Johnson: maskless in Islington
Boris Johnson was at the excellent Almeida Theatre in Islington on Tuesday to see a production of Macbeth, a prescient play to watch in his present situation one might suggest.
Despite a very clear requirement to wear a mask he was of course not wearing one, much and mainly at all.
The number of occasions a maskless Johnson has been spotted has been growing.
The most well-known was when Johnson visited a hospital in Hexham on earlier in November. He did promote getting the vaccine and the booster which was worthwhile.
But just as he shook hands with patients in February 2020 so Johnson appeared in an NHS hospital unmasked. Of course everyone else was wearing one. It echoes the situation in the Commons where despite guidance from the Parliamentary authorities some Tory MPs, notably leader of the House Rees-Mogg continued to appear mask-less until very recently. Johnson now wears a mask in the Commons.
The hospital later claimed that Johnson wore a mask in clinical settings, but that didnt help. In that case the release of pictures Johnson unmasked sent the message that it didnt matter.
The public health advice on this is clear. Wearing a mask protects the wearer and others from Covid and flu and indeed all airborne viruses. Of course the protection is not that great (vaccines are much better at the job) but it’s a matter of social responsibility. These are two words not in the Johnson dictionary because for him, Rees-Mogg and others it’s about personal responsibility or lack of it.
It is a classic debate between individualism and basic collectivism but in this case a potentially somewhat deadly one
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