Whereas you will blindly follow your party regardless of what they're up to.

This whole bloody thread is built on hypotheticals.

Only if the number of deaths massively - and proportionately to population size and density - outweighs deaths elsewhere at the end of the crisis. Since - and I know we all wish this was not true - we're barely in the beginning phases of the total toll of Covid-19 there's absolutely no way we can assess the overall damage or how it stacks up in comparison to other approaches. We're trying to compare nations right now when we have no idea what the eventual outcome is going to be, and comparing it based on ongoing data is utterly meaningless. For example, if a country that managed to completely nip the covid-19 infection in the bud this month suffers a complete economic collapse in a year's time as a result, and a more measured approach could have mitigated that, then a "as few immediate deaths as possible at all costs" approach will have been absolutely the wrong approach. Thus, comparing current death figures? Utterly pointless, one-dimensional "pop" outrage in a situation that's going to involve a decade or more of layer upon layer of complexity.

We're already seeing cancer patients slipping through the net and countless other unforeseen complications... we're less than two months in. We have no idea what this looks like in 6 months. "Not good" is probably an understated estimation.

Will I? That’s a very bold statement to make, I don’t even belong to a party so

Anyone can state the obvious Livia. ..it's not an exclusive club.

It's reactions like this that show you didn't even glance at the Whitty lecture I posted, which in 2018 laid out pretty much to the letter what would happen, how our services would be stretched, the need for adequate amounts of PPE, the spread, lockdown, isolation.

Can I respectfully say to anyone mocking the posts of others to not do so from a position of ignorance? I left that information to remove the suggestion that my comments simply come from a place of governmental mistrust with no basis....that lecture is the basis.

This has nothing to do with what I was talking about? I was pointing out that there is no evidence base for the absolute best practice during a modern global pandemic, because this is the first modern global pandemic. There literally can't be an evidence base... Where would it have come from? There are theories, plenty of them, and I won't argue that the failure to adequately prepare healthcare services with adequate capacity and equipment lies squarely on the governments (plural, right back to Blair, let's face it)...

But I'm talking about people's certainty that the timing of lockdown was wrong. That the current figures serve as "proof". They don't... There's no way to know which approach was right until analysts can reflect on the bigger picture once all's said and done,and it'll be years until we reach that point.

For now people can say they don't THINK the government made the right moves and explain why, but it's far from evident or obvious.

For example as I've repeatedly said, I think the collateral damage done to public health by a lockdown going on for too long would be devastating and worse than the damage done by Covid itself. I don't "know" that, I just worry that it might be the case. Time will tell, but not for quite a while, so it's too early to be confidently stating what was right or wrong.

Not sure why you are now fixated of 'evidence based' responses, there is a response. .. it's the response I posted, it may be a novel coronavirus however there is still best practice and contingency planning for a novel virus. It may not have happened before, that does not mean it has not been prepared and planned for at a local and national level.

Where we did not have 'absolute' best practice we had a well researched and documented script for resilience and preparedness in the UK. That was the point I was making.
There are those for whom this pandemic is the realisation of a life's work... All their labours are now being played out in real time.

So I'll play it your way, I don't know that they got it wrong but based on what we know, that the likes of Whitty, the WHO and many others were expecting and waiting for this eventuality across the globe.

A pandemic is easier to prepare and plan for I would say though than a public response to a lockdown, it is nigh on impossible to say how each individual nation will respond. I don't have as negative view of the British public than most it seems, which may surprise some...

I feel this is our time to shine, to show as I feel we are doing, that we can work together for the greater good...no matter how long or how deep we have been divided, so long as we are informed and supported.