Greek govt should follow and enforce WHO guidelines to eliminate community transmission of #Covid_19 and bring the pandemic under control in #Greece. Instead, travellers from the UK are allowed in despite much higher case loads there and testing is insufficient so infections 1/

are missed and govt prefers to blame Greek youth, despite evidence they're not the source of the current wave. Govt also has allowed the church-because of its political power to flout the laws so the elderly gather in crowds for religious festivals and church services 2/

without masks, including priests, despite the law, even in covid hot spots like Thessaloniki where St DImitris day was celebrated on the weekend. We see priests performing blessings at openings announced by the govt, politicians-all crowded together with few wearing masks 3/

for their photo op for the politically affiliated propaganda machine aka Greek commercial media. We see 800 new military jobs announced while the fragile underfunded Greek health system could do with 800 more doctors and nurses to cope with the exponential daily rise in cases 4/

We see the PM @kmitsotakis in many photos without a mask, leaning over the school desk of a high school student inches from her face, looking serious poring over the covid ma of Greece in a huddle with health officials, allowing priests to go unmasked at official state events 5/

We see the PM wears a mask in his Twitter profile photo and photo ops with foreign press without any sense of irony. We hear daily that again, the Greek people are to blame, as they commute to work in overcrowded metro trains, trolleys and buses about which they have no choice 6

and yet they are wearing masks and have no choice about physical distancing because the govt lacks the basic common sense to add more public transport services in peak hours even though we know coronavirus is airborne and highly contagious 7/

We see that a curfew from 12-5am introduced to stop youth and others gathering to contain the spread, as if the virus then takes leave as the sun rises and hundreds of thousands of people again crowd onto public transport, knowing that even with a mask they are at risk. 8/

We are insulted by the govt's stupidity and hypocrisy as they mismanage the second covid wave when the reality is this is not rocket science. The pandemic playbook set out by the WHO hasn't changed much since this pandemic began or even since the Spanish flu 100 years ago 9/

Greek govt needs to follow the WHO guidelines on public health measures to stamp out the virus:recognise that lockdowns and/or strict measures don't work without EXTENSIVE TESTING, CONTACT TRACING, ISOLATING CASES and COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT. They must adhere to measures they 10/

announce and shine into law to set an example because that's what leadership looks like. And the measures must be universally enforced which means priests and congregations gathering in crowds without masks should all be fined as per the law and common sense. 11

The context of blaming the Greek people in the face of their hypocrisy, singling out the youth for special criticism while some sectors of society openly and publicly flout the measures with impunity is a recipe for failure, not containment of the #coronavirus. 12/ end thread