Aoife Moore: Government needs to start asking the right questions about lifting restrictions
Musician Lisa Hannigan performs outside the Pepper Canister Church on Mount Street Dublin, last Saturday as part of two nights of open air concerts, presented by Selective Memory. Picture: Allen Kiely
There is nothing more infuriating than when someone with relevant information they haven't told you, says: "Well, you never asked."
It now turns out the Government which stood over one of Europe's longest lockdowns never bothered to ask either.
On Tuesday, Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan said: “We wouldn’t have a concern from a public health point of view to express about an event that happened that was confined to vaccinated people."
He was talking about festivals like Electric Picnic, just weeks after Laois County Council rejected a planning application for that festival on HSE public health measures.
Only after Dr Holohan was asked what he thought about outdoor events going ahead for the vaccinated was the Government willing to spring into action.
Thousands of jobs and thousands of euros hung in the balance while a live entertainment sector was on its knees and the answer was "yes, for the vaccinated," all along.
Arts Minister Catherine Martin wrote to Health Minister Stephen Donnelly as far back as July 23 about the use of Covid certs for outdoor and indoor events. Two weeks later, she wrote to the leaders of the nation about her plan for the industry.
Such was the appetite to get the sector up and running, Ms Martin was not granted permission to attend the following week's Covid sub-committee.
The cautious approach that we took as a nation was based on the overriding concern that our health service was on its knees even before the deadly pandemic, and to protect our people and our frontline workers, we had to take a harder line than our European counterparts.
Now it appears the Government won't even consider tackling the hard questions, and it is left to the media to enquire about how we can live in our new vaccinated reality.
The vaccine bonus has landed. However, other than a few pints indoors and out of the rain, there's little other societal bonus to be found.
Theatres and venues lie empty while Croke Park filled with 40,000 vaccinated and unvaccinated people alike and now even the public health officials can't square the circle.
Sunday's game drove a cart and horse through any public guidance that we should be avoiding crowds and left us in no doubt that some sectors mean more than others.
The ongoing theme of the pandemic in Ireland has often been that one moment, one event or one debacle crystalises the new phase of Covid-19 we entered, and Croke Park was the venue for this one.
No one is calling for life to return to 2019 or calling for all guards to be dropped but trust in the public has not been forthcoming for months and as Covid-19 welfare supports begin to wind down in a matter of days, it's time for clarity on what the future looks like.
Ireland has outshone its neighbours in our vaccine take-up, our frontline staff and vaccinators have moved heaven and earth to get us to this place and the Government needs to start making the tough decisions.
Those who are vaccinated should reap the benefits, while the benefits of the vaccine should encourage those who haven't been jabbed to get a move on.
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