THE FIRST mention of Covid-19 in our pages came on February 6, 2020 with a front-page headline that showed how new it was: Coronavirus was split into two words with the warning that it ‘could hit UK by mid-March’.
This was a warning from Professor Ben Cowling, a former Sonning CofE Primary School pupil who is currently a director of a World Health Organisation Collaborating Centre in Hong Kong. As our exclusive revealed, he had been analysing covid’s transmission patterns in China.
He felt that it was ‘too early to say’ how effective the UK measures against coronavirus were, but expected cases to pop up in the UK by early March.
“I predict that older adults will start being admitted to UK hospitals with pneumonia and testing positive for the coronavirus, but having no links to China or contact with travellers from China and no idea how they were infected,” he told Wokingham.Today.
“This will alert health authorities to the start of an epidemic.”
The fears about the new virus started to be felt locally. On February 11, Boundary House Surgery in Bracknell closed to allow for a deep clean about a suspected coronavirus case. It ultimately turned out to be a false alarm, but as it was one of the first such moments in the county it made BBC and ITV regional news broadcasts.
Daily test results became part of our national routine, with updates published by the Department of Health at 2pm.
Life did continue reasonably normally throughout much of February.
Students from three schools pitched ideas for clamping down on graffiti and litter to Wokingham Town Council in a special contest, impressing town mayor Cllr Lynn Forbes and her panel.
Loddon Valley leisure centre’s £2 million makeover was completed – and christened by borough mayor Cllr Bill Soane joining Cllr Parry Batth, the executive member for environment and leisure, for a spin on the bikes.
It was announced that Farley Hill Primary School could be moved to a new site in Arborfield, something is now in the process of being built.
There was bad weather too, as Storm Ciara ripped through the borough. Trees came down in Finchampstead, Foresters Way and also the A329m. Hare Hatch-based rehabilitation centre Yeldall Manor also suffered severe storm damage.
A week later, Storm Dennis brought major flooding to the borough, seeing roads underwater at Showcase Roundabout in Winnersh, Mill Lane in Sindlesham, Sandford Lane in Woodley and Church Lane in Arborfield. Our photo of the flooded Tesla charging station at Sindlesham Mill went viral.
A big boost for the borough came when it was announced that
a £200 million film studio – the UK’s biggest – was being planned for Shinfield. Cine Valley would be part of the University of Reading’s science park and bring Hollywood to the Thames Valley. By the end of the year, further details would emerge, including the new name of Shinfield Studios and the promise of 3,000 jobs. It is hoped to open in 2022.
Shinfield St Mary’s Primary School installed a book vending machine, allowing studios to feed their mind rather than stocking up sugary snacks.
Revised plans to revamp Dinton Pastures activity centre were unveiled, showing a building more sympathetic to the lakeside location, with controversial red funnels removed.
The Wokingham Half Marathon took place as on the final Sunday in the month, one of the last big races to take place across the UK this year as coronavirus started to make its way into the country.
Earlier in the month, a third case was identified in a 53-year-old who contracted the virus while attending a conference in Singapore. He was later linked to 11 cases, five in the UK and was said to be a ‘super-spreader’. Doctors were able to order people to self-isolate if they had the virus.
The first British person to die from coronavirus was a tourist who was on-board the Diamond Princess, a cruise ship moored off Japan.
On February 22, Italian authorities reported cases in holiday resorts, including Lombardy, Piedmont and Veneto. As this came after half-term, it would have repercussions for the spread of the virus in the UK in March.
The first confirmed case in the borough was a staff member at Willow Bank Infants School in Woodley who had been on holiday in Italy during that half-term break. The school was closed for deep cleaning, and staff from The Bulmershe School self-isolated as they had children attending Willow Bank.
It later turned out that the staff member had attended a training event at another school, leading to more tests, but these came back as negative.
The news was broken by Wokingham.Today during the evening of Saturday, February 29, and saw Cllr Charles Margetts, the executive member for health and wellbeing at Wokingham Borough Council, appear as the main story on the national BBC news bulletin the next evening.
He told us: “We want people to stay calm and focus on the advice from Public Health England” and pledged that council officers were working around the clock to ensure that appropriate information was shared with residents.
Reading East MP Matt Rodda raised the case in parliament, asking health secretary Matt Hancock what would happen to help protect schools. Responding, Mr Hancock said that it was important for schools to stay open and staff and parents should follow medical advice.
“If there is no epidemiological reason to close, a school should not be closing,” he said.
