With COVID cases, deaths, and hospital admissions down and falling every day in the UK, lockdown measures being relaxed, and vaccine appointments booked, is this really the beginning of the end?
Today felt like a big day. It’s been a couple of weeks since my age group qualified for the vaccine, but a local centre finally popped up on my NHS app and appointments were quickly booked in for the 1st May and 21st July 2021 with Mrs H soon after, marking our household as finally being COVID safe.
I take that back, today felt like a huge day.
After all the worry about health, employment, and our children’s education, this is it, the end-game. Five more days till my new suit of armour, then more restrictions to be lifted on 17th May, then, on 21st June, all legal limits on social contact can be removed.
But hang on, will it all be plain sailing? Despite the highly successful vaccine roll-out, aren’t we forgetting we were in this exact same position this time last year? What of India’s variant and their horrific second wave? What happens when travel restrictions lift? What about no-one’s safe until everyone’s safe, which is a long way off? Haven’t we learned the lessons of Eat out to help out and Christmas bubbles?
It’s been said that, whatever happens, social distancing and mask-wearing will remain part of our society for the long term, and those, as we all know, will continue to have a deep impact on many.
So yeah, this really does feel like the beginning of the end, it’s just that, unfortunately, we still appear to have no idea when that actual end will be. Frankly, vaccine or no vaccine, I get the unnerving feeling that, despite today’s landmark, we aren’t out of the woods yet.
What’s your take on the current COVID situation? Drop me a comment below.