The U.K. has been accused of having a “sluggish response to the Coronavirus pandemic” according to The Independent, and has been slammed by the World Health Organisation and scientists for their ‘wrong and dangerous’ Coronavirus strategy. Epidemiologist, William Hanage, describes the British government’s handling as “inexplicably choosing to encourage the flames, in the misguided notion that somehow they will be able to control them”.

On the 5th March, the U.K. confirmed their first Coronavirus related death and the number of recorded cases were 116. Unfortunately, by the same date our brothers and sisters in Italy had a recorded loss of 148 people. Boris Johnson addressed the nation an entire week later (12th March), after the COBRA meeting with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, where he stated “We’ve done what can be done to contain this disease and this has brought us valuable time. I want to be clear, this is the worst public health crisis for a generation”. He then goes on to say “It’s going to spread further. I must level with you, level with the British public, more families, many more families are going to lose loved ones before their time”.

At this point, Spain had thousands of confirmed cases and had already cancelled all sporting events as a social distancing measure. However a few days later, Liverpool played Atletico Madrid at home in Anfield, and Liverpool hosted thousands of Spanish fans during that period. How is it that if that same match took place in Madrid, it wouldn’t have went ahead due to the threat of infection spreading. Yet in England, where there were also confirmed cases, and allowing people to come into the country untested, they allowed the match to continue? This lead to an increase in the number of registered cases in Merseyside, which lies with the British government alone. Now, there are a number of 1,391 confirmed cases in the U.K, and so far we’ve already lost 35 people. The U.K. government spoke of a “herd immunity” plan, and are expecting 60% of the population to contract the Coronavirus. So realistically speaking, there’s nearly 67 million people in the U.K. and 60% of people they are expecting to catch the virus, is over 40 million people infected. Even at a death rate of 1%, that’s possibly 400 thousand deaths. (Italy has a population of nearly 61 million people, but regrettably has a Coronavirus related death rate of over 6%).

There’s been no action taken over social distancing measures, upcoming events, tracking of people entering the country and their health status, or advice for the elderly and vulnerable, all the while cancelling their own personal government meetings due to safety reasons. Health Secretary, Matt Hancock, appeared on radio and advised people to wash their hands for twenty seconds, which barely scratches the surface of advice needed from government officials during this time. The government has only added to the ever worsening confusion and uncertainty in this country, and as there’s no official advice given from British authorities to their citizens, this leads to a huge disconnect between the government and health care professionals which is forcing city councils, schools, university’s and businesses to come to their own decisions on how best to protect their people while the government ponders. Jeremy Corbyn is arguing for U.K. to follow France, and suspend all rent and mortgage payments which has lead to ease the financial pressures of French citizens during this unexpected time.

In 2018, The European Committee of Social Rights announced the U.K.’s statutory sick pay and protection for jobless and self employed people were in breach of their legal obligations under European Law (which is one of the legally binding parts to the Human Rights Convention – no big deal). In a report written by the committee, they claimed the British government’s provisions for sick and unemployed people were “manifestly inadequate” which has created a “discriminatory system that falls foul of international law”. Statutory sick pay in England has not increased or been amended in any way since this 2018 report, so it’s a fact our citizens are going into this pandemic behind the rest of Europe, in regards to the state easing financial pressures.

Today, I kid you not, Richard Branson’s Virgin Atlantic has asked the British government for a 7.5 billion tax payer payout to “support them through a potentially prolonged period of slumping revenue amid the Coronavirus pandemic” due to travel bans across the globe, aiming to tackle the virus. They also said they “plan to ground 75% of its fleet by 26th March” adding, “staff will be asked to take eight weeks unpaid leave”. It’s a shame how a billionaire who owns multiple islands and businesses is asking this, and that he intends to leave his nearly 8 thousand workers without pay during this crisis, while pocketing his loss of earnings. Virgin Atlantic already has a history of suing the NHS for a failed children’s service contract and having received multiple tax payer hand outs for his rail service. They are a billion pound company who pay no tax in this country, wanting to pocket money from the tax payer and I am absolutely sick of it. In the fifth richest country in the world where public services, NHS, education and our every day life is already harmfully underfunded at the hands of greed, let’s hope the government doesn’t bail Branson out – that will be one mistake too many for the tories, and I can see the British public having a lot to say about that. With the USA throwing 1.5 trillion payout to Wall Street in an effort to “calm investors’ worries about Coronavirus” which is the same amount of student debt in America, it’s clear to see capitalism and all it’s flaws, are failing and exposed. People are getting angry. What is it with this, ‘bail the banks, businesses and billionaires out with billions and trillions of tax payers money’ attitude? Yet when it comes to universal health care, housing the homeless, shortening the working week, increasing minimum wage, we are met with ‘wHeRe’S tHe MoNeY tO PaY FoR iT?!’

The thing that I’m most uncomfortable with in regards to the UK’s handling of Coronavirus, is the ending of the unnecessary laws and sanctions once embedded into our society, now ‘lifted’ for a while. Examples of this are the delaying of the BBC TV licence fee for over-75’s until August and shortening usual, controversial, five week wait for a Universal Credit payment down to just one week. These are of course welcomed, but we know they’ve had the power to do that for years, so they will get no Brownie points from me for basically doing the job they are paid to do, which is to advise the country and make life easier for their citizens. It’s only down to public pressure that the government finally implied they are likely to bring in restrictions on mass gatherings at some point during this week (a policy it has spent the past week downplaying and illegitimising by the way). It’s only down to criticism of a lack of transparency over their Coronavirus plans that Number 10 have now announced they will address the media every day to update and inform the country. As Labour MP, Dawn Butler tweeted “We shouldn’t have to drag him kicking and screaming to these decisions. A daily update is a basic step. Transparency, honesty, compassion are vital in this time of global crisis! No more secret briefings PM”.

On a personal note, I’ve seen a lot of people on social media say that mentioning the NHS already struggling, and going into this crisis already on it’s knees is “cheap political point scoring”. It’s not like somebody can take pride in pointing out the fact that our National Health Service has been underfunded for 10 years now, it’s our reality and truth, reflected in the state of our hospitals and health centres across the country. If the NHS was at its full capability and was properly funded, we wouldn’t be having problems like not having enough beds, needing millions more GP appointments, waiting time being the worst its ever been, staff shortages and hardly any resources to care for this outbreak. The government’s approach to attempting to work the virus around the NHS to avoid collapse for their own gains, in no way ensures our protection. Evidently, I don’t think our safety or best interests are a concern of theirs.