UK's vaccine strategy was right in the circumstances
It is unfortunate that an approach agreed by all of England’s regional health directors and supported by the World Health Organization 鈥� vaccinating the most at-risk people against covid-19 first 鈥� is constantly challenged and politicised (Letters, 3 April).
When vaccines are limited, choices have to be made as to how to get “the biggest bang for your buck”. Cutting hospitalisations and deaths allows a health service to continue to function and carry out treatment for myriad chronic and acute health conditions.
I find it sad that this choice is linked with the supposed political ramifications of a health service becoming overwhelmed rather than being seen for what it was 鈥� a genuine attempt at maximum impact on severe illness and death.
Jab doubts may be a sign of something else
Vaccine hesitancy is a matter of concern in some countries, even if it isn’t worsening overall (27 March, p 8). I wonder if the level of hesitancy reflects the effectiveness or otherwise of a country’s science education.
Science is based on a method, it is a package deal. You can’t believe in the bits that give you mobile phones and not in the bits that give you vaccines. Countries with low vaccine uptake need to review their science curriculum.
Elimination policy will prove to be the right one
You suggest countries that have adopted a covid-19 elimination strategy will find it “difficult to reconcile their zero-covid border policies with those of countries learning to live… with the virus in some form” (Leader, 13 March). However, when vaccination is complete, borders will reopen, and the anguish and disruption seen in countries “learning to live with the virus” will probably have been avoided.
None of my UK friends regard a year of lockdowns, policy confusion, deaths and greater economic hardship as preferable to the near-normal life in countries like New Zealand, Vietnam and Australia.
The next wave will be the fourth one
There is a common misperception that the UK has only had two waves of SARS-CoV-2 when in reality it has had three so far (3 April, p 9).
There are three peaks in the graphs showing infections, hospitalisations and deaths. Waves one (April 2020) and two (November 2020) were caused by the original virus, whereas the third wave (January 2021) was caused by the “Kent” variant. We have had three lockdowns in the UK aligned with these three waves.
Our European neighbours are now in the midst of their third wave caused, unsurprisingly, by the more infectious Kent variant. Like the US, if we have another wave, it will be our fourth.
Perhaps time is like a river flowing over us
In his look at time, Julian Barbour states that “we have no choice but to be swept from past to future” (6 March, p 46). I propose a line of thinking where we aren’t swept from past to future, but that time passes by us, as “observers”, in the reverse direction 鈥� from future to past.
In this model, the future consists of a set of probabilities that, once observed from a given spatial location, will collapse across an imaginary boundary (the present) into a set of actual past events that instantly inform the set of future probabilities.
The flow of time loops from future probabilities to past actuals to future probabilities 鈥� an alternative two-way flow of time to Barbour’s. For each observer, this constant flow of probabilities collapsing into actuals generates a unique experience of time flow, being relative to the observer’s spatial location. Perhaps the big bang seeded the first set of future probabilities into a starter loop, while concurrently creating a spatial platform from which time flows could be observed?
Nature's well-being benefits are truly vast
There is more to add to your piece on nature and mental health (27 March, p 36). First, protected areas worldwide have an economic value in terms of mental health, .
Second, national parks and other biodiverse ecosystems improve mental health much more than urban green spaces. Third, health insurers in the US, the national health services in the UK and a mental health charity in Australia already include nature therapies in mainstream mental healthcare.
The links between nature and mental health thus go far beyond urban planning and green prescriptions. They provide new political support for protected areas, and an avenue for global mental health rehabilitation after the pandemic.
Once a week I feel like Schr枚dinger's cat
How would you feel if you were in a quantum superposition, asks Carlo Rovelli in his article “Why quantum is relative” (13 March, p 36).
That is easy enough to answer. I am in a superposition every Friday night, having played the lottery but not looking at the results until Saturday morning. On Friday nights, I am in a superposition of both being a lottery millionaire and also the same old wage slave. The consequences are that one does wake up in a bit of a daze 鈥� or is it a hangover?
Carbon tax dividend could be an error
Proposals to recycle carbon tax to citizens are flawed (20 March, p 44). The revenue is a limited-period source of money, which will be used to provide additional income that will become part of the core support mechanism for recipients and therefore politically difficult to switch off as carbon tax income declines to nothing.
More tell-tale signs of an ancient black hole?
The article about the possibility of a small, primordial black hole in our solar system makes me wonder: could it be responsible for the Kuiper belt, in the same way that the Sun-Jupiter Lagrange points seem to be responsible for the placing of the asteroids? (3 April, p 34)