Virus inaction

Subject: Virus inaction 

Much has been made of Boris Johnson's decision to join the rest of the world and seek a safe harbour in accepting at last what is happening around him. At last he has climbed down from his assumption that by allowing the virus to spread, 'herd immunity' would limit the death toll to 250,000 - 350,000 - 500,000 which his experts were suggesting was an acceptable price to pay. Now he has succumbed to the call to stop assuming that a call for the general public to use its common sense would be enough and that the people would make the decision not to gather in pubs clubs cinema theatres or any places where entertainment is on offer, on their own. Close proximity mixing was seen to be crucial in the fight against the virus, it was a move that might clinch the battle and even though he had been brought struggling to the alter as a reluctant bride, at last he had uttered the words "I do".
In the same breath he said that he would never close the tube or public transport and that a general curfew was not being contemplated, and generally he avoided the thorny problem that whilst thousands of white collar workers can work from home, 70% of the workforce can't work from home and they are out each day using public transport which must be just as toxic as the pub.
There is simple no joined up thinking from Number 10 or from the management of the thousands of small and medium sized business's which are asked to carry on as normal. Contracts are enforced even though the contracts were envisaged before the virus came to light which creates the need for a reasonable reassessment as to whether there is still the need, or the urgency for the work to be completed on time. It's as if, in a surreal world the things we envisaged would still remain in tact, that the  time lines are still in place and have to be conformed to, that workers must submit to the economic consequences of being hired and fired if they voice their fears as if nothing has changed.
That grey underbelly of workers, the shelf packers, the cleaners, the production plant workers, the cameramen and the sound technician, the woman working on the till, the bus driver, the men and women working for the police and most importantly the workers in our care homes and those who daily go to work for the NHS are all at risk as we try to keep the show on the road. They are the forgotten piece in the Boris's jigsaw, they must chance their luck whilst the managers isolate themselves at home behind their computer screen.
It's a fact of life that firemen risk their lives in a way that we would be squeamish about, that police officers engage with that dark side of our city streets, threatened each shift with life threatening issues. We rarely put ourselves in their shoes on the assumption  that, as with our armed force personnel they signed up for it knowing full well the dangers. But now we are asking a 'minimum wage worker' possibly the mother of children  to shoulder the brunt of this exposure to the virus war that's unfurling.
The only responsible reaction of government is to give the new troops the equipment to fight the battle for us. In the NHS the protective garments seem shoddy, almost Heath Robinson compared to what is in use in Italy and Spain let alone China and South Korea.
Even masks are in short supply and it's scandalous to assume that we can't come up to the plate and meet their needs properly.
The other equally serious mismanagement issue is the lack of testing for the virus. In Korea they are testing people at the rate of 50,000 a day which gives them a real time picture of who has the virus and who doesn't. This Is crucial in combatting and isolating cases before they have time to transmit the virus but in this country we limit the testing to those who already show signs of having the virus. Again we are behind the game line hopelessly inadequate to forestall its spread, we dither, possibly at the cost of providing the test, always with an eye on the balance sheet, never on the true cost lying behind our inaction.