Isolation is the only antidote and you feel very alone … When you’re in the red zone of infection and you want to stay well you pray for this: emptiness. This is a journey into the centre of the Coronavirus epidemic. Coronavirus: Into the Red Zone, Sky Atlantic 2020
‘The Coronavirus is the biggest threat this country has faced for decades.’ Dispatches: Coronavirus: How Britain is Changing, Channel 4 2020, Boris Johnson, Channel 4 2020
In the last five weeks Covid19 has killed thousands of Britons. To stop the spread, the government has announced measures unprecedented in peacetime Britain. ibid.
The prime minister is easing lockdown. Since the start of this crisis he and his ministers have faced immensely difficult decisions in the most challenging of times. But with the UK deathtoll amongst the highest the world, questions are being asked about the critical decisions in the weeks before lockdown. Much still remains secret. Dispatches: Coronavirus Catastrophe: Did the Government Get It Wrong?
Donald Trump returns in triumph from hospital convinced he’s won his personal battle against Covid. Pealing off his mask in defiance. This is the inside story of the president, the virus, and the battle for the White House. Dispatches: Trump’s Coronavirus Catastrophe, Matt Frei reporting
His attitude is familiar to those who know him best … Trump supporters were soon growing restless … ‘So I said to my people, Slow the testing down, please.’ ibid. Trump
‘I went through it. Now they say I’m immune. I feel so powerful.’ ibid.
‘They are using Covid to steal an election. They are using Covid to defraud the American people, all of our people, of a fair and free election.’ ibid.
The wonder of modern medicine: the key to securing the future without lockdowns and self-isolations. There is no race more important. Scientists across the globe focused on one thing: a vaccine for every adult on the planet. Our societies, our economies, and our lives are counting on it … while reassuring everyone that the vaccines are safe. Dispatches: Coronavirus Vaccine: Is It Safe? Matt Frei reporting
Over six million should be vaccinated in this first group before the spring. ibid.
The Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine: at £3 a dose, it’s at least five times cheaper than the Pfizer-BioNTech one; it’s also so much easier to store at normal fridge temperatures. ibid.
The government’s borrowed heavily during this Covid pandemic – £400 billion and rising. Dispatches asks, Do we face higher taxes to pay back this massive bill? Will ministers use spending cuts and austerity to meet the cost of this pandemic? Dispatches: Britain’s £400 Billion Covid Bill: Who Will Pay? Channel 4 2021
For the last four months I’ve been filming my friends and colleagues, risking their own lives to try and save others. Under more pressure than ever before I’ve been with them in the heart of the Covid storm. Dispatches: Covid Critical: A Doctor’s Story
A year into the pandemic one in ten of us who catch Covid 19 will still be suffering physical and psychological side effects months later. It’s been estimated that Long Covid could cost the UK around £2.5 billion a year. Dispatches: The Truth About Long Covid
As nations battle to control Covid-19, Pfizer’s successful vaccine has made it one of the most powerful companies on the planet. Dispatches reveals new details about Pfizer’s pandemic profits. We disclose how Pfizer’s cash helped spread misleading claims about rival vaccines. We hear from a whistleblower who raises questions about Pfizer’s rush to get approval for its lifesaving jab. And we discover just how little of its vaccine has reached poorer countries. Dispatches: Vaccine Wars: The Truth About Pfizer
Two-thirds of all Covid deaths have happened since the Second Wave hit in September. Could this catastrophe have been avoided if Boris Johnson had followed his own scientists’ advice? We disclose fresh evidence on how Boris Johnson battled against official scientific and political advice. We reveal gaps in our border controls that fuelled the second surge. Dispatches: Second Wave: Did Government Get It Wrong?
We’re in the midst of a global pandemic that has upended our lives. The arrival of Covid19 in the UK has made social distancing the norm. Coronavirus: How Clean is Your House?
We’re going to bring in a forensics team and have the whole place [family home] fingerprinted … On hard porous surfaces, the virus can remain alive for many days. ibid.
Around the world eighty different teams are racing to develop a Coronavirus vaccine. Three hundred and thirty drugs are being clinically trialled in seventy countries. Never in human history has so much brain power been focused on one problem. Pandemic: Can Science Beat the Virus? Channel 4 2020
Vaccine is not going to be an option any time soon. ibid.
Over a month ago Britain went into lockdown. We aim to slow down the spread of the virus and stop the NHS from being overwhelmed. Lockdown is working but if we end it too such we risk a overwhelming surge in cases. It comes as a huge cost to the country. We can’t live in lockdown for ever. So how and when is it going to end? Dr Xan van Tulleken, When Will Lockdown End? television news, Channel 4 2020
We don’t have a vaccine and we don’t have a cure which are the two things that would alter everything so in the meantime what do we do? ibid.
It’s deaths from Coronavirus versus the dead from the massive massive impact of the lockdown. ibid.
Is going to be with us for a long time. ibid.
Lockdown: Britain’s weapon against Covid-19. But was there another way to beat this disease? Should we have copied South Korea? Unlike here, they raced to get a mass testing programme in place. They tracked the contagion through social media and mass surveillance. And even though their strategy was tested to its limits, as the contagion spread through a religious cult, they still kept the death-toll low. The Country that Beat the Virus: What Can Britain Learn? Channel 4 2020
Ecuador, April 2020: The Coronavirus epidemic is spiralling out of control. With the number of deaths rising, hospital Morgs are full. In desperation bodies are stored in shipping containers. Covid 19: World in Danger, Discovery 2020
To stop the virus from spreading, millions of people were forced to stay in their homes. From there they watched events unfold. ibid.
Shocking images began to appear online; the first were from China. ibid.
By late 2019 [Chinese] doctors were noticing patients with flu-like symptoms that were resistant to the usual treatments. ibid.
The full scale of the epidemic and the Chinese tragedy are still unknown. ibid.
The next country to be badly hit by Covid 19 was Italy. ibid.
Passengers on the Diamond Princess: the Japanese authorities imposed a quarantine; with passengers and crew trapped on board, the virus spread rapidly throughout the ship … More cases of Covid 19 began to emerge on other cruise ships. ibid.
Apart from healthcare workers, one of the groups most at risk of contracting Covid 19 were public transport staff … By July, 44 public transport workers had died in London alone. ibid.
The first Coronavirus case in America was confirmed in mid-January in Washington … By the start of June, over two million people had tested positive. Over a hundred thousand had lost their lives. ibid.
The pandemic has caused an economic crisis in the United States. Over 40 million Americans have lost their jobs. The effects of the virus has been felt all over the country. ibid.
‘There have been police violence in different parts of the world. The disease is very bad but the response to it has been in my view even worse.’ ibid. Dr Carlo Caduff, medical anthropologist, King’s College London
In late March the Indian government ordered a nationwide lockdown forcing everyone to stay at home. As a result in April alone, about 122 millions lost their jobs … The poorest Indians were beaten and forced to do humiliating exercises as punishment for ignoring the restrictions. Daily wage workers suffered the most severe consequences … ibid.
The number of lives lost due to hunger and starvation as a result of the lockdown may never be known. ibid.
‘Since I was in medical school it has long been a concern that there could be a highly transmissible, highly lethal, respiratory virus that could spread throughout the world very quickly.’ Race Against the Virus: The Hunt for a Vaccine, Channel 4 2020
For years a global network of leading scientists and doctors have been looking out for a deadly new virus. ibid.
In Wuhan 27 people have come down with a mysterious new disease. ibid.
In a little over a month cases across China have rocketed to over 17,000. ibid.
3,700 passengers and crew of the Diamond Princess are stranded on board when it is quarantined. ibid.
The new virus fits the bill for Disease X. ibid.
The first European country hit hard by the virus is Italy. ibid.
Beyond the economic damage the human cost of the pandemic is mounting. ibid.
Lockdown is slowing down the spread of the virus but hopes for an end of the pandemic rest on a vaccine. ibid.
The global vaccine race is hotting up with 24 candidates going through trials. The Oxford vaccine is out in front. ibid.
The virus hasn’t gone away. The hot weather is on the way out. Schools and businesses are re-opening. And there are fears about what will happen next. How to Avoid a Second Wave, Channel 4 2020
Dr Xand van Tulleken: Do you think there’s going to be a second wave?
Expert: In the profession we think there will be. ibid.
It seems to behave differently in every single person. ibid.
What we need is a definitive track and trace system. ibid.
The magnitude of this failure is astonishing. According to the Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering, the United States leads the world in Covid-19 cases and in deaths due to the disease, far exceeding the numbers in much larger countries, such as China. The death rate in this country is more than double that of Canada, exceeds that of Japan, a country with a vulnerable and elderly population, by a factor of almost 50, and even dwarfs the rates in lower-middle-income countries, such as Vietnam, by a factor of almost 2,000. Covid-19 is an overwhelming challenge, and many factors contribute to its severity. But the one we can control is how we behave. And in the United States we have consistently behaved poorly. nejm online article