Lockdown: Day 13 - 05/04/20

The first week of Lockdown ended pretty much as it started, with myself not in work and getting out of the house only to take in an hour's trip around my exercise circuit to the east of Morley, enduring much lower temperatures and gloomier skies than we'd seen over the previous excursions out, once again sharing the paths only with dog-walkers and the few others who cannot abide being confined to their residences while being kept out of work or compelled to be at home with their kids. Working from home or enforced self isolation aren't for me though, as I've got a job at the hospital to return to, rising with the lark on Tuesday morning to see just how thoroughly the world has changed in the week that I've been at home, choosing to travel to Leeds by train as it's still the quickest option for getting down the hill, heading down to the station and noting that the long string of cars that usually stretches up much of the length of Station Road has not come out, and that the businesses at the bottom of the lane that had still been open during the preceding week have all shut up shop now. Landing at Morley station is an even more surreal experience, as the local train services have been reduced further from the level put on during the first week of Lockdown, and only six people are out to catch the 0729 service, a huge reduction in numbers from usual, like down from the 70+ who would usually turn out, and it's even quieter than a Christmas Eve might be, with the train actually forming the Manchester - Hull service, and stopping all stations rather than running as a express, and even then running at maybe 10% seated capacity as so few people need to be travelling into the city. So there's no real need to be anxious about keeping your mandated 2m distance from your fellow travelers, as there are so few people out to begin with (and it's worth noting that TPE were running 6 carriage trains on the local services in the initial week of the restricted timetable, but there's only a need put on a 3 car unit this time around), and social distancing when passing through Leeds station is just as easy as I've never seen the place so empty, with there being almost as many station personnel as travelers in the place, along with a small phalanx of police officers checking up on whether we really need to be in the city at such a time of day. I do, as I work at the hospital and the terrain of Leeds between the station and the LGI seems devoid of all life, aside from the guys out tending the extensive roadworks, with most of the establishments and offices around Infirmary Street, East Parade and Park Square having shut up for the duration, with the traffic levels reduced to a minimum, not quite looking like a ghost town but still eerily quite for 8am on a weekday.

So back on my usual site for the first time in more than two weeks and back into my role as a Key Worker for the NHS, which I can now state formally as I have a letter from my manager that confirms me as such, not that my role that I left really exists anymore as the Trust made an operational change during my week off to massively reduce the number and scope of outpatient clinics, in order to enforce social distancing of staff and patients, and to restrict the handling and transport of medical records in the system across the site. As that means most clinics will be running paperless for the foreseeable future, that means that the bulk of my tasks in the MRL hub have now gone, as there's no need for deliveries of paperwork out of the libraries, and absolutely no necessity for creating new files and restoring old ones, leaving only a gradual draining of returns back into the filing system through our site, leaving me feeling like a spare part to the hospital's ongoing work routine, when crisis conditions are coming down on other parts of the Trust, far from my usual contact. There's still work to do in the Paediatric Library at Clarendon Wing though, and thus I'll head over there to slot in as the temporary replacement for the colleague who left us last week, getting back in to the routines of casenote filing and paperwork removal which I've been out of for a while, working in the persistent chill of the library that is the complete climatic opposite of my regular haunt in the Old Site, but enjoying the fact that there's sufficient space to have a workstation to myself and to be able to keep a regular sort of distance away from my compatriots. Honestly, we're in about as safe and secure a corner of the LGI as there is at present, not too deep into the building and mostly detached from the activity of the nearby children's wards, and despite having been kept up to date with the regular communiques from the those in charge of organising the priorities of the hospital service, effectively shutting down all elective services and becoming almost a completely emergencies only business, it's really hard to get a feeling of what the COVID-19 pandemic is having across the site. I couldn't even report what sort of numbers of patients are on site, or where they are being treated, as that information hasn't been disseminated to the staff formally, and thus we work on, still in the grip of regular library work for the time being, but not feeling especially essential to the management of the on-going situation, which ultimately has me feeling like a bit of a fraud, claiming status as a nationally important Key Worker, toiling in the face of an unprecedented crisis in the modern age, when I don't really have that much to actually do with it.

If there's free Domino's pizza available for NHS workers
on the menu, I'll take it, with much gratitude.

Still, all the public appreciation that comes the way of the NHS is most welcome, and will hopefully endure in the national consciousness for a long while, and if the good folks from Domino's are dropping in on our building to distribute free pizzas for the staff, they will be received with much gratitude, not least as they will provide me with a good two meals worth of food, and that it shows that some people are still ready to stick their necks out to aid others in these difficult and confusing times. The random acts, and organised displays, of kindness to those in services and those harshly afflicted by the pandemic have been heartening, with over half a million people having volunteered to aid NHS services while unable to do their regular work, and with social media having illustrated the willingness of the able to aid those who are in enforced isolation to ensure that they are still supplied with food and medicine. Less cheering is the growing amount of people rushing to accuse others of not doing their bit toward self isolation and social distancing, an unattractive and pervasive display of judgementalism and unwillingness to consider circumstances of others that seems to have flooded the online world, which was unappealing in normal times, but now seem like many are ready to be informants against those who aren't doing there bit for social conformity (sadly confirming the belief of mine that many people only think rules need to be applied to others). Sure, folk don't need to partying, hanging out in groups in the park or nipping out to the shops for something to do, but these are weird times and it's impossible to tell why people are behaving in ways that seem antisocial, people could just as easily be panicked or riven by the stresses of these strange days, as they are being mentally lazy or unconcerned by the risks, and screaming that 'something must be done' is plainly directing ire in the wrong places, and ultimately helps very little. Indeed, today, after my morning walk in the returning sunshine, I return home home to discover the Health Secretary pondering harsher restrictions on the movement of people, and considering that even allowing time out for exercise to be barred, which would do more to threaten the mental and physical health of the nation, and that sort of behaviour from a minister in HM Govenment just rises the frustration in me.
As I feel that it's pretty clear that it is those working on the medical frontline of our health services, treating those most adversely afflicted by COVID-19 are at a much greater risk of infection and the further spreading of disease, than random people out sunbathing or taking their dogs for a walk, and that is where the focus of the nation ought to be, as the death toll climbs and and those at the sharp end of this crisis feel the full effect, still not fully prepared or equipped for the situation despite all the events of the preceding weeks and months...

But hey, what do I know? I'm just another voice on the internet, after all.

Walks: Morley Social Distancing Circuit. Walked: 30/3 & 5/4.
2.8 miles, via Valley Mils, Broad Oaks, White Rose, and Daisy Hill. x2

5,000 Miles Cumulative Total: 4373.3 miles
2020 Total: 106.8 miles
Up Country Total: 3910.3 miles
Solo Total: 4059.1 miles
5,000 in my 40s Total: 2967.1 miles

Next Up: Pushing on the the long Easter weekend.