And the Daily Mail says Hurrah!

“I shook hands with everybody.”

The last time we visited my grandma we told her we’d better not hug and she giggled as we touched elbows, my bobbled hoodie rubbing against her cashmere, like the gesture was a twerk or dab or some other cool thing kids do these days that she’d never try to understand.

They announce the daily death toll with a smile - a mere triple figure. Oh, lovely. Look at those pretty coloured lines all steady. Let’s take a minute to admire them.

Once visits were banned we still drove to stand outside her care home and wave and shout “you good or not good?” and wait for a silent answer, just a gesture. For the first few weeks, her grey curls emerged just above the windowpane followed by a weak thumbs-up.

On the Monday, it took her a little longer to appear. On the Tuesday, when she didn’t show, we decided she must be taking a bath despite knowing her bath had been at not-this-time for years and did not let our hearts sink as we returned home without a sighting.

Is that a slight smirk as he says ventilators are well stocked? Picturing them shining prettily in their abundance on spanking shining new wards, plastic wrapping still intact? No one has turned up to hospital and had to be turned away from intensive care yet. A success.

On the Wednesday the doctor rang. It wasn’t looking good. He said there was no point sending her to hospital because they wouldn’t attach her to a ventilator, those were being saved for the young. Did he have our permission to get the morphine ready, to at least make it a little more gentle?

No point, no point, no point. It echoed round the house as we waited, a little less air in our lungs than before. It seemed a strange, big thing to decide in two minutes over the telephone.

How soon after those wooden doors close do they cave into the urge to pat their own backs?

A few years ago my brother, after a few too many pints, lost his house key. Instead of knocking, he climbed up on top of the porch and tried to jump through the open bathroom window. It closed on his fingers and he fell straight onto a pile of scaffolding poles.

The doctor rang and said his leg might need amputating, most of the skin missing, a few ribs broken. A few more things punctured. A puddle of blood not yet cleaned off the patio. My dad didn’t flinch, just raced to the hospital to hold his hand. When he came back a shock had settled behind his eyes but he firmly said he was glad he went.

My dad got asked to say goodbye to his mother at 4 in the morning, the Thursday. He sat for the 30 permitted minutes with his mask and his gloves and watched her fight for breath like a truck had tipped cement inside her.

She’d died by 6. Even his second-hand impression around the dining room table, breaths like Darth Vader and a chest rising a foot high, was enough to make me more nauseous than any amount of blood. My dad, ever-calm, never phased, said he wished they’d never let him see her like that and simply rang to say she was dead.

A journalist tries his luck; he’s used up his allotted slot of questions but just before they switch his screen off he asks “Why didn’t you close care homes sooner if you knew in the very first week what a risk they’d pose?”

A gulp. “I think that’s unreasonable as a question, actually.”

My dad used to tease: “You’ll make it to 100, you will - get ready for your telegram”. She joke-pointed at the ceiling like she was telling off God and mumbled “I better bloody not”.

But she also always said: “One day I will go to bed and I won’t wake up” with a kind of peace in her voice and it’s the fact she was robbed of the chance to go quietly in her sleep that stings.

No, but - but - this was the fine line we were walking. Closing care homes sooner would have saved lives. But allowing visits to continue improved residents’ mental health. Kept them cheery.

I’m back from my daily walk, face sweaty, press conference half-finished, my panting breaths half-obscuring the sound. I didn’t think the first few minutes would matter but I stand stock-still, frozen; clearly I missed a news flash. I want to yell to my mum in the other room: Listen to this! They just said - no, no, I know they’ve never cared before but – listen! I’ll rewind! You have to hear this!

Each morning they rise from silk pillows, slip on starched suits and stand praying for their Churchill moment.

I grew into my distrust of politicians around the same time I lost my final baby teeth - but it’s always been a quiet disdain, a roll of the eyes, a shake of the head. Not this red anger. This numb rage. This disbelief that fizzes so loud in my ears I can’t hear the weatherman predict drizzle. I spit out the line they just tried to feed me and I know years later I will never forget the shape or the foul taste of it and they can make as many historical Netflix specials full of archive footage as they want, they’ll never completely convey the feeling of it.

“Breaking: Matt Hancock refuses to apologise to relatives of elderly residents who died in care homes.”

Turns out it made no difference in the end. So I will probably spend my life wishing I had knocked her elbow out of the way and given her that hug.