According to reports today, a reasonable worst-case scenario would see 80% of the British population contracting the disease. Experts seem agreed that its effects increase in seriousness with the age of the patient and that babies and young children seem somehow to be almost immune.
If that's so, it seems likely that the younger element of BCG membership will very soon be peppering Newsjack with breaking news stories, good week - bad week jokes and hilarious sketches about the suffering and ultimate deaths of some of our older members. It'll be a bit grim and gruesome and not at all PC but it'll advance some people's embryonic writing careers and it'll make a pleasant change from the incessant rewordings of "Trump's a c***" and "Boris is a knobhead".
Facts about the disease's seriousness and the extent to which it's a national threat are few and far between but I've heard it said that an elderly person who gets it has a 10% chance of dying. That's worrying news unless, of course, one turns it on its head and says elderly sufferers have a 90% chance of survival. If you put it that way, the statistic becomes very nearly "uplifting".
I've got some tinned foods in my larder - mostly soups, so as long as the people running my Internet service and the people running Netflix don't all snuff it before I do, I expect the coming months of isolation to be relatively pleasant.
It would be reassuring if, during the forthcoming crisis, BCG members would continue to post simple messages to indicate their continued existence.
Perhaps, to add a bit of excitement, we could all put a few quid into some sort of central pot with the last man or woman standing collecting the lot?
It's just an idea.
