A mishandled pandemic
Through several news
stories, one begins to see the fundamental issues with how the Coronavirus
pandemic has been handled by certain governments and how the infection and
death rates have been reflected as a matter of consequence.
This especially with
the admission of Prime Minister Boris Johnson to hospital last night for further
tests having not shaken off the symptoms he acquired 10 days before. The real
condition of the Prime Minister is subject to conjecture but generally immaterial.
My comment on that matter is that all the best of my humanity wishes him well,
yet there is nothing of his principles, his virtues, or his policies regarding
the pandemic that persuades me to feel more that way. [BBC News]
Our sympathy towards
a situation of human frailty should not automatically confer absolution from
culpability and responsibility for the way the UK government has failed to
grapple competently with this pandemic in scaling up tests to determine who is
infected, in providing protective equipment to NHS staff, some of whom have
unfortunately succumbed to the COVID-19 virus and in acquiring sufficient treatment
facilities as ventilators.
Michael Gove confirms
death of seven NHS workers fighting coronavirus [Evening
Standard]
Indecision cost too
many lives
A study puts the
mean duration from the onset of symptoms to death at 17.8 days, the range being
between 16.9 to 19.2 days. Whereas, from the onset of symptoms to hospital
discharge with the patient having been through the worst of the disease to
recovery is 24.7 days with a range of 22.9 to 28.1 days. [Estimates
of the severity of coronavirus disease 2019: a model-based analysis - The Lancet]
The UK was finally
asked to lock down on the 23rd of March 2020, that is 14 days ago,
going by the data capture today at COVID19Info.live, 4,948 people have lost
their lives to the COVID-19 virus, people who otherwise might well be alive if
this virus had not complicated their underlying conditions and sped them to
their demise.
These are the people
who inadvertently took it on the chin as Boris Johnson suggested we should in
early March and were knocked out. The loved ones who we have lost before their
time.
People make up these
numbers
That would imply the 625
people who have died in the full day of yesterday, the 5th of April
were infected somewhere between the 17th of March and the 20th
of March, by inference, if the UK government had acted a week earlier on the 16th
of March, there is a likelihood for each day from the 31st of March,
3,529 lives might have been saved. The UK breached the 100 mark on the 26th
of March with 115 deaths. [COVID19Info.live]
This could link up
with the well-attended Cheltenham Festival that ran from the 10th to
the 13th of March and the Liverpool FC match with Athletico Madrid
with visitors from Spain on the 11th of March.
This is information
we cannot ignore because too many individuals, people with names who through unfortunate
happenstance died lonely deaths in hospital and had no immediate family at
their funeral ceremonies.
Stripping off our
human dignity
In the story of two COVID-19
victims, Pastor Landon Spradlin, 66, was survived by his wife and four
daughters, an entertainer and evangelist, he was recently attended at the Mardi
Gras, yet when he died there were two guests at his funeral and none of his
immediate family. Ismail Mohamed Abdulwahab, 13, himself had parents and
siblings, none of whom were at his graveside, he was buried by strangers. [BBC News] [ITV
News]
The Coronavirus, in
life and in death dehumanises us and strips us of all human dignity that
decisions are being taken for reasons that do not essential protect life and
more towards rationing treatment and intervention depending on assessments of
viability determined almost unilaterally by GPs as seen in letters informing
the aged and extremely vulnerable of decision not to attempt resuscitation if
they should fall ill.
We were adequately
forewarned
The argument of the
benefit of hindsight is moot as we all had the warning signs from China, the
extreme measures taken were indicators and as it swept into South Korea and
then Italy, our government was not oblivious, just unpersuaded and caught flat-footed.
Including in the US, we had almost a 2-month lead time and it was squandered valuing
the economy over human life and the atrociously untested policy of herd
immunity with a vaccine does not exist for a virus we know little about.
The lockdown has its
usefulness, but the emphasis should be on social distancing rather than on people
filling up parks. This considering many might just live in apartments without
outer spaces as balconies or gardens. Obviously, going out should not be for
the leisure of it, but for essential activity.
The responsibility is
with the government
What would save the
NHS the most is the social distancing and the equipping of the NHS staff with
protective kit, the widespread deployment of testing and kitting intensive care
units with ventilators to manage respiratory distress. There is enough space
for us to keep our distance of 2 metres and maybe more, but I see a surreptitious ploy to deflect attention from where the problem really is, the
incompetence, the ineptitude and the lethargy of Boris Johnson’s government.
We should not be
inured into just seeing the numbers with recognising that the statistics are
made up of individuals, people like you and I, over 4,000 families grieving the
loss of loved ones over and above the nominal death rate, in the space of a month.
That is why I cannot absolve my government from this somewhat avoidable human
tragedy.
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