appetite to go higher. Companies in Britain must

do their duty, and refuse to co-operate.

shows him being arrested outside St James’s

Palace in London, where George V was meeting

guests. Then as now, readers were eager to see

images of celebrities, particularly royalty and the

stars of that other emerging medium, cinema.

Risley’s first boss, indeed, the newspaper’s art

editor Ulric van den Bogaerde, would shortly

become the father of Dirk, the film actor.

Risley was charged with obstruction, yet the

magistrate sent our man packing with only a

warning, his leniency perhaps influenced by

Towner’s evidence that the arresting officer was

overzealous. Geoffrey Dawson, the Times editor,

certainly thought so, thundering in these very

columns on the subject the next day. Press

photographers, Dawson editorialised, should be

treated “as public servants and not as a public

nuisance”. Questions in the House of Commons

followed; the home secretary was forced to

confirm that the police had no business placing

restrictions on accredited photographers.

The principle Dawson argued for thus became

established. Members of the press are able to go

about their work largely unmolested by the forces

of law and order, at least in this country. Everyone

who values a free press should be grateful.

Doctor Zoom

Technological innovation has helped the NHS weather the pandemic.

General practitioners should embrace plans to make consultations remote

The National Health Service turned 72 this

month. Those who have endured the tedium of

attempting to book an appointment with a general

practitioner at short notice could be forgiven for

thinking that it is still run from the first half of the

20th century. While technological innovations

have transformed patient care, the same cannot

be said for the archaic administration of hospitals

and doctors’ surgeries, which can often feel like

places where the modern internet fears to tread.

An NHS that still uses 9,000 fax machines and

10 per cent of the world’s remaining pagers is

manifestly overdue the sort of digital reckoning

set out by Matt Hancock, the health secretary, in

a speech yesterday.

Now that the first peak of the coronavirus pan-

demic and the acute pressure it brought to bear on

the NHS has passed, ministers and clinicians have

an opportunity to apply lessons learnt and look to

the future. If Mr Hancock has his way, they will do

so via webcam. From now on, he told the Royal

College of Physicians, consultations should be

conducted via phone or video call unless the

clinician or patient has good reason to choose

otherwise. The NHS and its doctors will be digital-

first. Gone will be the days of early-morning calls

on hold to overworked surgery receptionists. Few

Corporate Racket

Companies that suffer cyberattacks should never accede to ransom demands

If Britain is to prosper outside the European

Union, it must maintain its reputation as a good

place in which international companies can do

business. And one of the most important reasons

why foreign direct investment floods to this

country is the robustness of the rule of law. That

crucial component of commercial confidence is

put into question, however, by a Times

investigation showing that businesses are under

attack from Russian criminal gangs mounting

sophisticated cyberattacks. Many of the targeted

companies are choosing to accede to huge ransom

demands in order to get their files back.

The temptation to yield to extortion for the sake

of business continuity and a quiet life is under-

standable but it has destructive consequences. A

criminal enterprise that succeeds once has a

powerful incentive to carry on. It is no fault of the

police or the criminal justice system if they do not

apprehend and punish the perpetrators in these

cases. They cannot do this if the victims decide to

acquiesce to ransom demands instead of reporting

the offence. The companies must stop indulging

criminality, and be shamed if they do. The prob-

Snap Judgment

Almost a century ago, our first staff photographer won a vital press freedom

Most professional photographers would be

disappointed if the most famous photograph

associated with them was an image of them rather

than by them. Yet given that the picture of Times

staffer Edward Risley, taken by his rival Frederick

Towner in 1924 helped establish access rights for

the emerging trade, perhaps he wouldn’t have

minded. The Times had been publishing photo-

graphs only since 1910, and then only occasionally.

The status of Risley’s job had yet to be determined.

The picture of Risley, who 100 years ago this

weekend was appointed our first staff photo-

grapher on the princely salary of £10 a week,

UK: The Betfred World Snooker

Championship begins in Sheffield, with a

reduced crowd, rescheduled from April due

to the coronavirus pandemic.

One by one our

song birds have

fallen silent for

another year. Now,

only the song

thrush is still

singing in the

village gardens. For a little longer, those who

sleep with windows open will be roused by

the most harmonious of pre-dawn alarm

clocks. A typical thrush uses up to 100

phrases, some inherited from parents, some

stolen from other birds, and some borrowed

from us. Urbanites lucky enough to live with

a resident pair of song thrushes will hear

this species at its finest. Studies suggest that

city thrushes have the richest repertoire.

They take our car alarms, HGV reversing

beeps, ringtones, and sweeten them into

music. jonathan tulloch

In 1703 Daniel Defoe was placed in a pillory

for seditious libel after publishing his satirical

tract The Shortest Way with the Dissenters.

JK Rowling, pictured,

author of the Harry

Potter books, 55;

Victoria Azarenka,

tennis player, former

world No 1, 31; Baroness

(Angela) Billingham,

shadow spokeswoman

on culture, media and sport (2010-13), 81;

Kenny Burrell, jazz guitarist, 89; Geraldine

Chaplin, actress, Doctor Zhivago (1965), 76;

Antonio Conte, footballer, Italy (1994-2000)

and manager, Inter Milan, Chelsea (2016-18),

51; Norman Cook (Fatboy Slim), DJ and

record producer, 57; Jonathan Dimbleby,

presenter, BBC Radio 4’s Any Questions?

(1987-2019), 76; Lord (John) Dyson, Master

of the Rolls and head of civil justice

(2012-16), 77; Daniel Evans, artistic director,

Chichester Festival Theatre, 47; Emilia Fox,

actress, Silent Witness (since 2004), 46;

John Goodbody, sports news correspondent

of The Times (1986-2007), 77; Evonne

Goolagong Cawley, tennis player,

Wimbledon singles champion (1971, 1980),

69; Fergus Henderson, chef, writer, The

Whole Beast (1999), 57; Penny Hughes,

chairwoman, The Gym Group, Aston

Martin Lagonda (2018-Apr 2020), 61; Javed

Khan, chief executive, Barnardo’s, 57; Sherry

Lansing, producer, the first woman to head

a leading film studio, 76; Robert Balchin,

Lord Lingfield, chairman, Institution for

Further Education, knight president,

Imperial Society of Knights Bachelor, 78;

Rear-Admiral Tim Lowe, chief executive,

UK Hydrographic Office, 57; Andrew Marr,

presenter, The Andrew Marr Show, BBC 1, 61;

Sir Alan Meale, Labour MP for Mansfield

(1987-2017), 71; Lynne Reid Banks, children’s

writer, Tiger, Tiger (2005), 91; Colin Roberts,

governor of the Falkland Islands (2014-17),

61; James Douglas-Hamilton, Lord Selkirk

of Douglas, lord high commissioner,

General Assembly, Church of Scotland

(2012-13), 78; Wesley Snipes, actor, the Blade

film trilogy, 58; Mark Thompson, president

and chief executive of the New York Times

Company, director-general, BBC (2004-12),

63; Roy Walker, comedian and broadcaster,

Catchphrase (1986-98), 80.

“Music was the safe space in which my

passions, as Nietzsche says, could ‘enjoy

themselves’.” Stephen Johnson, broadcaster,

How Shostakovich Changed My Mind (2018)

Nature notes

Birthdays today

On this day

The last word

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