Nigel Farage told UK did lockdown wrong - "We should have protected the vulnerable"
31 May 2020, 12:49 | Updated: 31 May 2020, 12:52
Nigel defends lockdown, suggests we should have locked down earlier
The government was wrong to lock down the entire country and should have focussed on protecting the vulnerable.
The conversation came after news that shielding groups will be allowed to go back outside on Monday as restrictions ease. Nigel was arguing whether or not lockdown was being lifted too early.
Nigel Farage found himself defending the UK's coronavirus strategy as caller James told him that the UK should never have gone into a blanket lockdown at all.
"If we locked down four days earlier, we would have half the infection rate" Nigel said, recalling that back in March "the infection rate was doubling every three to four days" and if the government had acted days sooner there would have been thousands of lives saved.
James tackled Nigel and brought into conversation the model that Nigel was referencing. "If I put that model into a system I would have lost my job" he said, insisting that the professor that came up with the report didn't use accurate numbers.
Nigel was clearly agitated by James' argument and challenged him to share what he thought of the UK's death toll. He began by telling James that "we have an official death toll of 38,000" and wanted to know what he thought the number would be "if we did nothing."
James turned the conversation on it's head and argued that "the hysteria of lockdown distracted from the fact we had to protect the vulnerable" adding that "the media pushed us into this."
He went on to tell Nigel that "we should have prioritised, protected the vulnerable and not the rest of the community" reminding him that "the model is not reliable."
Nigel asked how James felt the UK should move forward from lockdown and James told him that we must "protect the vulnerable" and then the rest of the country can be released slowly.
Listen & subscribe: Global Player | Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify
