Covid effects – general election – lawn squelchy – more marking

Church of England figures show attendances hit by Covid as data reveals pandemic accelerated decline in number of worshippers regularly attending C of E services.

Gatherings of people were prohibited during lockdown, and churches closed for several months. Estimates that about 747,000 people would have attended weekly services in 2023, bt actually 685,000 worshippers attended services in 2023 – 62,000 less than the projection – or 1.2% of the population of England. In the pre-pandemic year of 2019, weekly attendance was 854,000, or 1.5% of the population. However, some recovery was seen in 2023, with weekly attendance figures rising by almost 5% overall, and nearly 6% for under-16s. Source.

This sparked a thought process in my addled brain about the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, and I looked at available data. In 1918 there was not a lockdown and people actually gathered in churches for comfort. With better scientific understanding, unpopular though it was, isolation worked. This table shows deaths from the infections against percentage of world population. Three papers are cited with widely varying estimates, but even the least bad estimate shows a death rate from Covid of a tenth of the Spanish flu.

	Number of deaths	1918	2020
Population		1.8 billion	7.82 billion (increase of 334%)
Spanish flu – Spreeuwenberg et al. (2018)	17.4 million	0.97%
Spanish flu – Patterson and Pyle (1991) lower limit	23.7 million	1.32%
Spanish flu – Patterson and Pyle (1991) upper limit	39.3 million	2.18%
Spanish flu – Johnson and Mueller (2002) lower limit	50 million	2.78%
Spanish flu – Johnson and Mueller (2002) upper limit	100 million	5.56%
Covid – Ritchie, Hannah et al (2024)	7,047,741		0.09%

General Election: If, in Excel, you subtract 23/5/24 from 4/7/24 you get 42.

The lawn was still in ‘squelch, squelch’ mode when I want to fetch the bins in.

Been marking – not particularly happy – those who worked got the marks. That statistic equates quite well to those who turned up. On that subject (turning up), some students don’t seem to realise that when they get a job they’ll have to (turn up, that is) otherwise that job will be of very short duration. In new developments in teaching, and this applies across the sector, we’re almost pandering to those who have issues with attendance. I wonder how this is going to affect companies, the economy and business in general. We’re already suffering from Brexit (thanks for nothing, Nigel) and now we seem to want to shoot ourselves in the other foot.

Ten weeks. You know what I’m counting.

Pic today of an egret from St Anthony in Meneage in August 2022

Music

In honour of the current weather …

Claude Debussy (1862-1918), Prélude for piano, Book I, L. 125 (117), No.10 La Cathédrale Engloutie (The Sunken Cathedral), Performed by the composer via a piano roll made before 1913