Yesterday, after much foreshadowing, Boris revealed a four stage plan to ease and end UK lockdown restrictions.
Dawnise and I watched him read the prepared statement to a small group of MPs.
The plan targets the end of July, by which time his goal is that every adult in the UK has been offered the vaccine. It seems cautious and rational. The dates are “no earlier than”s. The delays between steps are driven by how long it takes to see and measure the impact of the previous change on the key metrics.
It’s the sort of plan that should have proposed during the first lockdown. Or the second. I’m trying to say “better late than never” with a straight face.
And really, as much as my rational mind approves of a plan that (finally) “follows the science,” I’m struggling to keep perspective, and to stay positive.
Put a fork in me. I’m done.
Telling people they maybe might get most of their lives back at the end of June is like Lucy holding the football for Charlie Brown saying “this time, for sure.”
I’m fully expecting it to get yanked away, leaving me flat on my back.
And yet… I’ve been wrong before. Take the frankly amazing progress in creating and distributing vaccines.
A year ago if you’d offered to bet that we’d have multiple highly efficacious vaccines, that over two hundred million people would be inoculated, and that vaccination would actually reduce serious illness… well, I’d have certainly bet against you.
And happily I’d have lost.