Chart for UK cases on 29 June 2021

Javid's speeches yesterday put him firmly on the side of dates rather than data. He committed very strongly to removing as many restrictions as possible on 19th July and living with the consequences.

Such bravado could very easily cause him a huge headache. Even though the numbers are lower than before, it would be foolish to think the number of hospitalisations is independent of the number of cases, and every case occupies a hospital bed for a comparatively long time (many operations, such as my wife's knee replacement earlier this week) occupy beds for two or three days. Covid-19 hospitalisation is longer. The chart I took a snapshot of and linked to above shows the UK is not doing well controlling the delta variant, and relaxing in a few weeks if we have not got this under control looks very unwise from a data viewpoint.

He is also gambling that a new variant will not emerge that has worse statistics than delta.

SO he could very easily find himself in the nearish future - say before the end of the year - having to decide whether to eat humble and pie and actually reverse the irreversible, or to be held personally accountable for any deaths etc arising from this hypothetical variant.

In essence, he has already gambled his future that such a variant will not appear. JH, and the rest of us, may be lucky.