The Price of Petrol

The price of petrol in my local filling station in Blarney now stands at €1.259/litre. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it that low here before. The Blarney station isn’t the cheapest in the area but I haven’t visited anywhere else in almost a month. I’ve been told the price went as low as €1.199 elsewhere in the city.

The last time I filled up was about three weeks ago when I remember using a latex glove to hold the pump handle. I’d normally use sanitiser anyway but it seemed prudent to be extra careful. The price then was €1.299/litre, not far from the price when I started recording my fuel usage in 2010 when it was €1.289/litre!

We’re only allowed travel for necessities like shopping, work or caring for others. There are Garda check points. There were reports of Dublin and UK reg cars in West Cork last week prompting the Taoiseach to ask people not to travel. People are sent home again. There’s hardly any air travel. Dublin airport reported only 900 people passed through the airport on Easter Monday when normally there’d be 100,000.

On Monday evening there was only one aircraft flying over Ireland, and that was the coastguard helicopter.

The fall in price wasn’t due to COVID-19, but that contributed to it. Demand for oil was slowing down already but from my experience the price was still at €1.399/litre in early March, and that was probably at one of the cheaper places. The Russians and Opec were having a price war. Opec wanted to reduce pumping but the Russians ignored them and continued pumping. It seems now there was a deal two days ago so we might see prices jump again.

Restrictions are going to continue until May 5th and of course we all know they’ll go on for longer. A vaccine for general use won’t be available until next year so we’ll have to learn to live with it.

My son plays Minecraft with a friend in Sweden who is still going to school. We’re wondering why since schools here have been closed since March 12th. They think that children aren’t super spreaders so there’s no need to close them.

While other countries, or rather, their inhabitants, struggle with varying levels of lockdown, Sweden has relied on relatively few recommendations to try and prevent the spread of the virus.

Nursing homes have been closed to visitors, higher education has been moved online and there’s a ban on gatherings of more than 50 people.

Authorities have also encouraged people to work from home and to avoid unnecessary journeys.

But primary and secondary schools up to the age of 16 remain open, as do hairdressers and gyms, and restaurants and bars can stay open once they offer table service to avoid crowding at counters and bars.

A large emphasis has been placed on personal responsibility, and anyone with symptoms is asked, and trusted to self-isolate.

But is the strategy working?

As of today, over 1,000 Swedes have died from Covid-19, an increase of 114 deaths on the previous day’s figure and around 11,440 have been infected, out of a population of 10 million.

I went out for a cycle. The roads are much quieter. It was lovely. It almost felt normal because I was well away from the few people walking around. I heard birds singing.