Many are saying we need to learn to live with Covid, but without spelling out what that means, other than allowing the UK to become the source of the next variant.
What's actually needed is for us to adapt our way of working such that the effects of the virus, and its spread, are minimised.
It strikes me that the various lockdowns, albeit lamentably late, have proven that many of us are perfectly capable of working from home - many more of us than did pre-pandemic.
Now the sector that's best adapted and most suited to working from home is the service sector, with the exception of the hospitality segment. IT, insurance, financial services, etc.
Now, what kind of economy does the UK now have in our post-industrial times? A service economy, and thus we're one of the best equipped economies to learn to live with Covid. Working from home also improves work-life balance and ensures parents are there for when their kids get home from school, improving the children's wellbeing. Some today treat education as a cheap form of childcare, rather than a setting for learning.
Manufacturing will, in any case, be taken over by robots and AI in the not too distant future, so manufacturing as a source of work has a limited shelf life anyway.
The fly in the ointment, however, is that exports of the service economy are best effected with close neighbours, if only from a time zone perspective.
Oops! We've shot ourselves in the foot a bit there...
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