Good Heavens! What happened to the Daily Dose of Doom and Gloom? Did you change your breakfast cereal? ;)

OK, what do Canada and New Zealand have in common? Both stuck out on the arse-end of nowhere. Manageable populations. A tendency to mind their own business and not get wrapped up in 'global issues'. These, as much as anything else, have contributed to their success.

That's what the British, or at least the English, wanted to achieve with Brexit. A hope that if we left the world alone, it would leave us alone. A hope that people would stop coming here and that some at least would leave. We're way too crowded here, and it's done nothing but help the virus.

Boris Johnson is not a 'strongman'. he's the type of 'leader' the British turn to in troubled times. A plummy-voiced Public School man. Not exactly dim, but determinedly unintellectual. Someone who will put on a show while the Civil Servants - who are a good deal brighter and who work for the Crown, not the government, get things sorted out. Corbyn was a strongman, and his determinedly interventionist stance would have made life much more difficult for everyone. Twenty million impossible to enforce rules and regulations which would have wasted no end of time and effort to little avail. His successor, the fiercely intelligent Sir Keir Starmer, would have done better than either Boris or Jeremy, but wasn't an option at the time.

Responders. Stop talking about deaths 'per 1000' or whatever. we are not talking about cases of flu here, or smartphone ownership, or access to fast broadband. We are talking about people's lives, and every single one counts!