When a brilliant scientist like John Ashton says the government's Covid-19 strategy is wrong, you should sit up and listen. See his bio below (note he is not the author of this editorial).
Today, the top scientist in Boris's circle of boffins, 'Sir Patrick', said he was comfortable with 60% of the UK population getting the disease - because we need 'herd immunity' and that it will 'return annually' and that 'it can't be stopped'. All of these comments should get him replaced immediately. Consider if your top general announced the enemy could not be defeated?
You'd fire him. More seriously, this almost inhumanely-cold approach (reminiscent of notorious mid-century experiments on large populations) takes for granted that 1% of the population will (must) die for this 'herding' to work... that's giving up on upwards of half a million people in the most threatened categories in the UK alone...
This extraordinary idea - to let the virus pandemic proceed among the populace, is dangerous and flawed-thinking because 1) we known China managed to STOP THE SPREAD in a country of more than a billion people; and 2) WE ONLY NEED TO DELAY THE SPREAD UNTIL A VACCINE IS FOUND in 2021; and 3) It is not even clear IMMUNITY IS POSSIBLE with this obligate parasite; some coronaviruses - like the common cold - do not generate herd immunity.
Sir Patrick's eccentric focus on future years misses the point - most every other country - from South Korea, to Italy, to Ireland, is locking down now, for the next few months, to SAVE ITS PEOPLE FROM DYING.
If there was no hope of a vaccine, the UK's indifference would make sense - but their seeming-ultra-negligence has been monocle-popping, and is probably guided by a top-level interest in evolutionary biology - this is social Darwinism masking as verifiable science. It isn't.
The UK has not closed borders; does not test visitors; refuses to shut schools, or large events. It has not closed theatres, cinemas, shops, bars, pubs, or sports terraces. Why?
Herding.
The UK government policy appears to be to cull the population - let the weak, old and infirm to die - so that the strong can be 'immunised'.
Maybe in Sparta or Prussia this would be sensible.
In the 21st century, as Professor Ashton and other scientists are saying, it is swaggering inhumanity dressed up as expertise - this is Brexit in all but name, all over again - Britain against the world and its science. As the New York Times observed the other day - this government is more concerned with protecting the economy than its citizens's lives. Is the reluctance to shut down really about saving a way of life, or to fend off more market collapse?
We are not a herd - as Jung once observed, scientists see humans (at our peril) as a whole, not as individuals. We must humanise this discussion. No one's mother, grandfather, or disabled child MUST DIE.
Sir Patrick's PERFIDIOUS PANDEMIC PLAN needs to be RETHOUGHT.
Professor John Ashton CBE (born 27 May 1947 in Liverpool) is a former lecturer and professor of public health at Southampton/London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine /and the University of Liverpool Medical School. He was Regional Director of Public Health/Regional Medical Officer for the North West of England for 13 years and Director of Public Health/County Medical Officer for 6 years.
He was one of the initiators of the World Health Organisation's Healthy Cities Project from 1986 to 1988 during which time it went from being a European project to a global movement[1] and a pioneer of three public health initiatives.[2]
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