Germany puts Spain to shame, beats the UK and draws with COVID-19

This crisis can, or better, must be the beginning of a new way of seeing things and acting. We will be locked up for a few months without spending more than necessary, refocusing on sleeping well, working (those of us who can) from home without losing too much productivity, and spending more time with our families.

These changes have been assumed by society and there is no other way, but in the political system we will have to force changes through the votes of those of us who are locked up. The politicians have had little choice in deviating from the guidelines set by China by stopping their citizens' movements and isolating us. Those who do not opt for this system will win all the medals for ineptitude, and a death toll that no country in the world can afford.

The tens of thousands of deaths in the United States will be the legacy of the worst leader, both in terms of lack of diplomacy and empathy, and in terms of pride and arrogance... that arrogance directly proportional to the level of ignorance.

In a globalised world, the fragmented health system, directed by more or less large territories, must go hand in hand with global decisions in terms of health, with an organisation that acts faster and more firmly than the WHO in this current crisis.

Those who abandon the original script like Brazil, the United States or the United Kingdom until recently, and do not take a pandemic seriously, should pay for the danger they create in a world where squads of potential patients travel to countries that have been decontaminated, due to the lack of decency and commitment of leaders who seem to have escaped from Brian's life.

The answer should be no, but I still remember how at the beginning of the financial crisis in 2008, many "private school economists" blamed the crisis on John Maynard Keynes' doctrines. Keynes set out the tools of fiscal stimulus and expansionary policies by the state to get countries out of times of crisis or simply to help keep the wheels of the economy turning.

Keynes was buried and it seemed to be a fact that public investment was a thing of the past, but in the midst of the crisis he was dug up again and detractors such as Posner or Feldstein, went on to publicly defend Keynes' legacy.

The biggest client in many sectors and industries is the states, and if they buy, the factories produce more, there is more work, and more taxes come in to continue reinvesting. In the current crisis and in the case of the United Kingdom and Spain, which I know best, part of the reinvestment has to be linked without further discussion to two basic sectors.

Education has had to be reconverted in a matter of weeks, and what the Co-Director of the Digital Education Research Centre of the University of Leeds, Antonio Martínez Arboleda, has been presenting for years about the rethinking of current education in coordination with the new tools, has become the present, and not the future of Science Fiction. Working from home is possible in many industries and now we have to prove that it is possible to make studying and learning from home viable.

Education at all ages can be rethought, and without leaving aside face-to-face classes and tutorials, perhaps we can complement or supplement, as is the case today, education in physical buildings by more flexible education where and when you want or can, being able to enjoy those classes on the screens of our computers or televisions and be able to revisit them, if necessary to facilitate learning.

Education is not public expenditure, it is public INVESTMENT, and the more prepared we are as a country, the more flexible we will be to fill the jobs of the future, being pioneers for once, and taking advantage of that position of precursor and leader.

The second foundation of society is enjoyed at birth and accompanies us in many cases until our last breath, and that is Health. No. We do not have the best health care in the world and it has become clear, let alone the British, with a declining NHS.

We now know which countries were prepared, demonstrated with data and living people instead of coffins... and no, German politicians are not the ones saving lives in Germany... or maybe they are? Perhaps with their votes in the Bundestag they have managed to make health spending per head almost 6,000 euros per year, 80% more than Spain, and Germany in the past 12 years has been increasing its spending in this sector by an average of 2.5%, with the United Kingdom increasing it by only 1.1%, and Spain going from reducing it by 1.4% between 2008-13 and increasing it by 2.3% in the following 5 years.

Investment must be constant and reflect the change of the average patient. The bulging pyramid of the Spanish population with the baby boomers who have been reaching old age en masse for years means that budgets have to be recalculated...in the UK three quarters of the same.

In Germany, 9.5% of the GDP is invested in health care, in Spain 6.2% and although we are not far behind in terms of the number of doctors, we are behind in terms of the number of nurses; those that we exported to the United Kingdom by the thousands are 136% below if we compare them with the Teutons.

Angela Merkel is no miracle worker. The German Government are not superheroes against COVID-19. Germany is consistent and its continued investment in health care now puts the rest of Europe to shame.

They have convinced us that Spanish public health is the best, and so, like the British, we neither raise our voices nor ask for it to be improved..." what's the point, if we're already the best," many think with the ballot paper in hand.

2020 has made it clear to us that the Germans are there for a reason, and now we must ask our fellow Spanish and British citizens to start demanding investment where it is needed. Investment in the future through Education, and in Healthcare to be able to see that future.

David Casarejos is president of the Residents Council of the North of the United Kingdom