The erasure from collective consciousness of government briefings in December 2020 - a lesson in listening

Its no surprise to see the media flooded with hand wringing "why didn't the government tell us" howls, when talking about the huge rise in rates in Covid 2021 between 30th Nov and 22nd Dec. But in fact, the government told you, over and over, that like speed limits, lifting of restrictions was permission, and not a target for hedonism on a grand scale.

Here are just a few examples. Back in March, the country became familiar with the wonderful Liz Canavan, who is the most senior official at Department of the Taoiseach, and has been for many years. Had the media bothered continuing to listen to Canavan, instead of obsessing over every minutiae the then Taoiseach, and soon to be Tanaiste, Dr Leo Varadkar, might say, they might actually have noticed.

For example, on Nov 30:

"if you are meeting people over this period, and indeed beyond that, there will always be an element of risk. What we are asking is that you actively manage that risk – outdoors is better than indoors; shorter interactions are better than longer. We’ve all become used to interacting online, so if you can meet up online rather than in person – do that."

"As I mentioned, just because something is permitted does not mean that it is without risk.
I heard someone say think of it like a credit card limit - it’s a limit not a target. Being at a lower level of restriction means there is a greater onus placed on all of us to manage that risk, to consider it and to do our best to mitigate it."

"For food shopping, plan to shop early, shop off peak and shop alone if you can. If you feel unwell you should stay home. Remember that you can still shop online or over the phone and collect your goods or have them delivered."

NPHET was also recorded as advising on that date, that those who wished to socialise with elderly relatives at Christmas that they would need to stop socialising now.

A week later, Canavan doubled down (Dec 4th), warning businesses that they needed to be mindful of congregations at their businesses. She also addressed travel:

"If you are a business, you know what to do. If you are having difficulty controlling the situation, do the brave thing, look for help or close your business if the congregation is getting too much."
"As of yesterday, 3 December, the vast majority of these regions are at status red. This means that anyone arriving from these regions must restrict their movements for 14 days on arrival into the country.
Having a system in place does not mean that the right thing to do this Christmas is book flights or plan trips. Overseas travel poses a risk to the work that we have all done to date when it comes to slowing the spread of COVID-19.
That’s why our best advice is that this is not the year to travel home for Christmas. We understand that this is particularly difficult at this time of year."

A week later, there was a warning against complacency over the vaccine (Dec 4th):

"We want to avoid another spike in the virus. We know a vaccine is on the way for us. But the vaccine is not here yet and just because it’s on the way doesn’t mean we have any kind of immunity over the Christmas season"

There was also a warning about travel based on the US thanksgiving experience:

"There are reports this morning of a 30% increase in cases on COVID-19 in Chicago after people travelled and gathered to celebrate Thanksgiving.
We don’t want to do that here – lets learn the lessons from other countries and be determined not to repeat what happened there"

The briefing went on to remind the public that close family contacts were likely to be infectious:

"What we have to remind ourselves is, just because someone is a member of your family, does not mean that they can’t transmit the virus to you. The key thing is not how close you are but how many contacts you have had."

Most importantly, Canavan reiterated that the loosening of restrictions was a limit and not a target:

"Some restrictions have eased and some more will ease this day week, but because certain things are permitted doesn’t mean you have to do them. It’s all about choice, what we are saying is – choose wisely and with the benefit all of the advice and information that we have."

A week later, with infection rates climbing rapidly again, there was more warnings against travel:

"While we are advising that this is not the year to travel home for Christmas, we do recognise that some people will have to make that journey. If you are going to travel, make sure you know the rules; note what’s expected of you and note what airlines are doing to keep people safe. We have heard the reporting that planes will be crammed and airports will be bustling this coming week but we know that is not the case."

I think its also important to look at DAA reports for December. They advised that traffic would be at around 10% of normal, with about 92% of that traffic being direct. Of the 120k of travellers, about half would normally be arrivals and departures but there was a suggestion that there would be more departures than arrivals, which means that TOTAL level of travel of Irish returning home in December was under 60k, and not the spurious fabricated figures invented on social media.  Its unfortunate that DAA hasn't been countering this disinformation with the facts. A travel ban was imposed on all UK inbound flights from 20th Dec in the wake of the detection of a UK variant of the virus. It hasn't stopped mountains of disinformation about the actual number of visitors which is presumably considerably lower than the expected 120k inbound/outbound figure.

To give you an idea of how "busy" Dublin Airport was on 19th Dec, here is a haunting tweet from their Twitter account, of a lone mezzo singing O Holy Night to an empty terminal.

Finally the issues of household mixing and intercounty travel. Both were widely misinterpreted and often in full knowledge. For example the definition of "household" was specifically said by government not to include "bubbles" that included other households. And nobody took notice of the fact that this was a general reminder for the whole of the period, and often interpreted to mean "a different household every night." Here is what the daily briefing actually said on Dec 22nd:

"Intercounty Travel
You may travel outside of your county up to and including St. Stephen’s Day. You will be permitted to travel home after this point, but after that, you should stay in the county you live in except for certain essential purposes."

Somehow, the latter was garbled into a belief that you could go visiting outside the county after Christmas Day and then stay there until the last day for household travel a few days later. I actually know of people who were convinced that meant that they could travel to their in-laws on the other side of the country on Stephen's Day and come back a few days later! They are now complaining that the government didn't tell them what to do!

Part of our issues with government communications is that the media are obsessed with particular figures: mainly the most controversial ones. They've no problem getting their opinions in front of the media, even if sometimes that is distorted and taken out of context. However, the mundane serious job of messaging is too easily overlooked, especially at a media hungry for the next potential fallout between government and independent advisory groups such as NPHET whose role is apolitical.

In short - while restrictions were lifted by the government, and a strict set of guidelines set, nobody at any point made any suggestions that it was "safe" to do many of the things which we now know were happening: indoor gatherings, large gatherings engineered by split bookings to the same venue, people waiting several days to report symptoms to medical professionals.  This isn't the fault of a particular government, but a culture unwilling to let go of its traditions, even for an emergency situation. Its worrying, because this is a taster of what worse scenarios could arise that might mean the breakdown of law and order.  It doesn't bode well for many people.