Comment: COVID - if we winter this one out, we can summer anywhere ...

Fife may not have moved into a lower level of COVID restrictions, but it was still a landmark week.
By FFP Editorial Comment
Published 10th Dec 2020, 12:30 BST
08-12-2020. Picture Michael Gillen. FALKIRK. Day 258 of UK wide coronavirus lockdown. Day 37 of Scotland 5 tier system. Falkirk is in Level 3. LARBERT. Forth Valley Royal Hospital, FVRH. NHS Forth Valley. Covid-19 vaccinations will begin in Forth Valley on Tuesday 8th December 2020 with frontline health and social care staff along with care home workers set to the first to receive the initial supplies of the new Pfzier/BioNTech vaccine at clinics taking place at Forth Valley Royal Hospital in Larbert. Separate arrangements are being made to vaccinate local care home residents across Forth Valley from 14th December 2020. Pictured: Dorothy Bell, Head of Occupational Health and receiving the vaccine Hilary Nelson, ICU critical care nurse and Royal college of Nursing steward for NHS Forth Valley. 08-12-2020. Picture Michael Gillen. FALKIRK. Day 258 of UK wide coronavirus lockdown. Day 37 of Scotland 5 tier system. Falkirk is in Level 3. LARBERT. Forth Valley Royal Hospital, FVRH. NHS Forth Valley. Covid-19 vaccinations will begin in Forth Valley on Tuesday 8th December 2020 with frontline health and social care staff along with care home workers set to the first to receive the initial supplies of the new Pfzier/BioNTech vaccine at clinics taking place at Forth Valley Royal Hospital in Larbert. Separate arrangements are being made to vaccinate local care home residents across Forth Valley from 14th December 2020. Pictured: Dorothy Bell, Head of Occupational Health and receiving the vaccine Hilary Nelson, ICU critical care nurse and Royal college of Nursing steward for NHS Forth Valley.
08-12-2020. Picture Michael Gillen. FALKIRK. Day 258 of UK wide coronavirus lockdown. Day 37 of Scotland 5 tier system. Falkirk is in Level 3. LARBERT. Forth Valley Royal Hospital, FVRH. NHS Forth Valley. Covid-19 vaccinations will begin in Forth Valley on Tuesday 8th December 2020 with frontline health and social care staff along with care home workers set to the first to receive the initial supplies of the new Pfzier/BioNTech vaccine at clinics taking place at Forth Valley Royal Hospital in Larbert. Separate arrangements are being made to vaccinate local care home residents across Forth Valley from 14th December 2020. Pictured: Dorothy Bell, Head of Occupational Health and receiving the vaccine Hilary Nelson, ICU critical care nurse and Royal college of Nursing steward for NHS Forth Valley.

The delivery of the first vaccines was the day that the darkness started to lift.

The first health workers have now had the first of two injections, and the biggest vaccination programme of modern times is set to be rolled out across the winter months into 2021.

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It would have been the perfect week had Fife also been taken out of Level 3 at the start of the countdown to Christmas, but we have to wait, hopefully for only a short spell.

David Ross, co leader of Fife Council, hinted the region may yet move before the festive season – but that can only happen if everyone plays their part to supress the virus.

The journey through lockdown has been painful and protracted – more so than we could ever have imagined back in March when the pandemic first hit.

The human cost has been grievous.

Work completed on new Fife leisure centreTaggart star Blythe Duff and Red Hot Chilli Pipers' Cameron Barnes...

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Families with loved ones in care homes have suffered in ways that were simply unimaginable at the start of 2020. The arrival of the vaccine gives them hope for 2021, but it can never restore the precious time they lost this summer and autumn.

In announcing the arrival of a vaccine, the First Minister recalled the words of Irish poet, Seamus Heaney which have been quoted more than once in this most extraordinary and disruptive of years.

“If we winter this one out, we can summer anywhere”

At last, we have hope that we can.

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Related topics:FifeDavid RossWorkFife Council