Lockdown

Four years ago, I bought a ranch in Wyoming. Not that I was tired of New York, but I’m fascinated by the epic scale of this country, and I wanted to try something different. And different it is. The state of Wyoming is physically larger than the UK, but has much less than a hundredth of the UK’s population. I have to drive ten miles before I see a paved road. I stop there to pick up my mail, from a locked box on the shoulder. From there I have a choice of two supermarkets, one 40 miles north, the other 60 miles south. But distances are relative here. I

The public inquiry into the government’s handling of the coronavirus crisis has already started. Not the official one, which won’t get under way until next year, but the unofficial ones. First out of the gate was the Sunday Times on 24 May, followed by the New Statesman and, last week, the Financial Times. In addition, there will be ‘inquiries’ by other newspapers and magazines, parliamentary select committees, television and radio programmes, think tanks and universities, scientific and medical journals. Few will be able to resist blaming the UK’s higher-than-average death toll on the government’s failure to lock down earlier. That’s been the verdict of those that have been published so

Brasserie Zédel is a grand salon under Piccadilly Circus and the only place I desired when lockdown (or lock-in) ceased and I was allowed to visit London. It is, for me — and everyone is different in their yearnings — everything a restaurant should be: very beautiful; well run (by Corbin & King of the Wolseley and the Delaunay); not insultingly priced; and, as it is windowless, pleasingly unreal: an enchanted basement, if you will — a depository for dreams. I arrive early on the first night, walking through silent London, resisting the urge to lie down in the road. This used to be the Regent Palace Hotel, the grand

‘Musician’ is how I described myself to the nice Latvian lady interviewing me the other week for an ONS survey connected with the coronavirus, but that didn’t tell the government much. In economic terms, our profession embraces everyone from Sir Paul McCartney to the struggling garage band that may or may not be allowed back into your newly reopened pub. In terms of what we do, we divide into three overlapping categories — writers, administrators and performers, and our experience of pandemic and lockdown has been sharply different. I’m mainly a writer, and I guiltily admit that I have welcomed my first chance for years to work with minimal interruption

In October, a panel of 21 experts from across the world gathered for the first of what promised to be a series of reports assessing readiness for pandemics. ‘Infectious diseases know no borders,’ warned the Global Health Security Index. ‘So all countries must prioritise and exercise the capabilities required to prevent, detect and rapidly respond to public health emergencies.’ Every country was called to be transparent about its capabilities ‘to assure neighbours it can stop an outbreak from becoming an international catastrophe’. Two countries were held up as the best examples: Britain and the United States. If a league table were drawn up of countries that most failed to contain

Home Pubs in England would be allowed to reopen for table service from 4 July, Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister, told the Commons, his words being met by an exclamation from one MP of ‘Hallelujah’. But drinkers would be expected to supply names and addresses before being served. Restaurants, museums, galleries, cinemas, hotels and hairdressers could also reopen, but not bowling alleys. Churches could reopen for services, including weddings, with a limit of 30 people, provided no one sang. The ‘two-metre rule’ was reduced by way of advice to one metre, to be combined with mitigating measures, such as facing in different directions. The government discontinued its daily televised briefings.