That is what people said about Johnson all along. He has no interests in detail he just likes the dramatic and th publicity pieces and leaves others up to mange things.

I would be interested in Cronus view about how with PPE the government could not be blamed for not preparing.

Why were they sending tones of PPE to China in February when they had already been warned by WHO about how serious this was.

Why did they not ramp up production of PPE rather than export it.

Hang on, we already knew Johnson hadn't attended the early COBRA meetings, [url=https://www.politicshome.com/news/article/boris-johnson-to-chair-emergency-cobra-meeting-on-coronavirus-outbreak[uthis isn't new or earth-shattering news.[/u[/url Should he have attended earlier? In hindsight, probably, although it's worth noting we only had 16 confirmed cases on 28th Feb, the day his first COBRA meeting was arranged and the WHO didn't classify CV19 as a pandemic until 11th March. Until late Feb outside of China and Asia numbers were still extremely low - indeed, on 21st Feb Italy had only 3 confirmed cases.

Of more interest is Gove's claim that the PM doesn't chair most COBRA meetings [url=https://www.forces.net/news/what-cobra-meeting-who-attends[u - which appears to be correct.[/u[/url Of course not attending does not mean not briefed.

We also need to consider these numbers in the context of previous pandemic alerts - SARS, MERS, etc - which had all turned out to be pretty limited in scope and disappeared almost as quickly as they arrived, despite the extreme WHO warnings. The science on CV19 - including the key R0 value - was still pretty sketchy in Jan/Feb (not helped by China masking the numbers), and I don't think most people, including many scientists, realised just how infectious and widespread CV19 would turn out to be.

As for PPE going to China, I can't answer, I haven't seen any verified reports, have you? Was it private PPE producers selling to China, or government stock? We do know China imported over 2 billion items of PPE while blocking exports. Either way I've said it enough times on here - the UK had a pandemic stockpile. This has been confirmed many times - indeed the [url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/12/revealed-value-of-uk-pandemic-stockpile-fell-by-40-in-six-years[uGrauniad had an odd whinge[/u[/url about it's depreciation only last week. This is why the main challenge to date has mostly been a question of distribution, not supply - although as time goes on the need for new stock has grown, hence we're seeing more and more imports.

If you're asking why, in February, the UK didn't produce billions of items of PPE - firstly, we don't have the capacity. The majority of PPE is produced overseas. Secondly, I suggest you follow the WHO timeline. They only reluctantly admitted human-to-human transmission on 22nd Jan and - again - didn't classify CV19 as a pandemic until 11th March. Once the numbers started to explode in late Feb/early March, PPE demand also exploded globally and many producers had stopped exports - China, India, Japan, South Korea, etc. According to the WHO, "severe and mounting disruption to the global supply of personal protective equipment – caused by rising demand, panic buying, hoarding and misuse".

To place some context, according to The Mirror on 14th Feb, [url=https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/coronavirus-boris-johnson-more-deadly-21497704[uBoris Johnson was more likely to kill you than the coronavirus[/u[/url.

Keep the bumbling baffoon well clear I say.
At least Raab looks the part and is coherent.

So, in summary, Boris keeps away from these meetings until we're really in the Schmitt ?

You rather conveniently down grade SARS, MERS etc but, this is al about getting the planning right for a major disease.
China did alert the world that they had a problem and at that point, surely, we should have been getting crisis plans absolutely ready.

The way that you describe the sequence of events, we would start building aircraft carriers when the first bombs are dropped.
If anything, that previous outbreaks of disease, which never materialised into major outbreaks, should have served as warnings.

Either way, with the benefit of hindsight, we know that the UK was slow in getting up to speed and perhaps we should ignore the headlines in the Mirror, which although at the opposite end of the political spectrum, are certainly no worse than the Mail.

It will only be a few days before they have pictures of Boris coming to the rescue on a white stallion, after all, he loves a good photo opportunity.

When they start relaxing the restrictions do you think the Tories will buy stocks and shares in the industries that they will open -2 months after or straight away - five minutes ago before anyone else knows?

I can only assume you're being deliberately obtuse and ignorant, given you're certainly not as stupid as that post makes you sound.

- We had a pandemic stockpile (your aircraft carrier). I'm not sure what about this you lot are failing to understand? Am I spelling it incorrectly or inadvertently using a different language?
- The initial issue was that the PPE supply chain was catered to deliver to 226 NHS trusts. Overnight, it was suddenly required to provide PPE to over 58,000 care homes, GP surgeries, hospices and community care organisations. Upscaling took time and required army and expert assistance.
- Pandemic plans and models already existed via the Scientific Advisory Group on Pandemic Influenza and its sub-group, the Scientific Pandemic Influenza group on Modelling (SPI-M) in partnership with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC). Did you really think this sort of planning didn't already take place? We have a plan for the US invading the UK, ffs.
- But - you can't implement a plan or model the likely spread until you know the nature of the virus and have at least some scientific evidence. Even now, there are many unknowns about this virus as it's completely new.
- Until early March the numbers outside China and South Korea were still low.
- CV19 therefore wasn't classified as a pandemic by the WHO until 11th March and we still didn't know how quickly the numbers would rise.
- Greater minds than you or I and Boris Johnson are steering the UK's response, which was clearly explained as a four phase plan to progress as the numbers grew.

One of the main issues facing the UK that we are all ignoring is actually us; our behaviour and response to the lockdown - primarily the inability of large sections of British society to pay attention and follow instructions.
There are STILL thousands of people ignoring government orders and spreading the virus, and each time it spreads adds weeks. Societies such as China, South Korea, Japan and Germany are far more compliant and disciplined, and frankly have far fewer 'd'ckhead' elements. We demanded a lockdown - we got one. Then the media and left wing immediately started complaining about police enforcement, whining about a 'police state', and demanding a plan for coming out of the lockdown - all of which sends completely the wrong signals to those who already believe the are above the law and whose sense of arrogance entitles them to behave as they like. We constantly ask 'can I do this, can I do that' - it seems we cannot simply stay at home and shut the fck up for a couple of months.

I'm sure you'll find that paragraph outrageous - the usual 'how dare you blame the public' blah blah. But that fact is whatever direction the government takes, too many 4rseholes are ignoring it, adding to the crisis, and we all have our part to play.

actually, cannot be bothered

We are doing our bit it is the government that is not keeping up to their side of the deal. To be able to exit the lockdown we once again need the Government to reach their testing limit and have sufficient PPE, if they fail which current performance suggest they will, dare they go to the country and say you need to continue because we have failed. The other problem they face is that we are seeing other EU countries coming out of Lockdown the pressure will build on the Public’s will to continue for a further period. The Government can only hang onto the NHS coattails for so long before the public realise that what the NHS have done is little to do with the government.
I wonder since being elected PM how many days has he actually been in Parliament compared to the number of days away on holiday. London had riots, he was the mayor and on holiday, We had floods he was on holiday because he did not want to get in the way of the rescue efforts, not the same prior to the election of course.

Hi Boris.

I agree with YOUR post.
However, it was during the daily Coronavirus updates, where our government spokesmen, plus Patel

assured everyone watching that there was no problem with supply, only an issue with distribution - you do remember that, dont you ?
We were then told that "everybody hade enough PPE but, some weren't using it correctly and that it was THIS that had caused some shortages - again, you must remember this.

Although there has been an admission that the situation has been challenging, there is still no admission of ANY shortages, despite some hospitals and especially care homes, clearly not having the right numbers and or the right types of PPE.

As for the lockdown and people complying, personally, I think that the vast, vast majority are doing ok.

There are people out walking, taking exercise that would usually be happy to be in front of the TV but, overall, I dont think that people are doing too badly.

We are of course, only in the first stage of this, trying to "flatten the curve" to enable the NHS to cope.
What could and should happen next is difficult to imagine.

There are 100,000 people furloughed, 1000's laid off and businesses collapsing already and the exit, although not anything like in terms of loss of life, will adversely affect 1,000,000's of the population.

You rightly point out that some other nations people will be far more compliant and accepting of their fete than "us" and you only have to glance "over the pond" to see what may be happening here quite soon - thankfully our social care and benefits system, although a long way from perfect, is streets ahead of them but, many, many tough years lay ahead, for all of us

Nothing wrong with a furtive imagination?


The closest that pudding would come is a donkey on Blackpool beach whilst adorning a [ikiss me quick[/i hat.
And then the eejit would probably end up on his @rse in the sand.

I do. What he said was there was "enough PPE to go around, but only if it’s used in line with our guidance." Guidance which is very detailed and very specific for very good reason.

As he explained (but which is ignored), this is entirely in line with WHO guidance, which called for the "rational and appropriate use of PPE in healthcare settings". There is a specific guideance to "[url=https://apps.who.int/iris/bitstream/handle/10665/331215/WHO-2019-nCov-IPCPPE_use-2020.1-eng.pdfEnsure PPE use is rationalized and appropriate[/url." (pdf)


They have, many times, admitted issues and delays with distribution. A sudden increase from 226 delivery locations to 58,000+ will do that. At that time and until the last few days we haven't had a shortage of supply in the country so why would they admit shortages when the problem is distribution - something they have clarified and admitted to several times.

However - I do expect we will start to see genuine gaps as the existing UK pandemic stockpile diminishes and the global shortage and disruption to supply lines bite hard. We've seen several shipments from China turn out to be junk, and a shipment from Turkey delayed a few days at a critical time. Locally sourced supplies will help but this is a global problem, hence guidance is shifting and reusing items where they can be safely cleaned and reused is now recommended as an option of last resort.


I think you underestimate the numbers. There are likely to be more than 9 million furloughed, many tens of thousands have already lost jobs and thousands of businesses have already gone, with more to come.

My company has gone from around £35m turnover per month to probably £100k. I don't know as I've been on furlough for 3 weeks (after a promotion and 30% pay rise in January

). The government scheme has saved my job and around 180 of my colleagues until at least 1st July and then we can only hope things are picking up. If the government are still ordering a lockdown at that point the furlough scheme will again have to be extended further.

I agree, the vast majority are doing well. But I still see loads of road traffic, large numbers of people out, gangs of teens, families gathering for BBQs and whatever. And I've seen dozens of well-meaning social media posts such as [i"so proud of <insert child>, she's delivered <insert number> of <insert item> around the <insert community/location>"[/i. That's lovely Karen, but wtf - you're in the middle of a global pandemic under government instruction to stay the fck at home, not to be taking your offspring out to potentially distribute the virus across your community. Engage your brain, Karen.

Today's numbers are a vast improvement and we appear to be past the peak although it's not wise to jump to conclusions too early. That said, we do appear to be going into the longer, slowly declining part of the 'curve'. At no point has NHS capacity been exceeded, which was the main goal of the strategy. Either way it's still far too soon to think about emerging from the lockdown.

There's a lot of stock being placed in a possible vaccine at the [url=https://www.ovg.ox.ac.uk/news/covid-19-vaccine-developmentOxford Vaccine Group and Jenner Institute[/url, with scientists boldly claiming they already know it works. If that's the case we could see it being distributed in a matter of months rather than years. Let's hope that's the case.