Sunday Blog 28: Test Track and Trace

This government has a lot of problems piling up. There are pressing issues with the economy, Brexit and above all, still, Covid.

There is now a mounting anxiety at worst of a second wave and at best a series of regional, local and sectional lock downs. There are high hopes for a vaccine and reports are good, but even the optimists warn this will not be tomorrow. Maybe not the day after either.

So the return of a restricted normality and a semi-functioning economy depends above all upon the success of the test track and trace system, which Boris, in one of his idiot one liners, described as world beating. It works, but not well and according to almost all the epidemiologists and public health professionals not under the control of the Cummings Downing St machine, not nearly well enough.

If I had  been in government and someone had come to me and said the solution to track and trace was to outsource it to Centrica and put Dido Harding in charge, I would have upbraided them for an unfunny joke on a deadly issue in very poor taste.

But I am not in government. And those who are, with a few exceptions, are simply not up to the challenge. Especially Boris. He is always talking of the ‘right thing at the right time’. To the misfortune of us all it is now very clear he is the wrong person at the worst time. To be in charge of anything. Especially our country.