Wednesday, April 01, 2020

Toby "Quisling" Young is wrong






Toby Young, the right-wing neo-liberal activist, has started blithering about getting the economy moving again, by which he means letting the virus rip, taking it on the chin and anyone who ends up dying should have stayed at home. The over seventies. Hypertensives. Diabetics. Those with slightly dodgy heart or lungs, and even rotten heart and lungs. What's the fuss about? Some of them survive anyway. Are they really worth it? Look at the cost to the economy. That's the Gospel according to Toby Young.

So Young is trying to dig up the rotting carcass of the Diseased Caused Herd Immunity theory (DCHI) that delayed sensible action at the beginning. Let the virus pass naturally through the British people, picking off the weak like a lioness following munching away at a herd. We British are too important to wait 12-18 months for a vaccine. Let the virus immunise us as a nation, even if it picks off a  hundred thousand oldies and a few young weaklings.

The fact is, the DCHI theory lost the argument back in February. To try to raise DCHI is like some politician in 1941 shouting "It's no good, we cannot afford this war, let the Nazi army in, and we can just get used to it".

Young is wrong. Civilised societies look after their elders and most vulnerable. Civilised societies cares for people who are ill. Civilised societies  apply science and medicine towards solving problems effectively.

Young is wrong, because we are at last gearing ourselves up to defending ourselves. We have a way to go, but we have caught on to the basics: Stay home, wash your hands, look after yourself if you get ill, call for help if you are getting pneumonia  (scroll down for Pneumonia here) and wait.

We can do this. We have to do it.  What's more we can have fun doing it, and we can come out the other side a wiser, if slightly sadder, generation.

We do not need Young's defeatism. He lost the DCHI argument. He is an irrelevance.


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