I am truly of the opinion that, despite all the strictures imposed upon them and the fact that Italy remains the hotspot of the pandemic (that is until Trump’s America takes over shortly) the inhabitants of Bagni di Lucca are in the best place to be in the current pandemic. They should consider themselves very lucky (although that’s often a difficult thought to hold at the present time!)

Things are not looking too good in the UK at the moment.  Yesterday 938 victims died from the terrible virus. That’s higher than Italy’s saddest day when 919 died. And the worst is yet to come. With the lack of PPE (nurses at our local hospital had to wear bin bags in the absence of equipment and three of them were subsequently found positive), the low figures for testing, the abandonment of old folks in their homes where they are dying in scores (fifteen perished of coronavirus yesterday in one institution), the inability of too many people, now called ‘covidiots’, to realize how serious the situation is, the approach of the traditional Easter bank holiday with the promised fine weather a great tempter for people to escape from it all, the confusion of how the police should act in controlling lack of social distancing, and last but not least, the continued presence of the PM in an ICU  doesn’t add up to a very happy picture (typical English understatement…).

Yesterday we caught an empty bus to Harrow to do our local shopping (yes, we are not yet restricted to one borough unlike more serious-minded Italy). We were asked to enter by the bus’s centre doors by the driver as a precautionary method to keep the safe distance of two metres from him. (It’s scary to find out that fourteen London transport workers have died from Covid 19 in the past three days). We asked the driver how we were to tap in our travel cards to pay the fare as the machine was sectioned off by a red ribbon. ‘Don’t worry about that’, answered the driver who was fully masked, wore gloves and sat in a cabin sealed by a perspex pane. ‘It’s not important now whether you pay or not. Your safety comes first.’ We thought ‘how considerate of transport of London to put passengers’ safety before financial gain’ and were reminded of how too many concerns are still putting money before people’s health at the present time.

At the bus station cleaners were busy cleaning and sanitizing windows. We’d never seen that before in day-time.

Sadly the use of PPE and self-distancing is not at all consistent. Our return bus journey had no such precautions: we entered by the front door instead, paid our fare as usual and noted that the driver wore no PPE.

It’s this worrying inconsistency that indicates to me how lacking in firm direction the UK government is. If anyone thinks that the return of our PM to political life will improve matters then one should think again about someone who was still happy to shake hands with people while the pandemic was starting to rage in Italy.

We’re all taking our chances when we step outside our front door. In my worst imaginings I compare the present situation to Sarajevo’s ‘sniper alley’ during the Bosnian war. At least there one could see where the bullets were coming from!