2024-03-18
It has taken 4 years to move from Obsessive Covid Disorder to a point where we may now perhaps indulge in some rational argument about what really happened in 2019-20, and how we might actually more sensibly work in the future.
Leaving aside all the technical virological and counter-measures arguments, it is apparent that the situation management of early 2020 where "the science" met "the government" in a conflicting and fast-changing muddle of overthrown pandemic preparedness and panic (which saw much of the former somehow displaced by much of the latter), this contribution by the good folk at the Global Warming Policy Foundation is, if not completely timely, at least on target.
What has Covid got to do with Global Warming? Both involve serious interaction between "government" and "science", so should be subject to a set of common principles.
The authors' primary contention is that government and science need to get their act together in a defined and controlled way, to avoid panic, by ensuring that "the science" is properly tested, that conflicts of interest are excluded from the mix, and that decisions are taken in an orderly manner that respects some basic principles of interaction.
Those who believe that governments are simply a means by which rogues and criminals can make vast fortunes from manipulating such circumstances may dismiss the idea that reform is even possible, but we have to start somewhere, and where we are is as good a place as any.
So I commend these ideas to my readers.
Sadly, there is little here that is actually new (although some issues have only clearly emerged in recent times, and the illustrations are pretty 🙂), but at least somebody has had the gumption to restate this package of measures as a prerequisite for good governance.
