Do you feel secure by the theoretical dominance in the Coronavirus debate?

What is the price you think is worth paying to rid the country of COVID19?

Hello and welcome to my latest Podfilm.

In some ways this film is a cathartic exercise, because as the last week has demonstrated, the potential horrors that await us, are filled with misery, fear and sadness.

Like you, I watch as each day passes, at the procession of so-called leaders, offering their wisdom on the difficulties ahead.

For example, Trump offers his country with platitudes and tweets that are no longer amusing. In the meantime, people in the USA, from Congresswoman Katie Porter to the City of New York, are taking action and demonstrating that they will do what is necessary to protect the people. The Trump imagined scale of the crisis in the US, is clearly at odds with issues on the ground. For example, one person I know, just back from Seattle, reported that the streets were very quiet and that her return flight to the UK was only 25% occupied. In Ohio, whether you believe the figures or not, the State officials are warning that because they do not have access to testing kits, and based on reports they are getting, that they currently estimate that 100,000 people are infected with COVID19. 

In the UK, we have been carrying on as if everything is going to be OK, when clearly it is not. We hear a great deal about behavioural science, or should I say, the theory of behavioural science, but all you need to know is that people are panic-buying, whether that is a rational exercise or not, they are nonetheless panicking. Only a few days ago, we had the budget which was triumphantly celebrated in the media as signifying that austerity was over and the good times were going to roll.

The same papers celebrated that some £30bn was being put to one side to fund the Coronavirus. Well, forgive me for saying this and perhaps being a little ungrateful, but isn’t that what governments are supposed to do?

The budget or for that matter, Coronavirus, will not last as a perpetual screen for the issues that it masks, for example, brexit, the cost of brexit at £800m pw, failing high streets, flood-defences, climate change - they are all there, ultimately like the virus, waiting to return.

Another point of concern has been the media reporting, whether it is failure to probe and set out clearly Consumer Rights or simply repeating the mantra of Number 10. But don’t take my word for it, I have spoken with one broadcaster who has expressed privately to me their own deep concern about the output of the media and in particular the BBC. They had been approached by others who expressed the same concern, a concern that our media output is ill-informed and not really independent.

But for me, the most alarming thing to come out of this week has been the carefully considered phrase, ‘herd immunity’. It has been suggested as the long-term antidote to the return of the Coronavirus, in other words, let people get the virus and they will be toughened-up if you like, against reinfection. It is then suggested that this will then free up our precious health services to treat the more vulnerable.

But then, Boris Johnson wanted to level-up with the nation and advised us, in my view, in a most inappropriate way, that we should all stand by to lose loved ones!

Think about this: you are being asked to subscribe to the ‘herd immunity’ theory, but remember, virus’s do mutate so there’s no guarantee that you would survive at the next spread, and to pay the price of that survivability, we must all pay another more personal price. 

What is the price that is worth paying?

Is it 10 deaths, 500, 1000 or 1,000,000? Without any consultation, we are being asked as citizens to potentially accept that each of our family units should accept a death of a close relative.

Does that mean that I have to accept the death of my brother-in-law?

Does that mean I have to accept the death of a powerful campaigner?

Does that mean I have to accept the death of a business friend or even an opponent?

This is a deeply troubling and moral set of questions that should have at the least been war-gamed and not left alone to the theory of behavioural science.

I don’t want you to think that I have anything against behavioural science, because I haven’t; I definitely see the value in less critical areas. But I have sat in enough Westminster rooms to hear why this or that cannot be done, but we should adopt theoretical behaviour models as a way or means to achieve the end goals. I can tell you as a campaigner, I have never seen or been allowed access to these models to critique them. When I work across the International divide, I have even heard the same ‘theories’ being touted by some in the aviation industry on cabin air quality, but never to see the model they seek to rely on.

Am I worried, yes I am, I am worried for the country, its people and its industries, but not at any price.

I am worried for my family, some of whom work on the front line of the NHS and I realise just how unprepared the service is. If changes are being made to services, then it is down to those in our hospitals and GP practices who are rationalising and listening and learning from places such as China, Italy and the Republic of Ireland.

As a nation, at this point in time, in my opinion, we have been failed. Like Trump in America and now here, we are gifted with a ruling class whose skills lie below what is required. If you don’t believe me, then take the time out to watch the interviews with Jeremy Hunt and Rory Stewart, that should raise your alarm bells.

Maybe it's too late or maybe Boris Johnson will wake up and do what needs to be done, rather than treat the nation as some theoretical petri dish; I sincerely hope so.

(This is the script for the CreatingRipples™ PodFilm: Coronavirus: The problem with theories. You can watch Frank's PodFilm here)