The devolution of the public health function

How another nonsensical political gesture is feeding the testing industry

The Department of Health and Social Care has announced that from 5 January, passengers on direct flights from China to England will have to exhibit a PCR negativity certificate for SARS-CoV-2. The rationale for this measure is the unknown numbers of “cases” and “deaths” which are taking place in China, which could hide the introduction of highly transmissible deadly variants and the statements of the unreliability of data coming from China made by several senior politicians.

The faulty logic in all this is now all too clear. Let’s leave aside the most obvious ones: lack of evidence that any restrictions have any effect on viral circulation, as, by the time you apply them, the virus has already been doing the rounds, as we pointed out in April 2020. 

Also, let’s ignore the ease with which the policy can be bypassed by catching a connecting flight originating from a less plague-ridden country (which could land anywhere in the UK).

A variant of concern is a marketing term for a mutation: al…