Covid ministers must stop confusing caution and fear – this is a state of terror

I’VE helped patients fight cancer for almost half a century and I’ve learned the hard way how useful hope is – and how futile hysteria is. 

If we all stay calm and sensible, including our politicians, we can move forward carefully and confidently to get ourselves out of this coronavirus mess. 

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Over the last fortnight I’ve watched with horror as measured analysis has been tossed aside in favour of unfounded claims.

For months we have had predictions of a second wave.

First it was the pictures of a few busy trains in London.

Then it was the infamous VE Day conga line.

More times than I care to remember I’ve listened as various commentators have incorrectly told us to wait two weeks and watch the infections skyrocket.

It’s so irresponsible to be continuing this campaign of fear with no evidence.

It’s true that over the past month or so recorded cases have been rising slightly.

But what you don’t see is the story behind the numbers.

In July there were a million more tests carried out than in June. It would be surprising if that level of testing did not uncover more cases.

And like our reporting of deaths, very often the number of new cases reported will include cases from previous weeks or months. Even with Public Health England’s flawed methodology, from a peak of 1,173 daily deaths in April, the figure on Wednesday was 65.

We also have to take into account the two different types of testing. 

“Pillar 1” tests are for patients with a clinical need and health and care workers — these are showing no signs for alarm.

 

Under control

“Pillar 2” is testing for the wider community, so if you have a persistent cough or have been in contact with a known case and have a symptom you will receive one of these.

The rise in the latter is what is partly causing the uptick. And because they are targeting localised spikes, more tests are coming back positive.

We have more outbreaks than we would like, but they are parts of the first wave slipping through rather than a second.

The spike in Leicester is largely under control with infections reducing, and there is no reason the same success cannot be repeated elsewhere.

It just requires people to show some common sense.

What is crucial is that if you have symptoms you must get tested.

If people are not coming forward then public health measures such as Test And Trace cannot work.

Public Health England’s ludicrous way of reporting deaths has not helped either.

Once its database flags up a patient as positive for the virus, then that means if they die later for any reason — an accident or cancer, for example — they are still counted as a virus death. 

We were promised an “urgent review” of this, but the erroneous numbers continue to be published.

We know from the more accurate ONS figures and numbers from hospitals that the death rate is still falling.

It’s the same for hospital admissions and patients in mechanical ventilation beds.

While a Covid vaccine is not available just yet, medicines and treatments that can significantly improve the outlook for victims of coronavirus definitely are. And we understand so much more about the virus than at the start of the pandemic — and who is likely to be more vulnerable. 

To be frank, the rhetoric coming from some in Government is so over the top — London being cut off, over-50s told to stay at home — it’s too much.

There is no distinction between caution and fear. 

The No 10 Behavioural Insights Team has a lot to answer for, in my view.

The slogan “Stay Home, Protect the NHS, Save Lives” was brilliant, but they clearly did not understand the forces they were playing with.

The number of people diagnosed with cancer in this country has fallen off a cliff.

Due to a reduction in GP and hospital visits, there will be tens of thousands of people who have developed the disease and do not even know it yet. People are still terrified. Are they really going to get an unusual lump checked out right now? I doubt it. I find it astonishing that so much scaremongering language is used with no regard for the impact it has. 

Some scientists report higher infection numbers as if they are more concerned about being proved right than they are about the future of the country. 

 

State of terror

All reasonable perspective has gone.

Is it acceptable if we manage to keep infections low but lose thousands of lives to cancer or other serious illnesses that have gone untreated? Of course not.

Keeping the country in a state of terror was always going to have deadly consequences.

And what of the economy? Years of hardship lie ahead. I regularly spend time in London and it’s still a ghost town. When Government financial support dries up, there will be lots of people struggling to put food on the table.

We owe it to our children to open up all places of education next month. 

The country’s mental health is on a knife-edge. Somehow we have got to find a balance.

We all need to be careful, keeping our distance and washing our hands.

But we don’t need to be relentlessly reminded of the fragility of our situation.

We need to quickly rediscover some perspective or thousands more lives will be lost to cancer and other serious illnesses. 

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