‘…In the last twenty four hours we have a further 5492 cases, the spread is not accelerating and that is good news’.
Angela McClean, Govt scientific advisor
It’s difficult to find good news when we have reached another awful milestone, another day when the recorded deaths increased by the highest total so far, 938 more deaths recorded in the past twenty four hours.
I wanted to acknowledge this before moving on to the mundanity of everyday life under lockdown, the routine and inevitably repetitious nature of preparing food, looking after each other, and spending some time outdoors.
We don’t have the opportunity to take a walk at the moment, Gwyn is under strict instruction to stay put and I’m hobbling around on one leg.
Some of our conversation turns on how easily as a country we seem to be accepting the death toll that is announced each and every day. This may be the tone of news reporting, the media’s attempt to avoid any allegation of creating panic, but we recall clearly the shock of hearing how Italy was announcing over five hundred deaths, and how those numbers were seen as shocking, unprecedented and profoundly disturbing. Yet in this new norm the announcement of nearly a thousand new deaths is plotted on a graph in a government press conference with little comment, an abstraction, an inevitability. Panic is always unhelpful, many are grieving, and many more anxious and frightened, some are coping with situations that are compounded by lockdown, others are working way beyond their routine or expected capacity. Maybe this awfulness is so profound we have little choice in how to respond.
Spring continues to happen outside, the Forsythia bush is blooming, there is blossom on our apple and plum trees and our newly planted hazel has taken well, as have the other trees Dylan planted.
There was no weights bench this afternoon, instead it was cardio for the lads – skipping whilst trying to avoid mangling the washing line.
We moved seamlessly from pancakes to omelettes and back again in the course of a couple of hours. A neighbour shared with us some food she’d prepared and the sun stayed later in the afternoon as the days gradually lengthen.
Outside of these small events, we will watch the news with our evening meal and recall all the things our phones have alerted us to during the course of the day.
Hi Graeme, unfortunately, as you know, there are Lies, damned lies and statistics. Much more important, however, is Aaron Levenstein, an economist who wrote 50+ books yet is remembered for one thing only, a quote… “Statistics are like a bikini… what they reveal is suggestive, what they conceal… is vital…”
Yesterday a friend in the UK was ambulanced to A&E and released a couple of hours later. “It’s assumed coronavirus. They don’t test unless you are admitted.” She’s not even a statistic.