Opening of "No-Food" pubs pushed out again

OK, let's explain it in words of half a syllable in the forlorn hope that some of the people that haven't got it yet might get why some of the pubs remain closed.

The decision was made that pubs that don't serve food or have a kitchen in the premises are to remain closed. That's NOT saying that there's anything wrong with the precautions that may have been taken by the owner/landlord, it's just one way that the relevant people who make the decision have used as a necessary way to reduce the overall number of hospitality locations that are open and facilitating gathering of significant numbers of people, which is one of the major contributors to the spread of Covid across the population.

Like it or not, there are several levels of hospitality.

No 1 is the hotels.
No 2 is restaurants and pubs that serve hot meals with a reasonable menu selection
No 3 is "wet" pubs, that effectively only sell (primarily) alcoholic drink, though they might sell peanuts and crisps if you are lucky.

Brutal reality is that of the 3, if we need to reduce the total number of places where contact needs to be reduced, then group 3, the wet pubs, are serving the least beneficial total contribution to the mix. People need sleep, they need food, they can manage without alcoholic drink.

Maybe it would have been better if they'd said that all pubs painted green had to stay closed, or that if the name started with "T", or "F", or "L", they had to remain closed.

For all sorts of reasons, there's no easy option to allow some to open some days, and others to open on different days, and all hospitality open will only allow too much contact to keep the virus under control until there is a vaccine option available to supress it.

Food or no food is not really the issue, though there are good reasons for having food in the equation, as it does help to influence the total alcohol intake. Note I've said nothing about behaviour after too much drink is taken, though to deny that there are problems in this area is to ignore the elephant in the room.

The real reason for keeping things tight is to try and contain the spread of the virus, by reducing the number of places where numbers of people can gather for prolonged periods of time, and like it or not, it IS that simple.

The fact that some people get Covid and don't know they've got it only serves to make it more dangerous, in that their contact with other people may put vulnerable people at risk of contracting it, and their outcome may not be so benign.

Take a look at the figures coming out of some of the US states, do we really want that level of infection and death here, and the answer to that HAS to be a resounding NO. There may be a hundred different reasons why the death toll is so high, the reasons are in many respects irrelevant, the fact that people are dying when they did not need to is all we need to know, and anyone that thinks it's acceptable to put others at risk for their own pleasure has a much bigger problem than a possible dependence on alcohol.

The constant focus on wet pubs is only serving to annoy people who want to participate in larger gatherings for things like music, sport, theatre, etc, which have been equally badly affected by the ongoing restrictions. There are also massive effects on a range of social gatherings, but that's a much wider issue than the fact that some rural pubs can't operate at the moment, and not something that can be changed or dealt with until Covid is back under control, which right now it very much is NOT.