Longford Leader Editorial: Vigilance needed as lockdown eases
Covid-19 continues to be the dominant factor in informing the way and manner in which we presently live our lives.
This week will see a number of key decisions by Government relating to the current lockdown and the looming Christmas season.
A plan for exiting the lockdown next week and managing the pandemic over the Christmas period and beyond is in the offing.
To say that it is a delicate balancing act is something of an understatement.
There are tentative signs of hope in the past few days, with the rise in daily cases seeming to have decreased.
Despite the grim milestone in the number of deaths we reached last week, there was some good news with the announcement of the vaccines.
It is not too much now to hope that we may be nearer the end of this pandemic than we were even a month ago.
Yet, caution must remain the name of the game. The reality is most likely that our exit from this global pandemic will be a fraught experience, certainly not as black and white as some would suggest.
And as we get closer to the end, whenever that may be, then patience will be required.
This will also require vigilance over the Christmas and festive period, if we are to avoid more restrictions in January.
It may seem a bit obvious to state, but it's in everyone's interests now to get to an end to it.
Lives, jobs and businesses have been ravaged by this pandemic, and further damage should be avoided if at all possible.
The coming weeks will require responsibility and discipline on the part of everyone, if we are to attempt to avoid these types of lockdowns going into the new year.
An orderly and measured exit from this pandemic is clearly preferable to a chaotic one and all that might imply.
Patience will be needed, and we owe it to ourselves and each other to try and get there.