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Best of the Spectator

The Edition: The long winter

Best of the Spectator

The Spectator

News Commentary, News, Daily News, Society & Culture

4.4785 Ratings

🗓️ 29 October 2020

⏱️ 39 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Why does the government think the second wave will be worse than the first? (00:49) Will a Biden presidency restore America's fortunes? (18:45) And finally, does Covid mark the end for the silver screen? (30:10)

Spectator editor Fraser Nelson talks to Carl Heneghan, professor of evidence-based medicine at the University of Oxford; editor of The Spectator's US edition Freddy Gray is joined by columnist Lionel Shriver; and reviewer Tanya Gold is in discussion with The Spectator's arts editor Igor Toronyi-Lalic.

Presented by Lara Prendergast.

Produced by Gus Carter, Max Jeffrey and Sam Russell.  

Transcript

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0:00.0

You can subscribe to The Spectator for 12 weeks for only 12 pounds for our print and online editions,

0:06.1

plus get six months of digital access free to the Telegraph. Go to spectator.com.ukh, forward slash,

0:12.5

telegraph.

0:17.4

Hello and welcome to The Edition. I'm Lara Prendergast.

0:21.7

Each week, we look at some of the most important and intriguing pieces in the magazine with the writers behind them.

0:28.1

This week, we'll look at the explosive paper that's guiding the government's response to coronavirus, as revealed by the spectator.

0:35.7

I'll also speak to Lionel Shriver, who says she's reluctantly voted for

0:39.4

Joe Biden in this year's presidential election. And to finish, I'll find out whether coronavirus

0:45.0

spells the end for the big screen. First up, the constantly tightening social restrictions can

0:52.3

sometimes seem nonsensical, to say the least,

0:55.5

with the government rarely revealing the basis upon which it makes its decisions.

0:59.6

But in this week's cover piece, Fraser Nelson publishes the details of Sage's reasonable worst-case scenario plan,

1:05.6

which is now guiding decision-making.

1:08.2

Fraser joins me now, along with Carl Hennigan, a professor in evidence-based medicine

1:12.3

at the University of Oxford. Fraser, in your cover piece this week, you reveal the details of a

1:17.8

sage document modelling the worst-case scenario for COVID-19 this winter. Can you explain what it shows

1:23.9

and why you've put it on the cover of the magazine this week. What we're publishing is what's called the reasonable worst case scenario.

1:30.8

Now, this is a hugely important document in UK pandemic planning because this is the scenario

1:35.3

that other government departments are supposed to plan around, not plan around what they

1:40.0

think is realistically going to happen, but plan around a worst case. This is what's happened in

1:45.3

swine flu. And the important thing is that when we're trying to find out why the government's doing

1:51.3

what it's doing, why are they moving to these tier restrictions, we need to know the scenario they've got

...

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