You can stop people talking about Cummings but, like a cancerous lump, you can't stop it doing damage as long as it remains. And, in the next phase of the pandemic, where trust and acting for the common good become even more critical, that damage will be all the greater (thread)

As we move from lockdown to distancing plus test and trace, the strategy depends upon people being will to be tested, give their contacts to authority and observe quarantine if contacted, eveeen if not feeling ill.

These are not easy, they go against existing norms (don't inform authority about your mates) and individual interests (having to stay in while you feel well and others are going out). You quarantine to protect others, not youself.

That's not to say they won't happen. As I have repeatedly insisted, the real story of the pandemic is how well people understand these issues and are prepared to observe restrictions for each-other. And data from yesterday confirms this https://www.kcl.ac.uk/policy-institute/assets/getting-used-to-life-under-lockdown.pdf

But as long as you retain, at the heart of government, someone who symbolises breaking the rules and putting individual urges before collective concern, then it can only damage the trust and community spirit we now need more than ever.