James O'Brien reacts to the "ultimate confirmation" the Government failed on Covid-19
30 July 2020, 13:57
James O'Brien reacts to the "ultimate confirmation" the Government failed on Covid-19
England has seen the highest levels of excess deaths in Europe this year - James O'Brien reacts to this "ultimate confirmation" that the Government has failed disastrously on handling coronavirus.
England had the highest levels of excess deaths in Europe in the first half of this year, according to new figures from the Office of National Statistics.
England on Wednesday had 763 new cases of coronavirus which is "almost double" the daily cases two weeks ago.
"You will remember the Government scientists have repeatedly said that excess deaths are the best measure of the impact of the virus on a country because coronavirus death figures are not counted in the same way in different places," James said.
"Still of course they try to claim that they have handled things well or that there has been success or triumph has been achieved, or Boris Johnson should take a lap of honour. These are just facts."
James continued, "The notion that this Government has handled this catastrophe in anything other than the worst imaginable way is, I'm afraid, a matter of historical fact."
He branded these statistics "the ultimate confirmation" that the Government failed.
Searching for optimism, James said, "The science is changing, this is a good thing. The understanding of this infernal virus increases and as it does so, the official advice in some ways changes.
He pointed out that just because the Government "muffed it up" one day, people believed they would not necessarily "muff it up the next."
"You could almost make a positive case here if you ignored the existence of every other country on the planet," he said, remarking that the Government have woken up "belatedly", with the new 10 day quarantine rule aligning England with the WHO recommendation.
"While our confidence in this Government would hugely increase if they admit the scale of this catastrophe that they caused at the beginning, we can't use that as conclusive evidence that they are going to muff everything up again."
"We just want to see fewer people die than did yesterday," James said, urging people to focus on "keeping as many people alive as possible for as long as possible."
