Scotland hopes to avoid the worst of coronavirus – opinion

If you don’t work in the health or care sector, it’s just this invisible threat.

By TIM KNOWLES

MARCH 30, 2020 21:05

A SNOWPLOUGH drives through the Drumochter Pass, Scotland. (photo credit: REUTERS) — A SNOWPLOUGH drives through the Drumochter Pass, Scotland.

(photo credit: REUTERS)

Here in Scotland, the worst of the outbreak is yet to come.

It’s here already – by Thursday we had had 25 deaths and 894 confirmed cases – but the feeling is that before long that figure will rise a lot.

Scotland’s chief medical officer says as many as 50,000 people may already have it, but may not realize they are infected.

So if that ratio of cases to deaths continues, many more people are going to die.

We only have to look at London – a third of all the UK’s coronavirus deaths are there – to realise how bad things could get.

In the meantime, the government has told us to stay at home, if at all possible.

Only essential workers are supposed to go to work, schools are shut and the rest of us are working from home.

Last weekend we had beautiful spring sunshine, leading to thousands of people going for walks in parks, the countryside or on Scotland’s hills.

It seemed to catch the authorities off guard – they had to urgently reiterate that this is not “social distancing” even if it is outdoors, and on Monday Prime Minister Boris Johnson issued his most severe “lockdown” guidelines yet.

There’s also been anger from people living in the Highlands, who suddenly found themselves playing host to “isolationists” from cities, renting holiday homes in a bid to sit out the outbreak and thereby putting a strain on local shops and services.

Now people who continue to break laws on public gatherings will face on-the-spot fines and possible prosecution.

The crisis has seen a new era of cooperation between the UK and Scotland’s devolved government, with Scottish government officials attending Britain’s Cabinet Office Briefing Room A emergency committee meetings and First Minister Nicola Sturgeon tweeting announcements about UK-wide policies.

But the reality for a lot of people is a kind of false calm.

If you don’t work in the health or care sector, it’s just this invisible threat.

So for now, Scots are hoping we will avoid the worst of it, and it will remain nothing more than that.

The writer is news editor of Dundee’s The Sunday Post.