Hundreds of cyclists have stripped naked (though a few wore masks, as you can see) to pedal through the streets of London, demonstrating the freedoms available when a population is well vaccinated.
The London leg of the World Naked Bike Ride is part of an annual campaign for cyclist rights and body freedom – and an ongoing protest against the world’s dependency on oil. This year, it also delivered a glimpse into a society where fear of Covid seems to be on the wane.
Photos and video of the Naked Bike Ride, as in the links below, show a population behaving very differently to people in, say, Sydney. In London, people are free to mingle. Masks are still evident, but many people are not wearing them. (On this event, many people are wearing nothing but shoes.)
That doesn’t mean there’s no Covid in Britain, or that the disease is declining. On the contrary, the total number of Covid cases identified in London was 947,437 last Sunday, 15 August 2021. The following day, Monday 16 August 2021, saw the daily number of new people tested positive for Covid-19 in London hit 3166 – on just that one day.
The British confidence reflects the fact that more than 47 million people in the UK (about 77% of the adult population) are now fully vaccinated against Covid – part of the biggest inoculation program the country has ever launched. Almost 89.5% have received at least one dose of vaccine.
These high vaccination levels have created a “protective wall”, according to the UK government, sufficient to end all legal restrictions on social contact.
Increasingly, Covid is a disease of the unvaccinated. Most vulnerable in the UK these days are adults who are still unvaccinated – of whom there are over 5 million – and schoolchildren.
Even so, 648 people died of Covid-19 in the UK over the past week (the week ending Tuesday 17 August 2021). All deaths from Covid in Australia ever recorded (967) reach a total only one third higher than the figure the UK recorded in that single week.
In Australia, just 27% of the population are fully vaccinated and about 38% have had at least one dose, though the numbers are rising fast.
The London leg of the World Naked Bike Ride was cancelled last year, but this year it was cleared to go ahead.
Britain’s online Daily Mail published some photos and video of the event in an article which may be accessed here.
The Mail has pixelated out intimate parts of the human anatomy from its photos, though not from its video. Male beer bellies are shown in the photos but not female breasts – an aesthetically questionable value judgment.
For glorious footage and photos of summery London’s World Naked Bike Ride, with far fewer pesky pixelations, go to Twitter: https://twitter.com/hashtag/WNBRLondon/
The London leg of the World Naked Bike Ride covers 85km of London streets, crossing 14 Thames bridges.
Riders were encouraged to wear masks and social distance, though that’s voluntary in modern Britain.
The usual after-ride party was cancelled.
Written by Peter Needham
