Dear LPG,

I just want to remind readers that while the government are announcing all sorts of relaxations with a view to ending lock-down we need to remember that people are still dying of this virus and that we all need to remain careful.

As I understand it, there are now rules about wearing masks on public transport while it is fine to walk the streets and make visits without one, and which and how many members of your family you are allowed to visit and who you cannot is getting more and more complicated and changing every day.   Many of us older people are truly missing our children and grandchildren in spite of being able to talk to them on the phone, but there are more and more mini rules that make the whole thing really unclear while the conflicting scientific studies, and statistical information about how many have had it, who can get it or even if you can get it a second time continue to confuse.  It is obvious that the whole episode has been more than enough to boggle the mind of the government let alone the man in the street.

The prime minister’s first pronouncement on the subject of relaxation could not have been more confusing, but the only thing that came out of it was that we need to be ‘alert’ which, at the time, made us all truly uncertain of exactly what we should and should not do and where we should and should not go.

I think that we self-sufficient, self-isolating older people who live alone are in a position where we have experienced both the best and the worst of the whole thing inasmuch as we were all told that we are part of the age group who are most at risk, but we are also the group who, no matter how little income we have, are likely to not be financially affected by not being able to go out.

With that in mind, I just want to implore LPG readers to be careful and delay following the government’s rules about getting out and about for just a little longer. 

 I think that I read on your pages that everyone has a different version of alertness when it comes to what Boris Johnson and his government had to say on that subject.  Please Err on the side of caution.

AY, Brockley