It’s so easy, as we have done for almost 2 years now, to focus solely on Cv19.
But we should talk just as much about all the other things that the Cv19 policy response affects, and recognise that they will be responsible for the misery and/or premature deaths of millions in the coming years.
Economic stagnation with high tax low growth due to our colossal borrowing for Cv19. Along with Climate Change taxes & higher energy bills, this will shorten some people’s lives as well as making many more miserable.
Non-Cv19 physical health - cancer, heart disease and many other illnesses not diagnosed, or diagnosed too late. This will shorten some people’s lives as well as making many more miserable.
Mental health deterioration in many, especially among young adults and those with no family support, forced into isolation. This will shorten some people’s lives as well as making many more miserable.
The colossal NHS back-log created by the ‘all that matters is Cv19’ policies the NHS has been allowed to adopt. This will exacerbate the usual winter struggles of the NHS and will shorten some people’s lives as well as making many more miserable.
Educational disruption for tens of millions of children. This may not shorten lives, but it reduces the life chances of the poorest children in particular, thus making their lives worse than they could have been.
Civil liberties cast aside as if they are mere whims, not rights earned over countless generations. Who knows where this will lead but nowhere good, we can be certain of that.
Do I feel very sorry for people who have had someone close to them lose their life due to Cv19? Of course!
Do I feel very sorry for people who have been made seriously ill by Cv19? Of course!
But I also feel very sorry for all those who have and will lose their lives or are desperately ill because their illness was demoted & treated as of less importance long after the seriousness of Cv19 was known to be far less than originally feared.
I also care about the mental health deterioration to many and the educational harm to our children.
And I also care about how easily we have allowed ourselves to be convinced of the necessity of giving up our civil liberties and freedoms.
Policy affecting 68 million people has to be based on more than panic, hype & political expediency, especially when not backed-up by the reality on the ground.
We have an Infection Fatality Rate of well under 1%, which was the case even before the vaccines, and an average age of death ‘with Cv19’ of 82 which again was the case before the vaccines.
This average age of death, by the way, means that Cv19 has been so devastating that it has had ZERO impact on the average life expectancy in the UK.
We have overreacted, and this disproportionate response will come back to bite us in coming years, particularly if we repeat the mistakes.
That we overreacted initially is understandable; that we are even contemplating further lockdowns & vaccine passports (& worse!), even now we know that Cv19 is nowhere near as bad as feared, is inexcusable.
It’s very simple, really. Some people think that Cv19 has been a big enough problem to justify all the collateral damage I have listed above.
I do not.
I believe that the collateral damage from our short-sighted, Cv19 only, policy response will be far worse than Cv19 itself.
I struggle to believe that those on the side of censoring debate, only allowing carefully selected & interpreted information to be released, using propaganda techniques to instil greater fear than warranted, mandating medical treatments & restrictions, harming the economy, harming mental health & non-Cv19 physical health, disrupting children’s education, using those children to shield adults, allowing the division of society into clean and unclean, good and evil, and curtailing civil liberties, is the side history will judge favourably.
Although of course, as Orwell realised, they will just erase, re-write & interpret the history to suit themselves if given the chance.
The question for all of us as individuals is, ‘will I continue to aid and abet them?’
