Visestatsminister Leo Varadkar i Irland advarer den irske befolkningen om en lang krig mot Covid-19, hvor myndighetene vil gi borgerne friheter bare i korte perioder. Han sier dette kan vare i flere år.

Breitbart beskriver tankegangen som «a chilling display of authoritarianism». Bakgrunnen for utspillet er omikron, som ifølge modeller fra Ireland’s National Public Health Emergency Team (Nphet).

While the future course of the pandemic is difficult to predict, Varadkar said, Ireland is facing a “long war” that could go on for several more years.

– There may well be a case to say, in this long war, that if it’s possible to have periods of freedom then that might make sense.

– Because there will be other variants and there will be other winters and perhaps in advance of those winters and those variants we should try to have periods of freedom and give people a break, an opportunity to de-mob if you like, during this long war, he said, adding that we may have to accept that we «go backwards on occasion».

Fredag innførte Irland strenge tiltak. Blant annet må de irske pubene og restaurantene stenge kl. 20.

Flere land, inkludert Norge, har innført tildels svært strenge tiltak. Dette til tross for at tallene så langt tyder på at omikron ikke er en spesielt farlig mutasjon.

Despite widespread excitement in Europe over rising numbers of positive cases of the omicron variant of the coronavirus, less attention has been paid to the harmful health effects of the virus, which may be significantly lower than last year.

Looking at deaths from the coronavirus, the numbers seem starker still. On December 18, 2020, 685 persons died in Italy infected with the coronavirus, whereas on this same date in 2021, only 107 persons died with the virus. This represents a 84 per cent decline in deaths from the disease.

Varadkar satt som statsminister i Irland fra juni 2017 til juni 2020. Han representerer partier Fine Gael (betyr omtrent «den irske familien»), som beskriver seg selv som et kristendemokratisk og liberalkonservativt politisk parti.

Breitbart