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| The daily "commute" |
The UK is emerging from coronavirus lockdown - too soon? - and as one of the "clinically highly vulnerable" due to immunosuppression I have been advised (the UK government *advises* the vulnerable rather than instructing them) not to even leave the house for the last 3 months. Having carried out my own risk assessment I decided that it was better for my sanity and physical well-being to take a daily walk around the nearby park and field. Some days a bit of planning is required to avoid dog-walkers but going before work (I'm working at home) means there's very few folk about. So far so good and a world away from my usual two-train journey into and across London. Whether I ever go back to that commute is a discussion for another day, but work are currently saying we shouldn't expect to be back in the office this side of Christmas - I won't argue with that.
The future is a bit less certain for us "shielders" as we continue to be at risk with the virus in circulation. The big question is how much risk? I may be classed as vulnerable but I am not unwell or unfit so who knows how I would deal with COVID? An effective vaccine may be the only way to get some certainty while the virus is still around. There are many teams working on different kinds of vaccines including a trial currently in it's early stages at Imperial College in London. Vaccines which rely on live virus (not the IC one) may not be suitable for people like me despite their likelihood of being most effective. For the time being it's a case of keeping my head down until the picture is clearer.
Like many others in the UK I've had a couple of bad viruses this year already. One was cold-like and knocked me out for two weeks plus at Christmas. I had another around Easter - not sure how I caught that! - which was more sore-throat and cough. No temperature on either occasion but had some episodes of breathlessness including one particular evening at Easter where my heart was pounding and I couldn't get to the kitchen and back without panting. Were either of those COVID - I've no idea but they weren't classic symptoms and I wasn't tested. When they get the antibody tests sorted out I will try and get tested just to see .... in any case it currently isn't known whether a positive antibody response guarantees resistance. We continue to live in interesting times. Stay safe!
Read other articles in this series at Living With CLIPPERS.
Living With CLIPPERS by Bill Crum is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
