In and around a London lockdown. A Cartoon Diary by Pidge.

 It was inspiring to see many small business businesses particularly retail outlets trying  to survive financially while serving the community while respecting the need to avoid contact at less than 2 metres although some longer established professions already had appropriate procedures in place that they had had in place for decades:

 Looking back it is interesting to note just how our view of the virus has changed. In the beginning the approach of the authorities seem to be to minimise any anxiety. This was reflected in the fact that the announcement of any fatality was always accompanied by the comforting comment that the unlucky deceased had always had “underlying health conditions. “ Carluccio‘s restaurant chain was one of the first bankruptcies of the crisis but it had  already exhibited  problems before the pandemic so it seemed appropriate to use this event to reference how ubiquitous the medical excuse had become:

 The bad news for the bugs was the introduction of social distancing which meant that no humans should be closer than 2m to anyone outside of their own  household. This must have been bad news for them  but their job is to mutate and it seemed likely that they were already gearing up to overcome this new obstacle:

The really shocking news was when Boris Johnson announced on the evening of the  20th of March that the pubs were to close immediately! If lockdown was justified it would obviously have to include pubs… but the timing! On a Friday evening after a week’s work when the massed thirsts of the country’s workers were about to climax in the nations’ pubs. This was no joke!

 After a while the generally complacent attitude towards the virus changed . The age of the terrifying nightly news bulletins had begun and we were bombarded with horrific pictures of hospitals in Italy so overcrowded that people were dying in the streets outside implying that the same thing could happen here and so it was that fears the coronavirus could be more lethal than originally thought began to gain traction  in the general population.

 And fears were not confined to the medical sphere. The public became aware that restrictions on peoples movements would disrupt the economic life of the country and the greatest threat was quickly identified as a likely national shortage of toilet rolls. This led  to panic buying and stock piling which changed the social etiquette of even some of the more genteel parts of London.

 At this time catching the disease did not appear to be too worrying. The only symptoms were a dry cough and a fever leading to a few days of mild discomfort. The only people that appeared to be at any kind of serious risk were the very old and even then they would receive the required hospital treatment well in advance of the feared future shortage of beds should the pandemic gather pace and even then they would  benefit from immunity from future infection which was the orthodox view back then. So when Jeremy Corbyn asserted that he would not comply with any government edict requiring the over 70’s to stay at home I thought he was following the same logic: And this cartoon never saw the light of day as I could find no reference to Jeremy repeating his declaration! The reason I identified with this logic and genuinely had these thoughts was that I had tickets for Cheltenham .... For further comment go to Cheltenham

 Some good news appeared. The science suggested that although the Coronavirus bugs thrive in winter they did not like higher temperatures and a warm spring was being forecast.