Coppola Comment

Monday afternoon, 25th May 2020. A beautiful, warm day on which to watch our new overlord make his first speech to the nation. I refer, of course, to Dominic Cummings's press conference . The Daily Mirror and the Guardian had revealed that Cummings had gone to stay in a family cottage near Durham at the end of March, and that he had also been seen in Barnard Castle, about 30 miles from Durham. The country was under full lockdown at the time, with non-essential travel completely banned, so both trips appeared to break the law. Furthermore, his wife, Mary Wakefield, had published an article in the Spectator magazine towards the end of April which said that she had developed CV-19 symptoms on 27th March and he became ill with suspected CV-19 the following day. Wakefield described him as "lying doggo" for 10 days, too ill to move. Yet on 31st March, Cummings's father had confirmed to the police that his son was self-isolating in a property on his estate. So Cummings appea...

The  freesias that my daughter sent me  are long dead, but the clematis in my garden is in full flower, and the flowers smell of vanilla. It has taken over six weeks for my sense of smell to return. But I was only mildly ill. For many people, the road to recovery is much longer. Initially, coronavirus was thought to be a respiratory illness causing cough, fever and breathing difficulties. But the range of symptoms that the virus produces is now known to be much wider. Headache, muscle pains, fatigue, nausea, diarrhoea are all now recognised as symptoms of coronavirus infection. There is growing evidence that it disturbs the blood clotting mechanism and can trigger heart attacks or strokes. It also seems to have caused renal or liver failure in some patients. And there are worrying reports of long-term problems such as a weakened heart or immune system. It's also difficult to diagnose. Some very sick people don't have a cough or fever, or obvious breathing difficulties. S...