I keep having an unpleasant dream: I roll up to departures for my first Spanish holiday since all hell broke loose… and they won’t let me go.
The “system” forbids it; my Covid papers are not in order – we are the unjabbed. I am escorted away for further questioning like a fugitive in a Cold War spy film.
There is another version of the dream where I am trying to fly back in the other direction but I am told I can’t board a jet to Scotland and must stay in Lanzarote forever.
This is a slightly more appealing scenario.
But I was not dreaming as I vented my frustration again while on the phone to Scotland’s Covid hotline the other day. It was the same routine which sparked similar frustration months earlier.
Here we go again: yes, the Covid adviser could see from our records that my wife and I were double-jabbed months ago, but “the system” still thought we were jabless. Our nice nurses at the GP practice speeded up the process by giving us leftover unused vaccine, which meant we cancelled our official NHS appointments due in a couple of weeks.
Computer says no
Therein lies our problem: human eyes at Covid control could see we were part of the jabbed brethren, but the appointments system thought we were outlaws because we cancelled. You can see the clinical logic of the computer system: we cancelled therefore we are not inoculated.
Anyway they promised to sort it out again, but it has been dragging on for months despite an earlier call. My nightmare is that border control checks the system and comes up with the answer I dread.
I should count my blessings that I only have to worry about a holiday to the Canaries in a couple of months, which I rolled over from last year. I kept thinking of sad news about radio and tv personality Jono Coleman, who died after a four-year battle with prostate cancer. I was diagnosed with prostate cancer in 2017, the same year as Jono, but I lived and he died. Death can hinge on such twists of fate.
He claimed his diagnosis came too late because a doctor failed to act on earlier warnings from a blood test. I was grateful that my medics were like a dogs with a bone and would not let go.
My blood test was only slightly raised while my internal examination and
MRI scan showed nothing, and I had no symptoms whatsoever.
Perhaps my younger brother who was diagnosed already made them suspicious: I was three times more at risk due to the genetic link.
“I think we’ll just do just one more thing – a biopsy,” I remember a surgeon saying.
This unmasked my early-stage cancer.
Things could be worse
It’s almost three years since the operation to remove my prostate. I received the all-clear again a few days ago. Sadly, Jono was playing catch up and never made it. As he said after revealing his diagnosis, regular check-ups for men and early detection were vital to surviving prostate cancer.
It’s not been a bed of roses: I am one of five per cent or so who don’t recover fully from the rigours of surgery and still have issues.
But I am not typical, I hasten to add. And it’s a lot better than being dead.
The Covid pandemic reminds me of surgery: it’s traumatic to get rid of and the recovery is slow and careful. That is why we cannot rush back to normal on a certain date without a measure of caution. I prefer wearing masks and social distancing to continue in close-quarter situations.
Years before the pandemic we saw travellers from the Far East wearing masks in public after other nasty viruses there. Maybe some of us thought it odd or funny at first; it isn’t now.
I for one will carry on wearing masks in close proximity to others, and they will be packed away first for that holiday. It makes perfect sense and apart from Covid just think of all the colds or flu I won’t catch, too.
I suspect this will eventually have to be enforced rather than simply asking people to be on their best behaviour – because it never works. I suspect if scientists ran the country we would never be free as they see danger everywhere, but some basic caution must continue.
Many people listen to pop music more readily than scientists, so let me put it another way. Celebrations after escaping Covid restrictions should be less Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go and more Can’t Get You Out of My Head.
David Knight is the long-serving former deputy editor of the Press and Journal
