In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK.
Because we had a government too scared about people in the media whinging about their curtailed skiing trips
True - see Kay Burley's trip to South Africa as another example.
But they also have the globalised mindset that restricting travel is anathema to them.
Maybe I haven't left enough time for all the goodun's to come to the surface. But it does seem telling though that not one anti Brexit person has said they'd criticise the EU if they did block vaccine delivery. Even hypothetically.
That's not going to be a political decision. If it occurs it'll be a logistics SNAFU.
Oh, I doubt that there'll be any vaccine delay. But it has been tweet-threatened on here by tweet-president ScottP. I wouldn't normally get so worked up by something so small ( except 61 seconds being minutes, 61 minutes being hours, 25 hours being days, 8 days being weeks, 32 days (or 29?) being months or 13 months being years), but just occasionally I get into fighting a narrow point!
I am a former Remainer, and it would be immoral for any EU nation, or the EU to withhold Boris' Belgian made vaccine, just because they hate us.
It is also immoral if the vaccine gets held up because of Johnson's total ineptitude.
Are any of the antiBrexiters here antiBrexit and brave enough to say that we deserve it for leaving the EU if the EU decides to block our vaccine supplies?
Or any sensible enough to say that they'd be furious at the EU for that kind of idiocy, however they feel about Brexit?
I’ll pass on your patriotism/loyalty tests if that’s okay. No one has suggested such a thing and the Government claims it has contingency plans in place in case of disruption. Your anger at the side that lost when you are on the verge of getting a everything you wanted is sinister.
Scott has posted a tweet saying that our vaccine supply might be delayed because of this latest covid strain. The supply we need can happen with virtually zero risk of new strain transmission. If the EU or any constituent countries block our vaccine supply because of it, I'd consider that an act of war. I seriously doubt it could ever happen, but the tweet suggested it could.
You won. Get over it. This is what you voted for. We can’t force another country to supply us with something we don’t have. We can trade for it sure but we can’t force a supply. We can’t declare war on a NATO country (which most EU counties are) as we would automatically be at war with the whole alliance. We are also strategically outflanked by the EU to our east and west. So if something they do interrupts the supply of something they make we are just going to have to live with it. It’s life I’m afraid.
So you're defending the EU if they block our vaccine supplies.
Remainiac No. 2.
They've specifically exempted vaccine supplies.
I thought they would, which is why I said about blocking it that "I seriously doubt it could ever happen", but it's certainly been implied that it could. And people insinuating that our vaccines supplies are at threat for political reasons should definitely STFU
Surely the hypothetical is that supply could be affected for logistical reasons, not political reasons.
Where do you think the supply might be slowed, between us and the EU?
What if there are problems supplying the factories and they can't manufacture enough doses?
Would either side block those supplies being prioritised and provided through our empty airports?
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
Grant Shapps has been the absolute worst this pandemic.
True.
But there don't seem to be any politicians demanding proper border control.
It seems to be some weird UK politician mutation that the issue is not discussed.
Maybe I haven't left enough time for all the goodun's to come to the surface. But it does seem telling though that not one anti Brexit person has said they'd criticise the EU if they did block vaccine delivery. Even hypothetically.
That's not going to be a political decision. If it occurs it'll be a logistics SNAFU.
Oh, I doubt that there'll be any vaccine delay. But it has been tweet-threatened on here by tweet-president ScottP. I wouldn't normally get so worked up by something so small ( except 61 seconds being minutes, 61 minutes being hours, 25 hours being days, 8 days being weeks, 32 days (or 29?) being months or 13 months being years), but just occasionally I get into fighting a narrow point!
This was the tweet Scott posted. Where is the threat?
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
We bloody should have stopped flights from Covid ravaged Italy, Spain and France, and flights from Covid- Central, New York, oh and Wuhan.
I don't blame any EU nations or Andrew Cuomo for shutting us down. We should have done the same to them when we needed to.
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
We bloody should have stopped flights from Covid ravaged Italy, Spain and France, and flights from Covid- Central, New York, oh and Wuhan.
I don't blame any EU nations or Andrew Cuomo for shutting us down. We should have done the same to them when we needed to.
You live and learn. If you aren't the UK government of course.
The only thing that matters now is getting people vaccinated as quickly as possible. Let's hope it doesn't take more than 3 or 4 months to vaccinate the vast majority of people in the vulnerable categories.
Re: RAF transports assets in Belgium mentioned earlier. There are none. The Royal Chair Force transport fleet is based at Brize and Lyneham with occasional dets to the Falklands.
It won't be a problem I wouldn't have thought as it just needs diplomatic clearance and ground assistance from BAF who are (usually) very professional and helpful.
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
We bloody should have stopped flights from Covid ravaged Italy, Spain and France, and flights from Covid- Central, New York, oh and Wuhan.
I don't blame any EU nations or Andrew Cuomo for shutting us down. We should have done the same to them when we needed to.
I really struggled to get my oldies to take precautions in March.
They were convinced there couldn't be a problem as the government were still allowing flights from China, Iran and Italy.
Maybe I haven't left enough time for all the goodun's to come to the surface. But it does seem telling though that not one anti Brexit person has said they'd criticise the EU if they did block vaccine delivery. Even hypothetically.
That's not going to be a political decision. If it occurs it'll be a logistics SNAFU.
Oh, I doubt that there'll be any vaccine delay. But it has been tweet-threatened on here by tweet-president ScottP. I wouldn't normally get so worked up by something so small ( except 61 seconds being minutes, 61 minutes being hours, 25 hours being days, 8 days being weeks, 32 days (or 29?) being months or 13 months being years), but just occasionally I get into fighting a narrow point!
This was the tweet Scott posted. Where is the threat?
You replied by saying it would be "pretty much a declaration of war".
I said (definitely raising the stakes somewhat from that one of Scott's tweets) that if the EU or constituent nations blocked our vaccine supply (which is the only way I can imagine it being delayed) that it would be like a declaration of war.
I also said that I doubt it would happen. I called on anti brexit people to either attack or defend this hypothetical and extremely unlikely EU action. When I started writing this post we were 2-2.
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
We bloody should have stopped flights from Covid ravaged Italy, Spain and France, and flights from Covid- Central, New York, oh and Wuhan.
I don't blame any EU nations or Andrew Cuomo for shutting us down. We should have done the same to them when we needed to.
You live and learn. If you aren't the UK government of course.
Err ... airports are devolved aren't they?
If the Welsh or Scottish Government had wished to stop incoming flights to Wales or Scotland, or test everyone coming in, I think it is within their remit.
another_richard makes a good point.
It seems to have become a mysterious article of faith across the UK political spectrum that travelling thousands of miles to infect others is an inalienable human right.
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
If this finally gets the airports closed down, and a moratorium on all the unnecessary air travel, it is a very good thing.
I think in March 2020, the brainless pb.com skiing community were heading out for their skiing holidays.
I definitely remember one Weapons Grade Idiot bragging about it on pb.com at the time.
Come, come with your Guardianista skiers. We had people on here gaming their summer holiday destination to avoid quarantining. First Spain then Portugal then Croatia, etc, etc.
We are an island, we could have kept everyone out unless they were driving a lorry or prepared to swim here.
Re: RAF transports assets in Belgium mentioned earlier. There are none. The Royal Chair Force transport fleet is based at Brize and Lyneham with occasional dets to the Falklands.
It won't be a problem I wouldn't have thought as it just needs diplomatic clearance and ground assistance from BAF who are (usually) very professional and helpful.
The A400M was practising landings into DSA (Finningley) and Norwich last week. DSA would be an ideal place to freight it in for the North of England (and was used in the same way for PPE when we had a PPE panic, although that was mostly civilian Jumbos).
If someone had told you a year ago that we would be where we are now you would not have believed them, but if they had proven it you would have panicked. The economy wrecked and getting worse, a mutant killer virus loose, Brexit still unsigned. But instead today we just shrug. Strange days.
I do not think many of us just shrug
This is by far the worst crisis since the war with threat to life, health and the economy
The way out will be long and complex and will test all politicians for years to come
I am genuinely upset and want to see a deal with the EU and I would like Boris to invite a GONU to include Starmer and Sturgeon
We are far too divided and we need to come together across the political divide
Maybe hope over expectation but there is nothing wrong in hope
Say something supportive of Drakeford.
Drakeford's all right -- he has a dusty, woebegone, academic charm about him & his spoken Welsh is truly excellent.
The reason why Drakeford seems to get a lot of criticism on this blog is because --- this blog teems with English Labour Party supporters busy telling us that all would be better under a Labour Govt, and that doesn't seem to accord with the reality in Wales.
COVID is an example. Johnson messed up. But, then so did Drakeford.
I have some sympathy with them both -- these are gruesome times.
Both are damned if they do and damned if they don't. However, the results speak for themselves.
I don't believe one can extrapolate a Westminster Labour Government's potential performance from Mark Drakeford either
The last sentence is true. SKS is not Drakeford, and extrapolation is not entirely fair.
However, if the Labour Party wants to demonstrate it can run things well, then it has a golden opportunity to show us by running Wales well.
Unhappily, I agree with YDoethur's assessment the other day.
YDoethur wrote: "Wales suffers from systemic problems in public services, rampant corruption & cronyism and a fragile, unstable economy."
It is hard not to blame Labour for some of that, given a generation has passed and Labour have been continuously in power in Cardiff. And for over ten years of that time, Labour were also in power in Westminster.
To be clear, I want to see Wales prosper. I'd vote for any party that convinced me they could make Wales prosper.
It cannot prosper, or be judged correctly, with one hand tied behind it's back by Westminster. Whatever party were in power would have the same problem.
Then we must free Wales' hand.
Wales voted Leave just like England and has its own Senedd already, I am sick to death of whinging Nats trying to wreck our country, it is time Boris slapped them down with an iron fist!!
I just have a horrible nightmarish, feeling that one day HYUFD will be a Welsh Tory MP.
He has exactly the kind of tenuous association with Wales that Virginia Crosbie MP has -- she was borne and bred in Essex before accidentally discovering opening her atlas and discovering where Ynys Mon is.
Well one Epping Forest cllr is now the Tory candidate for Islwyn for the Senedd next year and of course we all know how close Mark Reckless and Neil Hamilton are to Wales, I believe Hamilton also went to Aber
I think he was also born in Abergavenny. I may be wrong.
Unfortunately, you are correct, he was born & bred in Wales. His father worked for the NCB is some managerial capacity.
But the name Hamilton is certainly not Welsh. Our friend wiki says:
"The name Hamilton probably originated in the village of Hamilton, Leicestershire, England, but bearers of that name became established in the 13th century in Lanarkshire, Scotland. The town of Hamilton, South Lanarkshire was named after the family some time before 1445. Contemporary Hamiltons are either descended from the original noble family, or descended from people named after the town".
I thought "Hamilton" derives from "high mill town".
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
If this finally gets the airports closed down, and a moratorium on all the unnecessary air travel, it is a very good thing.
I think in March 2020, the brainless pb.com skiing community were heading out for their skiing holidays.
I definitely remember one Weapons Grade Idiot bragging about it on pb.com at the time.
Come, come with your Guardianista skiers. We had people on here gaming their summer holiday destination to avoid quarantining. First Spain then Portugal then Croatia, etc, etc.
Yeah, yeah, that is true as well. It is not just the Guardian readers that love their air travel. The Mail and the Sun do too.
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
We bloody should have stopped flights from Covid ravaged Italy, Spain and France, and flights from Covid- Central, New York, oh and Wuhan.
I don't blame any EU nations or Andrew Cuomo for shutting us down. We should have done the same to them when we needed to.
You live and learn. If you aren't the UK government of course.
Err ... airports are devolved aren't they?
If the Welsh or Scottish Government had wished to stop incoming flights to Wales or Scotland, or test everyone coming in, I think it is within their remit.
another_richard makes a good point.
It seems to have become a mysterious article of faith across the UK political spectrum that travelling thousands of miles to infect others is an inalienable human right.
Interesting you are replying to Dixiedean, with respect to your last paragraph, he was discussing Robert Nozick's philosophy only last night.
In March a lot of European countries had large numbers of Covid-19 cases when we had hardly any cases, but we didn't stop flights from those places — like Milan for example. I'm not sure why we didn't stop those flights at the time, but if the reason was that we were somehow hoping that if the situation was reversed they would do the same thing we were wrong. I remember a report from March of someone from Italy arriving at Heathrow from Milan and being utterly baffled that there were no checks at all on the passengers on his flight despite the fact that the Milan area was the European epicentre of the epidemic at that time. When the situation is reversed they quite rightly do the correct thing and stop all travel from the UK, but it goes to show how stupid we were in March and April.
If this finally gets the airports closed down, and a moratorium on all the unnecessary air travel, it is a very good thing.
I think in March 2020, the brainless pb.com skiing community were heading out for their skiing holidays.
I definitely remember one Weapons Grade Idiot bragging about it on pb.com at the time.
Come, come with your Guardianista skiers. We had people on here gaming their summer holiday destination to avoid quarantining. First Spain then Portugal then Croatia, etc, etc.
Yeah, yeah, that is true as well. It is not just the Guardian readers that love their air travel. The Mail and the Sun do too.
Whereas I am happy to stay in Wales all year long
...and you could even go skiing at Pembrey Country Park.
Maybe I haven't left enough time for all the goodun's to come to the surface. But it does seem telling though that not one anti Brexit person has said they'd criticise the EU if they did block vaccine delivery. Even hypothetically.
That's not going to be a political decision. If it occurs it'll be a logistics SNAFU.
Oh, I doubt that there'll be any vaccine delay. But it has been tweet-threatened on here by tweet-president ScottP. I wouldn't normally get so worked up by something so small ( except 61 seconds being minutes, 61 minutes being hours, 25 hours being days, 8 days being weeks, 32 days (or 29?) being months or 13 months being years), but just occasionally I get into fighting a narrow point!
This was the tweet Scott posted. Where is the threat?
You replied by saying it would be "pretty much a declaration of war".
I said (definitely raising the stakes somewhat from that one of Scott's tweets) that if the EU or constituent nations blocked our vaccine supply (which is the only way I can imagine it being delayed) that it would be like a declaration of war.
I also said that I doubt it would happen. I called on anti brexit people to either attack or defend this hypothetical and extremely unlikely EU action. When I started writing this post we were 2-2.
It's pretty much war
And disagreeing with your premise is pretty much treason?
The A400M was practising landings into DSA (Finningley) and Norwich last week. DSA would be an ideal place to freight it in for the North of England (and was used in the same way for PPE when we had a PPE panic, although that was mostly civilian Jumbos).
Yeah, it'll be ideal until something goes tech. There is no RAF engineering at Finningley now.
I spent a summer with 6FTS at Finningley when I was at university. They let me fly a Jetstream despite the complete lack of any appropriate clearance or currency and the Doncaster nightlife was a bit of an eye opener for a boarding school boy.
If you have a prime account they have a 2 episode (hour each) on the secrets of quantum physics that I quite enjoyed. If you like science that is
A couple of years ago I did a course from Stanford on Reservoir Geomechanics which is one of my areas of expertise as a consultant. The course was looking at the theoretical maths behind the practical applications and was absolutely brilliant - if a little taxing on the maths front.
I later did one of their course on Nuclear terrorism for a bit of fun and it was fascinating if somewhat terrifying. It was run by Dr William Perry who was Clinton's Secretary of Defence.
Hmmm not sure I would want to google the latter in case it was misunderstood
"But scientists say B.1.1.7 may already be much more widespread. Dutch researchers have found it in a sample from one patient taken in early December, Dutch health minister Hugo de Jonge wrote in a letter to Parliament today. They will try to find out how the patient became infected and if there are related cases. Other countries may well have the variant as well, says epidemiologist William Hanage of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; the United Kingdom may just have picked it up first because that country has the most sophisticated SARS-CoV-2 genomic monitoring in the world. Many countries have little or no sequencing."
The price of honesty. This mutation is all over Europe already, they just don't know it yet. Countries need a severe lockdown now and to close all borders immediately. Everyone going home for Christmas with this variant out there is going to end in disaster for the whole of Europe.
This article doesn't quite suggest this, though. In fact the overall tone seems to be somewhat querying some of the public assumptions about the new strain so far.
The people who have gone off the deep end on this COVID denial stuff is quite staggering. Of course we expected Piers Corbyn to go all Alex Jones, but some of the much more mainstream people is rather mind blowing e.g. Maajid Nawaz.
The people who have gone off the deep end on this COVID denial stuff is quite staggering. Of course we expected Piers Corbyn to go all Alex Jones, but some of the much more mainstream people is rather mind blowing e.g. Maajid Nawaz.
It's also quite amazing how they can get away with saying it is scaremongering without showing any actual evidence that it is only scaremongering.
Are any of the antiBrexiters here antiBrexit and brave enough to say that we deserve it for leaving the EU if the EU decides to block our vaccine supplies?
Or any sensible enough to say that they'd be furious at the EU for that kind of idiocy, however they feel about Brexit?
I’ll pass on your patriotism/loyalty tests if that’s okay. No one has suggested such a thing and the Government claims it has contingency plans in place in case of disruption. Your anger at the side that lost when you are on the verge of getting a everything you wanted is sinister.
Scott has posted a tweet saying that our vaccine supply might be delayed because of this latest covid strain. The supply we need can happen with virtually zero risk of new strain transmission. If the EU or any constituent countries block our vaccine supply because of it, I'd consider that an act of war. I seriously doubt it could ever happen, but the tweet suggested it could.
You won. Get over it. This is what you voted for. We can’t force another country to supply us with something we don’t have. We can trade for it sure but we can’t force a supply. We can’t declare war on a NATO country (which most EU counties are) as we would automatically be at war with the whole alliance. We are also strategically outflanked by the EU to our east and west. So if something they do interrupts the supply of something they make we are just going to have to live with it. It’s life I’m afraid.
So you're defending the EU if they block our vaccine supplies.
Remainiac No. 2.
They've specifically exempted vaccine supplies.
Why does that actually make any difference? Any “exemptions” only affect incoming traffic to France - they’re not preventing travel out. The issue is the indirect effect of not being able to get back preventing travel in the first place. Which would presumably affect lorry vaccine transporters as much as anything else. Is the EU currently importing vaccines from the U.K.?
Maybe I haven't left enough time for all the goodun's to come to the surface. But it does seem telling though that not one anti Brexit person has said they'd criticise the EU if they did block vaccine delivery. Even hypothetically.
That's not going to be a political decision. If it occurs it'll be a logistics SNAFU.
Oh, I doubt that there'll be any vaccine delay. But it has been tweet-threatened on here by tweet-president ScottP. I wouldn't normally get so worked up by something so small ( except 61 seconds being minutes, 61 minutes being hours, 25 hours being days, 8 days being weeks, 32 days (or 29?) being months or 13 months being years), but just occasionally I get into fighting a narrow point!
This was the tweet Scott posted. Where is the threat?
You replied by saying it would be "pretty much a declaration of war".
I said (definitely raising the stakes somewhat from that one of Scott's tweets) that if the EU or constituent nations blocked our vaccine supply (which is the only way I can imagine it being delayed) that it would be like a declaration of war.
I also said that I doubt it would happen. I called on anti brexit people to either attack or defend this hypothetical and extremely unlikely EU action. When I started writing this post we were 2-2.
Interesting charting of the genetic variations of the COVID virus - I don't know whether they haven't got the data, or it hasn't been published, or something else - but the UK has reported 1547 variations, the USA, 306, France 47 and Germany ("the UK strain isn't here")- 6:
The UK has reported 86% of the variants found in Europe....
According to the FT, the UK and Denmark have the ‘best genetic sequencing’ in the world. I have no idea if or why this is true. But it is intriguing that these are the two countries to react like scalded cats to potential mutations. In Denmark they slaughtered the mink. In the UK we have very sensibly kept out the French, who were clearly trying to steal our world-beating mutation in wheels of Dorset Camembert
Notably Denmark (54) have identified almost as many as China (56). There are some striking "small country' players like Singapore (36) and New Zealand (46).....Belgium meanwhile has 1...
As always, there's a price to being honest. We could easily have just said nothing and alerted no one. Instead we did the right thing and now we're being punished for it while nations who very obviously also have the same virus mutation keep quiet and silently spread it because their borders are still open.
There's basically no value in honesty.
The one single thing that our PM might have been useful for already knowing
Comments
But they also have the globalised mindset that restricting travel is anathema to them.
It is also immoral if the vaccine gets held up because of Johnson's total ineptitude.
But there don't seem to be any politicians demanding proper border control.
It seems to be some weird UK politician mutation that the issue is not discussed.
https://twitter.com/sima_kotecha/status/1340770915488043010
You replied by saying it would be "pretty much a declaration of war".
I don't blame any EU nations or Andrew Cuomo for shutting us down. We should have done the same to them when we needed to.
If you aren't the UK government of course.
The bad news is that we've got to get through the next 2-4 weeks...
It won't be a problem I wouldn't have thought as it just needs diplomatic clearance and ground assistance from BAF who are (usually) very professional and helpful.
They were convinced there couldn't be a problem as the government were still allowing flights from China, Iran and Italy.
I also said that I doubt it would happen. I called on anti brexit people to either attack or defend this hypothetical and extremely unlikely EU action. When I started writing this post we were 2-2.
It's pretty much war
If the Welsh or Scottish Government had wished to stop incoming flights to Wales or Scotland, or test everyone coming in, I think it is within their remit.
another_richard makes a good point.
It seems to have become a mysterious article of faith across the UK political spectrum that travelling thousands of miles to infect others is an inalienable human right.
We are an island, we could have kept everyone out unless they were driving a lorry or prepared to swim here.
Whereas I am happy to stay in Wales all year long
I spent a summer with 6FTS at Finningley when I was at university. They let me fly a Jetstream despite the complete lack of any appropriate clearance or currency and the Doncaster nightlife was a bit of an eye opener for a boarding school boy.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9073767/Professor-Neil-Ferguson-key-role-Boris-Johnsons-dramatic-U-turn-Christmas.html
https://twitter.com/toadmeister/status/1340777002543050754
Though you do wonder how many of these “shutting the stable door” countries already have the variant - just don’t do the testing to identify it.