[disgruntledphd2]

> - UK + Ireland: quite frankly a bit of a mess

That is mostly true. However, I would note that Ireland were kinda screwed in some respects by the border with Northern Ireland, which is part of the UK and thus has the incredibly poor response of England and the Tories. We've definitely made a bunch of mistakes, but it would have been a lot easier to deal with Covid were it not for the border (and our vast under-investment in our health service over the last 20-30 years).

It's worth noting that the UK cases are far worse than they seem, as uniquely amongst European nations, they only test symptomatic people, even though we know that asymptomatic spread is a big problem with Covid.