Covid-19

The global pandemic in 2020.

Covid: a comma, not a full stop

Solidarity 626 and 627 were the first issues since early 2020 to have no articles on Covid. That was mostly was to do with the pressure on space from coverage on Ukraine, and only partly to do with a slight pause in Covid developments in Britain. It's only a slight pause, not an end. Case counts and hospitalisation have been rising again, since late February, and by now substantially. Numbers in mechanical ventilation beds have levelled after falling steadily since early November (they didn't rise with Omicron). This may be no drama. Across the European Union, as Covid curbs have been...

To block pandemics, keep ecosystems healthy

According to a new scientific study , current official plans to prevent future pandemics like Covid-19 are unlikely to be successful. International bodies such as the WHO, the World Bank, and G20 are calling for increased surveillance after viruses “spill over” from other species to humans to generate so-called “zoonotic” diseases. But often that may be like bolting the door to the stable after the horse has bolted. With a virus as transmissible as SARS-Cov-2, even stringent control measures will not prevent rapid spread. The authors of the new study claim is more effective and cheaper to try...

Covid: defend and extend sick pay!

Rather than just complain about the Tories’ announcement on 21 February repealing Covid measures, the labour movement should launch a campaign to win good sick pay for all, permanently; to restore NHS funding and repeal privatisation; to bring social care into the public sector with NHS-level pay and conditions for staff; and to institute workers’ control of workplace safety. Curbs designed to slow virus spread have been eased off in other countries with high Omicron rates - Denmark, Norway, Netherlands - and that has produced no new Covid surge. Partial immunity from vaccinations or from...

Canada's blockades boost far-right anti-vax movement

Since 29 January lorry drivers who travelled in a “Freedom Convoy” across Canada to protest at Covid restrictions, including current and planned vaccine mandates, have rallied with thousands of other right-wing protesters in the capital Ottawa. Many have described the Ottawa protests as a blockade of the city; protesters are also blockading other parts of the country, including on the Canada-US border. The protests were organised with strong support from right-wing activists in the US. They are smaller than anti-vax or anti-lockdown protests have been elsewhere (France, Germany, Italy...

Tories reckless on Covid

The Tory government plans to lift all Covid restrictions in England from 24 February, including the legal rule to self-isolate when infected, and probably also restrict free Covid testing and cancel the £500 isolation payment available to some workers who lack sick pay (483,000 successful claims had been made up to 2 Feb 2022). Indications from other countries where Omicron hit early and the BA.2 sub-variant is common are that the widespread partial immunity from vax or previous infection may limit impact to a slower decline in Covid rates or a shallow new surge. But that doesn’t make it right...

Diary of a health worker: Listening without prejudice

As I write we are in a two week consultation (closing 16 February) to see whether the “no jab, no job” law for health and social care workers will continue, but no clairvoyance is required to know that by the time you read this it will have been scrapped in one of the most dramatic U-turns of this Tory government. The spin will be it is largely because the Omicron variant is so different to Delta, so they were right all along. The reality is over 30,000 staff have left social care since November, tipping a service already in crisis to the brink of collapse. The same was about to happen in the...

Atos and Fujitsu vote for action (John Moloney's column)

Our members in Atos have returned a firm majority in their ballot for industrial action over pay. On a turnout over 62%, nearly 90% of members voted to take strike action and just over 98% for action-short-of-strikes! The first action is scheduled to begin on 28 February, with plans for escalating action if their demands aren’t met. PCS members who work for Fujitsu Services have voted by 77.1% to take strike action and by 90.7% to take action short of a strike on a turnout of 80.4%. Again the dispute is over pay. The union’s national consultative ballot for industrial action over pay and the...

Omicron: lessons from Denmark

Denmark dropped all its Covid curbs on 1 February. The move, by the country’s right-wing social-democratic minority government, is supported by most of Denmark’s other parties. The official infectious-diseases agency has said : “mortality has followed a declining trend in all age groups as from Week 1 [of 2022] and is now approaching the normal level. “This occurs even though the number of deaths in which the patient had a positive PCR test is increasing [i.e. more people dying of other causes have Covid too]...” The prime minister says: “I dare not say that it is a final goodbye to...

Joe Rogan, Neil Young and me

Let me start by declaring my ignorance. I never heard of Joe Rogan until a few weeks ago. When Neil Young recently announced that he was pulling all his music off Spotify, I took an interest. And the more I read and listened, the more I admired what Young had done. Watching Rogan engage in friendly banter with the likes of Canada’s Jordan Peterson or Britain’s Douglas Murray, you can instantly spot the appeal. Rogan is a smarter, friendlier version of Trump. People who listen to him a lot will challenge that, of course, but I wasted several valuable minutes of my life watching Rogan’s video...

The poison in the prison system

Currently 79,412 people are in UK prisons. That is over twice as many, per population , as the Netherlands, Norway, or Finland, though only one-fifth the rate of the USA. The number is likely to increase with an increase in the sentencing powers of magistrates’ courts and laws such as the Police and Crime Bill that will criminalise more people. The government aims to imprison more people and new prisons are currently being planned. The media and government portray prisoners as monstrous people. We are told that the purpose of prisons is to lock up dangerous people, to keep us safe that prisons...

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