Time to relegate this coronavirus to the pages of history

• AS an infant of the 1940s I was in no position to consent or refuse the immunisations, then generally administered to children, and such was the confidence in health care services that parents would not have dreamed to question the wisdom or integrity of the family doctor or clinical professionals.

We were protected against the juvenile illnesses of mumps, measles, whooping cough and the scourge of TB, diphtheria and polio.

There were “anti-vaxxers” who refused, or deliberately exposed their offspring to infections to gain acquired immunity, sometimes with very severe or even fatal results, but such people were commonly dismissed as oddballs.

Today we are better informed about our personal health, the cash-driven National Health Service, and its relationship with pivotal pharmaceutical companies.

We are much less trusting of politicians and, perhaps, the endless parade of their scientific experts directing our response to Covid-19 infection.

The media frenzy greeting arrival the of a magical panacea is immature and unquestioned; it is entirely reasonable to be cautious and it will take a bit more than Professor Jonathan Van-Tam vaccinating his mother to reassure me.

That said, I believe we all have a social duty towards each other to relegate this coronavirus to the pages of history and to get inoculated once we feel personally confident with evidence of its safety.

ALAN WHEELER
Gordon House Road, NW5