Politicians of different persuasions, academics (both reputable and not so) and journalistic hacks are weighing in on their perspective of the only way to deal with reducing the spread of COVID. Not only can they not all be right (many of the views are diametrically positioned between the extreme isolation and herd approaches), the simple fact is that none of them can be right; they can hypothesize, but epidemiology is actually irrelevant. Most of them know it, but cannot mention the very large elephant in the room – peoples’ behaviour.

The current lockdown (November 2020) is based, as have been previous attempts, to seek to reduce transmission by minimising disjoint incidents of personal contact, to drop the key R ratio below 1. However, the plan is predicated on the populace at large actually complying with the procedures and restrictions and it’s patently clear to them that this has not (and probably will not) happen. Boris and chums just have to bite their tongues and take flak.

The Daily Mail frequently print pictures (see above as an example) of drunken, maskless young people (often students), not socially distancing, willfully violating governmental edicts seeking to protect the populate in general. Although that is the case (and partially driven by the fact that they perceive the risk from COVID to them is low), they nevertheless are potentially likely to transmit this to more vulnerable members of society that they come in to contract with.

However, Grumpy understands their hormonally driven dismissal of the pandemic, but there is another driver; that is that they see all levels of the establishment, ‘celebs’ and others choosing to demonstrate their disagreement with the ‘reduce R’ approach. At the top of this list (ignoring the deranged Peter Hitchens), in Grumpy’s mind, is the selfish, arrogant, geriatric Lord Sumption. As Grumpy pointed out elsewhere, somebody has to drive the bus and make decisions, and everyone else is a passenger. What Sumption has chosen to ignore when he excoriates the Executive (in a manner which is extreme hyperbole) is that they were elected as the bus driver.