With Covid cases rising in China, we must learn from the mistakes of 2020

Editorial: At a time of obvious extreme pressure on the NHS, some controls on visitors from high-risk countries, mainly China, would be in order

Socially and economically, it is difficult to see how Britain can support another period of extensive lockdowns (Reuters)

Given what the world has been through in the last three years, it seems curious that, in some places, there seems no great sense of urgency about the spike in Covid cases in China. The parallels, superficially at least, with the early stages of what we came to know as Covid are striking.

The epicentre of the surge is China. A principal conduit to Europe is via northern Italy and public health authorities outside are unsure how to respond. As in the original outbreaks, Italy and China’s immediate neighbours are imposing travel restrictions on visitors from China quickly, and the United States has followed suit. However, most of Europe – including the UK – is taking longer to respond.

The danger is that this does indeed turn out to be a rerun of the mistakes made in January, February and March of 2020, and the UK imports a potentially deadly disease almost absent-mindedly. Early in 2020, the scientists in the Sage advisory committee eventually took the view that it was too late to stop the infection spreading because it was already circulating internally.