About ‘Plague of Madness’
When COVID-19 arrives in the UK, Ed Wood – proud Englishman, lifelong Conservative and business entrepreneur – starts a diary. He writes 250 words a day.
Collected here, a year after the Covid-19 outbreak began, Wood’s diary entries offer a compelling, real-time chronology of Britain’s handling of the pandemic, political developments and observations on the economy, alongside his own increasingly vitriolic and desperate reflections, as he watches his country bounce recklessly between ‘common sense and common madness’. Data and government soundbites sit alongside haircuts, trampolining, Orwell, Dad’s Army, poetry, music (and futuristic pizza ordering) in this kaleidoscopic summary of twelve wildly unprecedented months.
In a tone that swings between fortitude and despair, patriotism and disillusionment, ‘Plague of Madness’ presents one individual’s bid to navigate the tumult and make sense of the overwhelmingly nonsensical. From the reassurance of the opening - ‘We need to be reasonable and stay calm’ – to the heaviness of one of the final lines – ‘Too many tears have fallen to have any left to shed’ – it is one man’s lament for the country, government and values he once prized.
Excerpts
Let’s be honest, Covid has been, for Xi and China, a rather successful ‘gain-of-function’ experiment with human societies, when all the gains have accrued to China.
In the worst stages of the Blitz, people were allowed to hug one another, have sex with someone from a different household, and share a drink with friends.
As Professor Michael Levitt said “The problem with epidemiologists is that they feel their role is to frighten people into lockdown. They say ‘there are going to be a million deaths’ and, when there are only 25,000, they say ‘it’s good you listened to our advice or there would have been a whole lot more.”
Professor Graham Medley - the UK's chief pandemic modeller - gave a lecture in recent days. One of his slides said this "we have, according to the revised projection of the adjusted figures, something more or less approaching no idea".
The Prime Minister likes to say that no one has ever lost money betting on the courage and character of the British public. So, isn't it time that he, himself, took that bet?
Praise
‘Plague of Madness is a splendid book. Clearly, calmly and urbanely argued. With recent news of the (ever?) extended rules, it’s even more important.’
‘Thank God, the voice of reason! This is all so absurd for something that has a fatality rate of 0.04%. I find your posts a bastion of common sense in a sea of fearmongers.’
‘I am truly alarmed at the speed with which my fellow citizens willingly suspended their freedoms and outsourced moral decisions to the state. Without so much as a whisper of opposition.’
‘It’s an adults’ game of 'Blind Mans Buff'. Politicians are wedded to their narrative come hell or high water. And, remember this, now they have found out that they can control their citizens, on a global scale, under house arrest, for weeks or months on end (a previously unthinkable concept) they can’t help themselves from reactivating this. time and time again.’