omgwereallgoingtodie (2)
The news continues to feed my hypochondria. I’ve been panic buying Tunnocks Caramel Wafers (dark chocolate) against the day.
My current thought, and it’s hardly unique, is that the USA looks to be in a particularly bad place with this virus. Since I have family and friends there, this is of personal interest. In the UK, we appear to be doing a respectable number of tests with a relatively low positive rate. On the one hand that’s good, on the other, there are currently no border controls at airports checking for indicators of infection in passengers entering the country, and the official criteria for testing is still tied to countries visited rather than community transmission. I think that will change very soon, but may well be too late. Looking at Italy, I wonder how long it will be before similar local quarantine measures are put in force here.
I hope I’m wrong, but I expect a substantial uptick in UK cases in the next week. At the time of writing, it looks like the lessons to be learned come from Hong Kong and Taiwan where controls and behavioural change appear to have restricted transmission of the virus very substantially.
I’ve pondered whether I’m overreacting and concluded I’m probably not. I’m as aware of the statistics as anyone else, and despite what I said in my last post, I’m a 60-year-old with underlying hypertension. There is a funeral I’ll probably go to on Tuesday, but my inclination is to self isolate as a defence mechanism. It is by no means a comprehensive solution because of other household activity, but it makes basic sense I think.
Having said all that, I’m faced with a dilemma: before I finished work (almost a year ago!) I bought some very good wine, and I still have most of it: should I be optimistic and leave it right where it is, or pessimistic and enjoy it while I can?
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