Der Stand der Dinge - 25.5.2020

News: The UK is enjoying a public holiday today and celebrating: the UK lockdown has been lifted – at least that’s true if you happen to be the Prime Minister’s “top advisor” (government speak for “overpaid social media spin doctor”). For my non-UK based readers, Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s “top political strategist” (he orchestrated the Vote Leave campaign), was reported for breaking the nationwide lockdown. Instead of sacking the idiot, BJ stated that DC had “acted responsibly, legally and with integrity”. I suppose that depends on your interpretation of those terms, a bit like statistics (and we know how good the UK government is at fudging those).

“Responsibly”: is it responsible for two Covid-19 infected people and their child to travel 250 miles across England, stopping for fuel and food and touching “stuff” while on the way, thereby spreading the virus? How about the people in their destination who will be exposed to two new “spreaders”?

“Legally”: that may be so as there was no actual lockdown law passed, but DC’s actions were definitely not in the spirit of the lockdown rules. He made a mockery of the lockdown. One rule for us, another rule for the great unwashed. Do as I say, not as I do.

Lastly, “integrity”: the Cambridge English Dictionary defines integrity as “”the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles that you refuse to change”. Bad choice of words, Boris. You need a new speech writer, or should I say spin doctor?

Let’s look on the bright side: it’s ok to do what we like. We get the message, Boris! The slogan “stay at home, stay safe” is only for muppets.

If you need further confirmation that the UK’s Covid-19 lockdown strategy is a shambles, consider the news that arriving air passengers will have to self-isolate for two weeks after arrival. I do not often agree with Michael O’Leary, the owner of Ryanair, but he was right when he called that proposal “idotic”. Infected arriving passengers will take public transport and spread their infection on their way home before entering self-isolation, which is not independently checked.

If you really want to reduce the risk of re-importing Covid-19, you should require passengers to self-isolate for two weeks BEFORE their flight and test them a day or two before their departure. That would also reduce the number of Brits flying abroad on a holiday and bringing back the virus: You spend your summer holiday self-isolating and then have run out of your holiday allocation. Is this workable? Of course not. But if people really want to fly Ryanair (with zero social distancing), they need to wake up and understand what they are about to do.

This is not about maximising one’s personal utility, it’s about society’s utility. Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings really should review utilitarianism. That probably was not part of their syllabus at Oxford…

Financial Markets: US and European markets closed unchanged on Friday while overnight Asian markets were either unchanged (HK and Shanghai) as traders are trying to figure out what is happening in Hong Kong or better (Nikkei). Further deterioration in US-China trade relations put a damper on the oil price.

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Stay safe. And remember: you don’t need to stay at home, as long as you act with “integrity”.