Slowly and nervously it goes, as the Government prepares plans for the next stage of reopening, due to be unveiled on August 31st.
It is likely the plan will follow the example of its predecessors and lay out a phased timetable, with restrictions eased on a weekly or fortnightly basis, and subject to constant monitoring. Without explicit announcements from official sources, it is becoming clear that there will be no overnight return to live events, a development that will be deeply unwelcome for a decimated industry that looks at big crowds attending sporting events and wonders: why not us?
Nonetheless, the Government is correct to proceed with the utmost caution, determined above all to protect the pre-existing reopening and to prioritise the return to school and college and the gradual return to office-based work that will be part of the new plan.
Employees will be reluctant to give up the freedom to work from home that the long lockdown has brought, for at least part of the week. Employers, however, are entitled to take the needs of their businesses into account as the country moves into this next stage of the pandemic; new flexibility should be available, but not everyone will be able to work in exactly the way they’d like.
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Consultation and local dialogue should be the key to a mutually beneficial transition. What the Government agrees with its own public service employees will send an important signal to the rest of the workforce.
In the background, the rising infection numbers of recent weeks are an obvious concern, and public health officials will be closely monitoring the trend in hospital admissions and the numbers being transferred to intensive care units in the coming days.
The vaccines have proved an effective shield against serious illness in the vast majority of cases, but it remains a grim mathematical fact that large numbers of infections will produce hospital admissions, and of these a proportion will become seriously– perhaps fatally – ill.
The challenge for public health authorities is to sustain the momentum of the vaccination programme – now charging through the ranks of the nation’s teenagers – while at the same time maintaining a degree of vigilance among the public.
The hyper-infectiousness of the delta variant means that the need for precautions – on masks, on social distancing, ventilation and on sensible socialising – is as great as ever. While reopening must continue, it must be a sustainable reopening. It is more like normal life; but it, not yet, normal life. For sure, it is difficult balancing act.
No matter how hard it tries, the forthcoming plan will not please everyone. It should not try to. The goal must be to continue the reopening at a steady and sustainable pace, so that as vaccination proceeds and the pandemic recedes, our society and economic can recover and people can restore their lives. There can be no going back.