The UK is still allowing incoming passenger flights, and these passengers are then free to travel on public transport and mingle with the population.
The Government says that it is learning, but it is not following the science. About 60 countries, including South Korea and Poland, quickly introduced enforced quarantine for all arrivals, or closed their borders. Their death rates range from zero to 12 per million of population. Compare this with the UK which already has 170 deaths per million, even with the draconian lockdown.
The Government has no way of knowing whether new cases are the result of internal transmission or introduction by the hundreds of thousands of incoming airline passengers. It is not too late. Border controls now will still save lives.
Tony Summers
Editor's reply
Dear Tony
Cutting ourselves off from the world might work if coronavirus wasn’t here. But it is. The few planes still in the sky mostly have more cargo in them. Strict control of passengers is impossible, too, when tests aren’t available. But when travel returns, as it will, you are right, we will need a better system to test and trace travellers. Not just to protect people in this country but to give other places confidence that they should allow British passport holders to visit.
Julian Glover, Associate Editor
Stirling legacy of a racing gent
Sad to learn that Sir Stirling Moss, arguably the greatest racing driver the UK has ever produced, has died at 92. He was a gentleman who never allowed his fame to go to his head. I can’t help smiling at the thought of just how many motorists, must have been pulled over by the police and greeted with the words “Who d’you think you are, sunshine? Stirling Moss?”
Robert Readman
