Kids gone back? How did you get on with home schooling?
Algebra? Physics? I know… tricky.
How about English? That can’t be difficult… we speak it, everyday. How hard can it be?
Did you teach tropes and schemes, such as;
Anaphora? Politicians use it a lot.
For example;
I will defend the right for you to eat cake,
I will defend the right of the nation to eat cake,
I will defend the right of the world to be cake eaters.
The same word or phrase repeated at the beginning of successive phrases or sentences.
How about; Epistrophe? That’s where the same word is repeated at the end of successive phrases;
I know you like cake,
I like cake,
We all like cake.
Did you teach; Metonymy? Send the kids off, looking for phrases like, ‘top-brass’.
You must have been across; Zeugma… that’s where one verb is applied to several words.
‘He added whisky to his tea to stiffen his drink and stiffen his resolve.’
And, what about a good old-fashioned Trope… a clapped-out phrase of doubtful truth. Example;
‘Test, track and isolate isn’t working.’
TT&I isn’t working, a familiar trope, trotted-out by lazy journalist and not very bright politicians.
Not working? Well, yesterday they provided 1.5m tests. I can’t think of any other service, or supplier, that did 1.5m of anything yesterday, part from, maybe, Amazon?
Not working compared to what? Not working compared to a Duracell bunny with no battery. Not working compared to Monty Python's dead parrot?
Not working compared to other countries? It is, see for yourself.
In terms of tests per thousand, our TT&I tested more people than the US, Canada, Germany, Turkey and Australia combined. More than Italy and France put together.
I know, it’s cost a shed-load. More than the whole criminal justice system.
But… it started from scratch. Wasn’t set up properly by the DH and because there was no ready, go-to organisation, big enough to manage the call-handling, train people and get the testing underway, there was a scramble to…
… to build something employing more people than the army, delivering on the scale of Amazon, logistics more complicated that all the supermarkets, a laboratory infrastructure bigger than anything in Europe, develop software and a mailing capacity, to every address in England.
At the time PHE was only funded for 10,000 tests a year, only assayed test-procedures and had no mechanism to approve new testing laboratories.
The DH set up was ropey. Things had to be changed and no doubt the principle lesson learned was; when organisations have interfaces, there are problems. T&T had multiple interfaces. Umpteen companies involved, plus the Army and the NHS and a supply chain.
In terms of a rolling average, T&T now test twice the numbers of Italy, France, US, Canada, Germany and Japan.
It’s taking a median of 79 hours between a case getting symptoms, to all their contacts being reached. A big chunk of that work is now being done by local PH people.
It is a massive management success.
How about isolation? Dunno. If BoJo won’t stump up enough to pay people to stay at home, you can only expect they’ll keep quiet and go to work.
Are the contracts expensive and are consultants earning more in a day than a nurse in a month? It looks like it. All that was arranged by the DH who have kept very quiet about their involvement... and inherited by DiDo.
Remember, a large part of the top-line capital cost, bandied about, is actually revenue costs… supplies, wages, fittings, consumables and running costs.
Which brings me back to home schooling. Did you get as far as Synecdoche?
‘England lost by six wickets…’ a figure of speech in which a part is made to represent the whole...
... just like TT&I isn’t working… when actually, it has lots of parts and they are working well and a huge number of loyal people working super-hard to help keep us safe.
Is TT&I reducing infections?
A select committee report says not. They say there is no evidence. I would add, the absence of evidence does not mean there is an absence of evidence. (For home-schoolers, that’s an example of Anastrophe)... and as we can't blind test the assertion, it's what home schoolers call hyperbole
A lot of people in this system are working their backsides-off (that’s personification)… the only people who are not working are the communications people in Number Ten who are missing daily opportunities to use the impressive TT&I numbers to reassure everyone, the system is stabilised and running well.
>> I'm hearing - Simon Stevens is backing greater regulation for senior managers but NHS Provider's Captain Mainwaring is resisting it. I wonder what Trusts really think?
>> I'm hearing - Nicola Sturgeon that told MSPs she will not do daily briefings in run-up to Scottish election.
>> I'm hearing - A new group chief executive has been appointed to lead Burlington Care and Marton Care Homes... Amanda Cunningham.
>> I'm hearing - China has developed a digital vaccine passport for its citizens to travel around China.
