[Margaret Pilkington]

Taddy, yes I have spent a long time in the NHS....and I do not underestimate the effects of this virus to those who fall into the category of the susceptible......but for those in the 40 and under age bracket, the risk of dying from this is just about 1 per cent.

We need to get a sense of perspective on this.....the media of all kinds has been instrumental in turning the population of the country into nervous wrecks.

Yet an old man approaching his hundredth birthday raised 33 million pounds for the NHS.....a man who had been in the military and survived a war....so tell me is he made up of something different?

I am pleased to hear that your friend(who must be described as being in the vulnerable grouping spite of being fit and healthy.....and I hate the 'vulnerable'generalisation) has come through the other side of this illness.....and of course it is going to take time for him to recover completely......he is older, frailer and probably will never get back to where he was before...but yet I hope he does because he sounds like a man of courage and determination...not one to 'give up'.

We cannot live our lives without risk.
We have to take up the reins again....to get people back to work....but there really is little incentive if you think you can sit on the sofa with your feet up and be paid for it.

Of course we have to be vigilant, of course we have to take precautions....but when will it be right to get up and go out again...this year, next year, sometime, never......and when we do get back to work....will the work still be there to go back to...because in many cases it won't.
A life on the sofa then will not not be the comfortable thing it is now.
There have been times during this crisis when I have wanted to go back to work.
The work of looking after people.
It does not take an Einstein to give a patient a drink, to take them for a bath , to help them wash......but because I have a close family member who has cancer I cannot do that.

In spite of being frustrated and feeling diminished by the lockdown....I have kept to it because of my family concerns.
But if I were one of the younger folk....I would be itching to get back to work and get the country off its knees....it is not where the UK belongs.