The government robbed young people of hope – then blamed them for the second wave

The dreaded second wave of coronavirus has become a reality in several European countries. On Friday, France recorded nearly 9,000 new daily cases of respiratory disease, surpassing its previous record of 7,578 cases. On the same day, daily cases in Spain topped 10,000 for the first time, and yesterday Spain became the first European country to register a total of more than half a million coronavirus cases. The UK has also seen a rise in cases and on Sunday the government announced 2,988 new daily cases, the highest figure since May 22.

The rise in cases across Europe is believed to be largely the result of a rise in infections among young people, and in England a third of all cases recorded last week were in people aged 20-29.

It led to calls from Matt Hancock, the Health Secretary, urging young people to stick to the rules and observe social distancing to avoid a second wave. At the same time, young people in Leeds have been urged to ‘acknowledge their own responsibility’ in controlling the virus as house parties and illegal raves persist across the city. Reading the news, you would be led to believe that young people are responsible for the recent increase in infections. But are they really guilty?

Since the government began to end the lockdown, it has embarked on a campaign of mixed messages. Don’t go to work, but go to work. Following instructions to avoid public transport, while insisting that commuters stop working from home so they can save downtown branches of Pret a Manger.

Socializing rules have left more people scratching their heads. With one rule for indoor spaces and another for outdoors, people confused the six-person rules (outdoors) and the two housekeeping rules (indoors), inadvertently breaking them at the restaurant.

Others have been puzzled by the concept of bubbles, not realizing that their household can only form a bubble with each other. This means that in a two-person shared house, one of you might be able to sleep with your partner (provided they live alone), while your roommate would have to keep a meter away from their partner and stay presumably single indefinitely.

Still, “the rules are really clear”, according to Hancock. But if in a hurry to take a quiz on them, I doubt many of us would pass.

In areas experiencing local lockdowns, even more confusion has emerged over the fact that people have been banned from having guests at home but can still go to pubs. And in England, while you can have a wedding of 30 guests, if you’re pregnant your partner can’t even accompany you to the hospital.

It’s not just that the rules are confused that create the chaos, it’s that they don’t make sense. This should concern all of us, because it is not being able to understand the rules that has led people to break them. So who is really to blame for a second wave? They are not young people. These are the mixed messages from the government.

But beyond that, seeking to scapegoat young people ignores how badly the lockdown has affected them. School-age children have seen their education completely disrupted. Thousands of university students have been forced to say goodbye to their independence and return to their families as campuses across the country have closed, with their future utterly uncertain. Young workers are among those most affected by unemployment due to the pandemic. And many young people live in precarious and poor quality housing, the confinement of which is difficult to escape.

The government’s attempt to portray the second wave as the fault of selfish young people who simply won’t follow the rules completely ignores why some young people rebelled in the first place: this pandemic has been incredibly difficult for them. When you look at the situation through this lens, house parties look not so much like acts of selfishness, but acts of desperation from a generation that has completely lost sight and control of its future.

This is where the messaging issue comes in. Not only has the government given confusing and inconsistent advice, it has also failed to give us a meaningful roadmap for the future.

Deconfinement plans have been so focused on the economy and opening schools and workplaces that the government has failed to talk about the bottom line: human connection. Gather your group of friends. Have sex. Cuddles.

You can’t keep telling people to follow the rules forever. We have to give them hope. We must offer them a future that matters.