Guy Trafford says a looser response to the pandemic threat favouring the economy over the health risks won't result in better outcomes in the long run

The news of the re-emergence of COVID-19 should have come as no surprise. With locked-in folk breaking out and those on the outside breaking in, plus just the possibility of infection through contact by staff ‘manning’ the jobs to keep the quarantine hotels operating, the risks had to be high.

However, when it did happen, I think I was typical to most in that the pulse took a jump and suddenly the future looked a lot more complicated, again.

In Christchurch at the Riverside Market today the place and surrounding streets were like a morgue. This is a place that is normally the most vibrant part of the city. Takings were down between 35 an 50% and this was only at level 2. My feeling  is many people had just begun to feel that life had returned to normal (international tourists aside) and now we have a small taster of what could lie ahead it has made us all just a little depressed and certainly a lot more uncertain of what to plan for and this kept the credit cards put away.

This current outbreak will get the lockdown treatment and most businesses will manage to survive, but then how long do we wait until the next one?

Despite this, I’m of the firm opinion that the course the Government is steering is the best and most rationale approach to be taken and get frustrated when I see some calling for whole approach to lockdowns to be dismantled as "the cost is too high" and the "cure is worse than the disease". It appears that some have a very jaundiced view of the world because from where I sit, only those few countries that have fully embraced the lock-down (go hard, go early) approach have managed to navigate the turbulent seas to any extent. These countries include: New Zealand, Taiwan, Vietnam, Iceland maybe China and possibly Australia if they can regain control.

Australia is a classic example of wasting earlier efforts by seemingly dropping their guard too soon and getting punished by the virus in quick time.

Countries that didn’t adopt the lock-down approach in an early, timely manner include the UK, Sweden, the USA, Brazil and most of the rest of South America. All these countries not only have had serious loss of life, but their economies are shattered. So, absolutely nothing appears to have been gained from a more hands off approach but a whole lot has been lost. Recent news illustrates the point: the UK is leading the European countries for all the wrong reasons. Last to go into lock-down and as a result last to come out, highest death rate and greatest loss in second quarter GDP losing over 20%. They were a country that suffered from poor leadership and mixed messages.

The latest whine (of which I was copied into to) was written to the Prime Minister complaining about the Governments approach and comes from a participant in the wine industry who no doubt is hurting financially and is certainly entitled to his opinions. But please don’t think that the Prime Minister is alone in her reactions to the virus.

I don’t have any elder relations alive above me now, although I have plenty of friends and colleagues who are and I don’t wish any of them suffer the fear let alone the death from the virus when it could have been avoided. Then there are the lasting impacts ‘survivors’ from the virus are also being found to suffer from. So for me, go hard, go early, I will also be affected financially but I am also an optimist and believe that at some time in the next twelve months a vaccine will be found, but in the meantime, the less of the virus floating around in our society the better and the risk of having some lock-down time being imposed upon me is a price I’m prepared to pay.

Push-backs from naysayers and alluded to conspiracies from the likes of Gerry Brownlee (trying to score cheap political points) only serve to undermine the commitment of some and may mean that a successful outcome is less assured. Nothing is certain in the future; however, I would feel a lot less certain and far more nervous if a relaxed approach were taken, especially after the sacrifices that have been made to date.

At the moment the latest COVID-19 score of confirmed and probables is low and given the travel undertaken by the unfortunate family the likelihood of more must be high. As the plea to the PM helps to illustrate, there is a high degree of anxiety in society regardless of what is believed to be the best course.

We may never know what the ‘correct’ mode of action should have been without a ‘control’ sample to test. But I wouldn’t be game to join them. I am a little reminded of the reforms of the 1980’s, I suffered financially through that also but accepted something needed to be done and while I didn’t agree with the approach at the time (and still don’t), we survived and moved on. Making the tough decisions is what we put politicians into their positions for. Fortunately, in the current situation ours appear to be trying to utilise the best advice from the scientists, not all thankfully otherwise we could still be in lockdown 3 or 4.

So, as long I can feel there is transparency and decisions made have minimal political dimensions I will continue to follow their lead. If that makes me a sheep, so be it. (I actually quite like sheep.)