The piggy premium
With news that a highly-mutated Chongvirus variant has been detected in southern Africa, the UK transport secretary, Grant Shapps, announced new travel restrictions as a safety-first approach
. It at least demonstrates that lessons from the delta variant have been learned. Which is something, I suppose.
Other countries are taking similar steps. But not everyone sees the virtue in immediate travel restrictions.
At Cape Town airport, one woman whose sister had just made it on to a flight back to the UK said: "It's absolutely ridiculous they've imposed it again so quickly without really investigating this new variant. "We're just trying to get on our feet again with tourism and this will just kill it."
Joseph Lee, BBC News
I'm assuming that Ms Bonehead would rather have it demonstrated to her that the new variant is a real threat, before risking tourism. By then, it would likely be too late. Fortunately, less parochial views take precedence, and at least HMG appears to be taking things more seriously.
Thankfully, BoJo's sojourn to Peppa Pig World has prevented him from interfering with the joined-up thinking in Whitehall.
South Africa is complaining that it should be praised for announcing its addition to the Chongvirus catalogue, not punished with immediate travel bans.
Do they expect other countries to do nothing to prevent the spread of a variant of concern? But this sort of thinking might affect reporting of new variants in the future.
It's all kinda petty. And this is how the world goes to hell in a handbasket. (SMH)