Ending The Lockdown
Some countries around the world, who have originally implemented a complete and total lockdown, have decided to either lift, or partially lift, said lockdown. Ghana is such a country. They'd lockdown effectively for a couple of weeks, studied the data, and decided that they didn't need such an extreme measure.
Every country is different. Even within large countries, like the United States, every state is different. What we presently have is the blunt instrument of social isolation, which has been implemented around the world. This is in the absence of comprehensive testing. Those that went in early and locked down are now reaping the benefits, which include the ability to ease up a little on restrictions.
Some places are now allowing people to go to the beach. This is the case on the Canary Islands. Some nations are now experimenting with opening up air travel but under very strict rules. Family visits are now permitted in countries like the Czech Republic - one of the countries that implemented the strictest lockdown regimes of all.
Here in the UK, we never really locked down. Yes, of course, the government said we should, and some people like myself did, but way too many people just didn't do it properly. Some, like some of my neighbours, totally ignored the directive. This is in addition to the fact that we were quite late to the game. As such, you can see that our curve is one of the worst in the world.
People talk about freedom. Can you think of a society more "free" than Iceland? If I wanted, I could probably arrange a meeting with the president of Iceland who is known for meeting with common folk regularly, including tourists. That country implemented one of the most efficient and thorough responses in the world.
Some might find it shocking that Iceland, despite having one of the highest percentages of infected, did not lock down their country. Why? Testing. It seems the people of Iceland understand and believe in science and data. Testing was permitted for everyone that wanted/needed to be tested, so they could identify pretty much everyone that had the virus, and isolate those folks. So they used the sharp instrument of quarantine, rather than the blunt instrument of lockdown.
People in many western countries, particularly in the United States of America, live under a false sense of "freedom". If you need a gun to protect your daily life, you're not free, you're at war.
In the UK, we're kind of somewhere in between Iceland and the United States. We think we're free, but we're far from it. We own nothing and our daily lives are subject to the whims of a few people who have inherited the ownership of everything. We don't need guns though, thankfully. Not even our regular police force does. What we have is surveillance.
Big Brother has been watching us way before it was cool. Since before the GPS trackers, spy cameras in our devices and the Internet of Things, the UK had been covered by a blanket of cameras - CCTV, from which you could monitor most people from the moment they stepped outside their door.
People here are up in arms (it's metaphoric here, we have no arms), about contact tracing to help curb the spread of COVID-19. The same people are happy to run FaceBook on their phone. What is FaceBook? Hahaha. What is Google Maps? Hahahaha. What is Zoom? LOL!!
Just some thoughts.
Peace & Love,
Adé