4 NEWS

THEWEEK 28 March 2020

The main stories...

Chinaraisedthealert,asdidSouth

Korea.TheWestmayhavebeenslow

offthemark,saidRichardHortonin

TheGuardian,buttherealmysteryis

whyBritainpersistedindoingsolittle

evenaftertherestofEuropeacted.

Havingdecidedtoallowacontrolled

epidemicoflargenumbersofpeople

togenerate“herdimmunity”,the

Governmentswitchedtoapolicyof

suppressionlastweek,reportedlyin

responsetonewdatashowingthat

Covid-19wasmoredangerousthan

previouslythought.Yetithasbeen

clearsinceJanuarythatthevirusistoo

dangeroustoignore.

Actually,thedataonCovid-19is

anythingbutclear,saidJohnIoannidis,

co-directorofStanfordMeta-Research

InnovationCentre,onStatNews.com.

Westilldon’tknowhowlethalitis.The

onlytestofanentire,closedpopulationisthequarantined

DiamondPrincesscruiseship. Thecasefatality rate there was

1%, but thiswasalargelyelderlypopulation, sothereal rate

may be far lower.Ifthat’sthe case,we maybegrossly over-

reacting to thisoutbreak, likean elephant jumpingoff acliff

to escapeabothersome cat. The costsof our precautions also

have tobeweighed againstthe

unknown consequencesofa

prolonged lockdown.There

will be aprice,saidTom

Whipple inTheTimes.

One studyhassuggestedthatif the lockdown leads toafall

in GDPofmore than 6.4%, moreyears of lifewillbe lost due

to recessionthan willbegainedfrombeating the virus.

Another new study byOxford academicshassuggestedthat

Covid-19 mayhavealready infected asmuchas halfthe UK

populationwithoutus realising, said Alastair Benn on

Reaction.Thatwould mean we’re alreadycloseto developing

herd immunity.The findingswill need to becorroborated

through large-scale antibodytesting.Donald Trump warned

thisweek thatwe “cannot letthe cure be worse thanthe

problem itself”. For once, hewas right, said PhilipJohnston in

The DailyTelegraph. Thedeath toll fromthe viruswill“shoot

up” in the nextfew weeks,but we must remember that in any

normal year, 600,000 people in the UK die, many of them after

contracting flu orpneumonia. Whilewe must of course seek

to limit the number of deaths from Covid-19 and protect the

vulnerable,we must also strive to get the rest of the country

“back to work, and soon”.

AsBorisJohnsonannouncedan

unprecedentedshutdownofthecountry

thisweek,moreevidenceemergedthat

thecoronavirusepidemicis“galloping

ahead”,saidTheTimes.Afurther 87

peopleinBritainsuccumbedtothevirus

onTuesday,thehighestdailytollsofar,

takingthetotalnumberofdeathsinthe

nationto 422 .Morethan8,000cases

havebeenconfirmedintheUK,andthe

pressureontheNHSismountingfast.

Worldwide,thenumberofcaseshas

passed4 00 ,0 00 andaquarterofthe

world’spopulationislivingunder

lockdown.Amongthosewhohave

testedpositiveforCovid-19arePrince

Charles,USsenatorRandPaulandthe

disgracedmogulHarveyWeinstein.The

UKgovernmenthopesthelatestlock-

downmeasures(seepage 24 )will

changepublicbehaviourandhaltthe

virus’sspreadwithoutthemoreextreme

enforcementintroducedinItaly,FranceandSpain,whereno

onecanleavehomewithoutappropriatepaperwork. Whether

its strategyworks, “wewill findout in duecourse”.

Themeasureswillsurelyhelp, saidThe Guardian.In Italy,

which introduced itslockdownafortnight earlier thanthe UK,

there wasevidencethat the

rate ofnewinfections had been

slowing. Britainshouldhave

acted earlier.Johnson’s

responseto coronavirus has

been “too little,too late”, agreed The Independent. Hehas

been resistantfrom thestart tothe ideaof imposingany

statutory limits onindividual or corporatefreedom.As a

result,it now looks unlikelythat theNHS willsecure all the

necessaryresources, inparticularventilators, intime forthe

comingsurgeof Covid-19 patients.The “harrowingscenes”

we’vewitnessed in Italian hospitals willlikely be replicated

inBritain soon. Things areprettydire already, said Robert

Pestonin TheSpectator. Doctorsand nurses complainthat

acritical lackofprotectiveclothing is puttingtheir health at

risk,andturning them all into “super-spreaders”.

The West as awholewas too slow to tackle this crisis, said

Emma Graham-Harrison in The Observer. Mostleaders

complacentlyassumedtheinitial outbreak wouldbe contained

near its source. Southeast Asian countries, scarred bytheir

experienceof the2003Sarsepidemic,took no chances.

Taiwan, “helped perhapsbyhaving an epidemiologist as vice-

president”, started tracing passengers from Wuhan as soon as

The coronavirus lockdown: too little, too late?

COVER CARTOON: HOWARD MCWILLIAM

It wasn’t all bad

Venice’s canals have turned a

vivid clear blue, owing to the

lack of traffic. Normally, a

stream of taxi-boats, vaporetti

waterbuses and gondoliers

churns up sediment, making

the water murky. But with the

tourists all gone, and residents

in lockdown, the water has

grown so clear, fish can be seen

swimming in it. Sadly, reports

of dolphins in Venice turned out

to be fake news, but in Rome,

ducks have been photographed

taking advantage of the rare

peace at the Trevi Fountain.

The former footballers Gary

Neville and Ryan Giggs have

closed their two hotels in

Manchester to the public, and

offered up their 176 beds free

of charge to NHS workers,

for stays of up to ten days.

Meanwhile in Brussels, a

chocolatier named Frédéric

Blondeel is delivering

emergency chocolate to

quarantined and self-isolating

local residents. And in

Teddington, west London, a

stables has been bringing its

ponies to the windows of local

people in isolation in order to

“spread some smiles”.

The Archbishop of

Canterbury led his first

virtual Sunday service

at the weekend, to mark

Mother’s Day. Recorded

in the crypt chapel at

Lambeth Palace in

London, the service

included prayers, hymns

andashort sermon, and

was broadcast across 39

local BBC radio stations.

In the Lombardy region

of Italy,apriest asked his

5,500-strong congregation to send him photos of themselves, and

taped them to the pews so he could still celebrate mass with them.

AUSCatholic priest, meanwhile, is offering drive-through and

contact-free confessions outside his Maryland chapel.

“We may be overreacting, like an elephant

jumping offacliff to escapeabothersome cat”

AllquietonLondon'sMillenniumBridge