[ritchiebaby]

I hope they're better than the face masks that China sent to Spain and The Netherlands! Conspiracy Theorists of the world unite.

[0762]

One would like to hope that many attitudes and extreme beliefs would change in a future "post virus" British society after observing many of the selfless acts that lots n lots of people "across a huge spectrum of humanity" have contributed in this huge quest to fight and overcome this pandemic.

[hibeejim21]

Meanwhile Boris's mate and UK ventilator supplier Dyson has produced......Zero to date.

[0762]

Aye! That's a good point! I was expecting great things from the Dyson production team with a fast turnaround - very disappointing when one considers the positive message that Dyson uttered.

[hibeejim21]

Johnson should use some of this rare respite from bluster and lies, to consider: if I wasn't rich, or important, and couldn't get tested at home the first time I coughed...... and didn't have a personal physician from that point on, and if i had to wait for one of Dyson's ventilators to be built....???

I'd probably be dead right now, through my own incompetence and stupidity.

Maybe it's time for some empathy boris.

[St Charles Owl]

Johnson should use some of this rare respite from bluster and lies, to consider: if I wasn't rich, or important, and couldn't get tested at home the first time I coughed...... and didn't have a personal physician from that point on, and if i had to wait for one of Dyson's ventilators to be built....???

I'd probably be dead right now, through my own incompetence and stupidity.

Maybe it's time for some empathy boris.

I have to say I was hoping Trump or Pence or any of his cronies would also get it i the hope it would bring some realism and humility to them!! Not convinced it would, but the hope would be there!!

[0762]

I notice that Denmark and Austria are already planning a recovery strategy to show the way back from the pandemic. Their measures included localised community quarantines, sealing borders and the closure of public spaces. Logged deaths were both less than 300 albeit very sad re any human loss. They both introduced early lockdowns when there were fewer than 500 cases. In Austria, the govt allied with Green Coalition officials to develop a twin-track approach to combatting this virus. Mandatory wearing of face masks was enforced for shopping and it was very interesting that they used a "Stop Corona" mobile app from the Red Cross which aimed at breaking the chain of infection by logging personal encounters using a "digital handshake". S Korea used similar smart tech to drive down transmissions!!! Compare with the UK eh!

[theo_luddite]

This time next week Boris will be telling us he went into hospital for a hernia operation. Nothing whatsoever to do with Covid-19.

[ritchiebaby]

0762 - I have an Austrian friend who lives locally and she cannot understand how the UK swings from right to left then back again every few years. She says that Austria is used to governing by consent involving two or more parties and is therefore more centrist in nature. Their politicians, however, seem to be no better than those in most other countries.

[0762]

Looking more closely at the history of British politics Ritchie one can see that since the early 1960s there have only been four elected Labour govts in just under 60 years. It is even worse when looking back say a 100 years. So the British electoral system is skewed towards conservative governance as opposed to an inherent left/socialist/community outlook in the likes of Scotland that has never voted in a Tory govt in over 50 years. IMO the closest to some kinda identifiable joint governance was during David Cameron's alliance with Clegg but, on closer analysis, many of their policies were still conservative and non centrist. They were indeed policies based on an ideology of imposing austere measures on the population with some of them damaging lotsa groups of vulnerable people at the "bottom end" of the populace spectrum. I think pragmatic politics has been missing from British govts for years and political ideology has dominated the machinations of government for far too long. Hence it would always be difficult to "break the mould" and govern as suggested by your Austrian friend. Politicians being distracted by their own political aspirations and dogma in the lead up to and during one of the biggest crises in a century is hugely disappointing and is certainly open to massive criticism.