Since the last time I made a blog entry the world has stopped, turned around and started off in a totally different direction. A deadly virus has escaped from a lab in China, so it seems, or perhaps nature has designed a virus which would jump from animal to human, but no one really knows where Covid-19 came from. Or no one has admitted to knowing. All we know so far is that a killer virus is on the loose and is taking out between one and three percent of the people who catch it. The death rate is high and the spread is accelerating worldwide. Covid-19 is particularly dangerous for anyone with a weak immune system, which includes all people in the last third of their life, all people who have a chronic illness, and as far as I can tell all people who have been taking medical drugs, are relatively unfit, who smoke, have mental health conditions, live in close proximity to one another and have many intimate contacts with people or come into contact with large numbers of people. The virus is transmitted directly person to person via droplets of body fluids emitted by sneezing and coughing, and indirectly by wiping nasal secretions on to your hands and then touching objects which may be touched by another person. The virus can survive over a week on hard surfaces such as metal. It is also possible that the virus can be transmitted through the air over larger distances although this isn’t proven. To avoid catching the lethal disease all physical human contact must be eliminated.
Countries have already begun to lock down their populations, but they started late, after the virus had taken hold. They have varied in their efforts to stem the explosion, but essentially there is little that can really be done. As all the horror stories say, we are more or less powerless against a truly virulent biological killer. No individual knows whether they will get a mild or serious form of the disease. Younger people tend to get off lightly, and consequently they are treating the potential of Covid-19 with scorn, and continuing to go about their normal daily lives in countries where the police are not patrolling the streets telling people to go home. In countries which have not yet lost several hundred people, and where the hospital beds are not yet all full, people are still ignoring the true danger, and putting other people’s lives at risk.
Some people are even saying that they are enjoying this. That the sound of silence is bringing joy to their life. That not being able to go to work or go to school is a relief. That spending time at home doing what you want to do is wonderful. That the clearer skies and cleaner rivers are a blessing. Well that is true, but at what cost. Why did we have to achieve a new world by destroying the global economy and taking away thousands - or perhaps yet millions - of lives before people’s time was up? How will they feel when their savings run out, when the government has used up all its reserves and they can’t afford to do the things they’ve done for decades? When war really kicks in with all the drawbacks and no perks.
The future implications of what has happened would fill a hundred books already. Both small and large, the knock-on effects of people not being allowed to leave their homes are mammoth. Here’s one example. I have four sheep due to lamb this spring. I am not a farmer and I use a local shepherd to take care of my sheep when they need help. He is over 70. He cannot come to my land to help out now. I did not expect this situation when I put the ram with the ewes last autumn. Had I known he would be unable to help, I would not have gone this route. This is just one example - there are many more much more serious than the threat of losing lambs through my own lack of skill. People who talk about how nice it is to be able to hear the birds again are not thinking it through properly.
I have always heard the birds. I already “self isolate” and the effects of the lockdown on me are minimal. But I have also had life threatening illness four times in my life and I know what it is to be rushed to hospital for emergency, life-saving care. I know what it means to be brought back to life. I also know that should the same thing happen now, you and I would stand a very much greater chance of dying than in normal circumstances. Everyone else is in the same boat. Now is not the time to have that heart attack, a stroke or to simply fall down the steps and break your hip. Now is not the time to have a baby, find a breast lump, have an anaphylactic allergic reaction or a serious asthma attack. Now is not the time to have a nervous breakdown, wonder if your child is autistic, decide to have your cataracts operated on or, God forbid, lose a crown on a front tooth. Relatively minor concerns become insurmountable problems when the hospitals are overwhelmed. People will go ahead now and ‘die of silly little colds’ to quote Mrs Bennet.
There has already been major ‘looting’ in the supermarkets as greedy, stupid people rush to fill their garages with everything they can lay their hands on. Don’t be naive. Many of these people will not use those stacks of loo roll or packets of cornflakes and tins of beans. They will find their way on to the black market and be resold at a profit. Whenever there is a national crisis the criminal element will emerge from the slime and in the absence of police vigilance will proliferate. The black economy will thrive, while the regular economy crashes. This isn’t hyperbole or scaremongering, it is simply what always happens, is happening and will happen more and more as the days go by. Rivalries will emerge, differences will intensify, social life will become divided between those who have and those who have not. Key figures will try to protect themselves from the masses. We will see royalty, celebrities, millionaires and more retreating from the limelight into their barricaded mansions, on to their helicopter padded yachts, into their mountain eyries and island paradises. Mark my words.
I said three years ago that if the UK left the EU the bloc would disintegrate and we would experience a shock return to the days of the 1970s. I predicted (to myself of course, because no one would listen, and why should they, it’s not relevant...) that we would see calamities of unprecedented horror. I felt that a bad genie would be let out of a bottle, and that the world would lose control. And that is what has happened. Who’s talking about climate change now? Who’s childhood has been stolen, Greta, and by whom? Have a word with Covid about that. Who’s talking about women’s rights? Does a woman deserve to survive the virus more than a man, or less? Who’s talking about their gender identity, and how they’d sooner be called ‘zhe’ instead of ‘she’ on their medical records...
We had reached a state of total lunacy in the world. With 65 different types of sausage to choose from in Tescos, how could it have been otherwise? We are a greedy, selfish, arrogant, ignorant, cruel, thoughtless, stupid, lazy, rude, uncooperative, vicious, lustful and perverted civilisation and we are being taught a lesson. Go, Earth, Go.
Countries have already begun to lock down their populations, but they started late, after the virus had taken hold. They have varied in their efforts to stem the explosion, but essentially there is little that can really be done. As all the horror stories say, we are more or less powerless against a truly virulent biological killer. No individual knows whether they will get a mild or serious form of the disease. Younger people tend to get off lightly, and consequently they are treating the potential of Covid-19 with scorn, and continuing to go about their normal daily lives in countries where the police are not patrolling the streets telling people to go home. In countries which have not yet lost several hundred people, and where the hospital beds are not yet all full, people are still ignoring the true danger, and putting other people’s lives at risk.
Some people are even saying that they are enjoying this. That the sound of silence is bringing joy to their life. That not being able to go to work or go to school is a relief. That spending time at home doing what you want to do is wonderful. That the clearer skies and cleaner rivers are a blessing. Well that is true, but at what cost. Why did we have to achieve a new world by destroying the global economy and taking away thousands - or perhaps yet millions - of lives before people’s time was up? How will they feel when their savings run out, when the government has used up all its reserves and they can’t afford to do the things they’ve done for decades? When war really kicks in with all the drawbacks and no perks.
The future implications of what has happened would fill a hundred books already. Both small and large, the knock-on effects of people not being allowed to leave their homes are mammoth. Here’s one example. I have four sheep due to lamb this spring. I am not a farmer and I use a local shepherd to take care of my sheep when they need help. He is over 70. He cannot come to my land to help out now. I did not expect this situation when I put the ram with the ewes last autumn. Had I known he would be unable to help, I would not have gone this route. This is just one example - there are many more much more serious than the threat of losing lambs through my own lack of skill. People who talk about how nice it is to be able to hear the birds again are not thinking it through properly.
I have always heard the birds. I already “self isolate” and the effects of the lockdown on me are minimal. But I have also had life threatening illness four times in my life and I know what it is to be rushed to hospital for emergency, life-saving care. I know what it means to be brought back to life. I also know that should the same thing happen now, you and I would stand a very much greater chance of dying than in normal circumstances. Everyone else is in the same boat. Now is not the time to have that heart attack, a stroke or to simply fall down the steps and break your hip. Now is not the time to have a baby, find a breast lump, have an anaphylactic allergic reaction or a serious asthma attack. Now is not the time to have a nervous breakdown, wonder if your child is autistic, decide to have your cataracts operated on or, God forbid, lose a crown on a front tooth. Relatively minor concerns become insurmountable problems when the hospitals are overwhelmed. People will go ahead now and ‘die of silly little colds’ to quote Mrs Bennet.
There has already been major ‘looting’ in the supermarkets as greedy, stupid people rush to fill their garages with everything they can lay their hands on. Don’t be naive. Many of these people will not use those stacks of loo roll or packets of cornflakes and tins of beans. They will find their way on to the black market and be resold at a profit. Whenever there is a national crisis the criminal element will emerge from the slime and in the absence of police vigilance will proliferate. The black economy will thrive, while the regular economy crashes. This isn’t hyperbole or scaremongering, it is simply what always happens, is happening and will happen more and more as the days go by. Rivalries will emerge, differences will intensify, social life will become divided between those who have and those who have not. Key figures will try to protect themselves from the masses. We will see royalty, celebrities, millionaires and more retreating from the limelight into their barricaded mansions, on to their helicopter padded yachts, into their mountain eyries and island paradises. Mark my words.
I said three years ago that if the UK left the EU the bloc would disintegrate and we would experience a shock return to the days of the 1970s. I predicted (to myself of course, because no one would listen, and why should they, it’s not relevant...) that we would see calamities of unprecedented horror. I felt that a bad genie would be let out of a bottle, and that the world would lose control. And that is what has happened. Who’s talking about climate change now? Who’s childhood has been stolen, Greta, and by whom? Have a word with Covid about that. Who’s talking about women’s rights? Does a woman deserve to survive the virus more than a man, or less? Who’s talking about their gender identity, and how they’d sooner be called ‘zhe’ instead of ‘she’ on their medical records...
We had reached a state of total lunacy in the world. With 65 different types of sausage to choose from in Tescos, how could it have been otherwise? We are a greedy, selfish, arrogant, ignorant, cruel, thoughtless, stupid, lazy, rude, uncooperative, vicious, lustful and perverted civilisation and we are being taught a lesson. Go, Earth, Go.
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