love* in the time of plague (and by love* i mean brexit* and other dreary matters of uk politics)

An Italian view of Britain's virus response: It's been a slow motion train crash, says @FerdiGiugliano https://t.co/8XWXFk2Pkx via @bopinion

— Jonathan Hopkin (@jrhopkin) March 25, 2020

Harley Street doing its magic for the rich and celebs as usual. The Royals have permanent medical staff and can get checked out on demand.

Twitter full of grovelling twats defending him

Crazy Dom makes a great spectre of death

They should give him the full Seventh Seal make-up, he's a natural

But Chris Whitty, the U.K.’s chief medical officer, and Patrick Vallance, its chief scientific adviser, share the blame. It is normal for politicians to dither as they try to balance different interests — above all, keeping the economy humming. But why were the official scientists not screaming from the rooftop? Did they get their advice wrong, or did they fail to speak truth to power and to the public?

fucking gallows for these cunts

If that's Whitty on the TV advert he looks like they've strung him up already

This "might just work" shite from the same people who brought you herd immunity and ramping up testing and keeping the schools open is low risk.

We're a fortnight from wishing we were Italy.

_But Chris Whitty, the U.K.’s chief medical officer, and Patrick Vallance, its chief scientific adviser, share the blame. It is normal for politicians to dither as they try to balance different interests — above all, keeping the economy humming. But why were the official scientists not screaming from the rooftop? Did they get their advice wrong, or did they fail to speak truth to power and to the public?_


fucking gallows for these cunts

It’s Iraq all over again. You get the legal or medical advice that fits whatever you were going to do in the first place.

First you get the rona, then you get the power, then you get the corpses

Thing is, even now, a complete lockdown and hoping the infection burns itself by midsummer with the minimum possible number of deaths and strain on the health service is still only going to work long-term if the UK closes its borders until the discovery of a vaccine. I'm not sure ANY country has a viable exit strategy yet, as we will probably find if and when this lets rip in China again.

Yeah magical thinking seems to be endemic

What difference is closing the borders going to make long term as long as community transmission still happens?

Corbyn’s last pmqs :( I’m going to miss him.

Community transmission would presumably be prevented to some extent by a major lockdown and the hope that the existing carriers develop immunity in the meantime. But my general point is that even the most draconian of measures don't extend much further than "lock everything down and hope for the best". Especially when there's not enough testing and what exists isn't that reliable.

Sure, but it’s other countries going to be locking their doors to the UK, rather than vice versa. Border closures don’t matter much when people aren’t doing lockdown properly.

Corbyn talking about care workers not being able to get food for their clients. Now calling out NHS staff having to ask DIY shops for PPE on twitter.

Watching Jez here too.

I'm not sure ANY country has a viable exit strategy yet, as we will probably find if and when this lets rip in China again

Yeah. I can still see why they wanted to take the herd immunity route first; it still seems like the only thing that is halfway sustainable to the end. (But also they went about it so ineptly and communicated it so awfully that I'm not sure it can saved.)

FPing Corbyn for pronouncing it “med-cins”. Johnson does too.

seems like a very fertile political moment for proponents of a UBI to get some actual, real-world traction

ironically this is probably easier with the Tories in. Doesn't bear imagining how the blue ticks would be reacting right now to a left-wing govt providing left-wing solutions to this

Med-cin is RP pronunciation.

Argh I just did an ‘ATM machine’ sorry everyone.

What a lovely day! The perfect day to drive up into the #PeakDistrict for a walk, bike ride, climb or horse ride, isn’t it?

No, actually it isn’t. pic.twitter.com/sNkgD2qSa3

— Derbyshire Police (@DerbysPolice) March 25, 2020

"Is this cool? Is THIS cool?"

Unbelievably, we’ve just had to deal with 20+ people having a BBQ!! Please listen to government advice else this will get worse and will last longer!! #RIPBBQ #COVID19 #StayHome #Foleshill #Coventry pic.twitter.com/INhXbCjd05

— Foleshill Police (@FoleshillWMP) March 24, 2020

lool pigs making an example of that burnt processed pork by using deadly force against a bbq!

Like Jesus destroying the market outside the temple.

can’t help wondering if boris’ boys’ sudden optimism might be related to ongoing brexit negotiations with the usa and trump’s new plan to commit viral genocide in the name of restarting the american stock market economy

xp The story is that no-one there was inclined to take a talking and overturning the barbecue seemed the easiest way to move them on. I mean, if it's that vs fines vs actually arresting anyone...

Lol some Tory asked about online delivery slots

thank fuck someone is asking the hard questions

I'm just imagining cops like that bad 80's comedy duo: You see these sausages I'm about to stand on with my size 14 doc martens? This is what I think of your human rights you bleedin' scrote!

JRM: God bless the Prince of Wales, some waffle about how the Queen’s actual birthday is the 21st April

Yeah let's not be taking cops at their word

The blame the public PR move looks to have been remarkably effective. https://t.co/SPuqa89iyh

— Tom Mills (@ta_mills) March 25, 2020

Oh he’s paying tribute to Corbyn now. Not a single Labour MP apart from Valerie Vaz doing the same.

as ppl have been saying on twitter, the british public does seem to have an unusually low opinion of the rest of the british public

The British Public: ‘how dare they tell me what to do! They should tell them over there what to do!’

belief in the wider community's feckless, selfish venality is a key part of british identity

This is how governments get away with murdering poor people tbf

the groundskeepers have come to mow the communal lawns for the block of flats, which is very nice and lovely and completely unnecessary, I'd have thought

at least they're able to keep well apart from a) each other (well, until they both get back into their van) b) anyone else

a self-conscious middle-class person writes: do people with less bad and shameful accents pronounce medicine as 3 syllables, or is -sɪn vs -sən the aspect in dispute here?

Can hear council lawnmowers here too

I usually go three syllables

They're still mowing the fairways on the council golf course at the top of the hill behind us, even though golf has effectively been banned

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbbOw-UMqDE

so meddy-san is the MES-approved locution

surely there's an -ah on the end of that

no