A recent York NHS Hospital Foundation Trust report on the total number of Covid-19 fatalities at York and Scarborough hospitals also stated that ‘more than 130 patients’ admitted with symptoms had been discharged.

Surely this is reassuring news? I wonder what the number is for the whole country and why the Government and the BBC are not telling us?

M Metcalfe, Barmby Moor, York

We should have followed the Australian model

Talking to my son in Australia about Covid, where they have had less than 7,000 confirmed cases and only 75 deaths, he says that the difference between them and the UK was that they stopped all flights coming from China at the end of January, and all incomers had to quarantine in hotels for 14 days.

With hindsight it seems we were too slow to stop incoming visitors, and by all accounts we are not testing incomers at airports.

Geoff Robb,

Hunters Close,

Dunnington

Whatever happened to supporting each other?

I read with disbelief the letter about how lucky we are to be out of the EU so we don’t have to help nations like Italy and Spain (The Press, Letters, April 17).

What selfishness! In a disaster are we not all supposed to support each other? When one member of a family hits hard times, don’t we help out?

Whether we like it or not, we are part of Europe, with relatives in many EU countries.

I am not a churchgoer but I do try to practice Christian principles. Turning your back on people in need is not one of them in any shape or form.

Sadly some people in this country have long since lost sight of such principles.

G. Brian Ledger,

Horseman Close, Copmanthorpe, York

Self-isolating pays off for some at least

Talk about ‘lording’ it over the rest of us. For sitting in an armchair at home looking into a webcam some members of the House of Lords are apparently demanding £323 a day in expenses. Self-isolating obviously pays off for some.

Peter Rickaby,

West Park, Selby

Would a car mechanic be able to fix your teeth?

Is Scott Marmion seriously suggesting that if you want a knowledgeable opinion on climate change or astrophysics you should visit a shoe shop (Experts aren’t the best defence against virus, Letters, April 14)? Would he hire a car mechanic if he needed dental work or a kidney transplant? I doubt it.

Expertise in science comes from learning and applying method: acquiring knowledge through observation and experiment, measurement and analysis, deduction, hypotheses, scepticism and rigorous peer review. The scientific method has proved itself over and over to be humanity’s best way of understanding how things work.

Who is more worthy of our attention during this coronavirus crisis: Anthony Fauci, an expert physician and immunologist who has served over 30 years as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases in the US; or Donald Trump, a man who does not know the difference between a virus and a bacteria? For most of us the answer is thankfully obvious.

Christian Vassie,

Blake Court, Wheldrake, York

I remember seeing that yucky hair bun

I refer to your article about the Yorkshire Museum and the 2,000-year-old hair bun from a Roman woman (Yuck! That’s just so horribly #creepy, April 22).

I remember seeing that hair bun many many years ago but it was displayed in the Hospitium, which was part of the museum at that time.

I understand that the lady’s head was resting on a pillow and so the resin which was put in the stone coffin to preserve the body did not touch the hair.

I thought it was fascinating. I believe that hair can survive for a long time. I have the hair of my husband’s mother in a box, it is quite long and she had it cut when she was young. She would have been 112 years old this year. Some thing else in my memoir box.

Maureen Robinson, Broadway, York

This petty blame game helps no-one

Despite not being a Labour supporter, I was pleased to hear that Keir Starmer had been elected as their new leader, as I saw a real prospect of the official opposition actually behaving like one.

My hopes were short-lived. Only four days later, Mick Phythian’s letter (The Press, April 8) criticising Cllr Carol Runciman for having the temerity to welcome the cancellation of £13.4m of NHS debt suggested nothing has changed.

Of course the NHS should be properly funded, but I would contend that this demand would be better addressed to the party currently in government, not by petty attacks on a party with 11 MPs that happened to be the junior party in a coalition five years ago. The Health & Social Care Act would have opened up services to market forces even more were it not subject to over 100 Lib Dem amendments.

As for austerity, the total public expenditure cuts by the coalition were £500m less than proposed by Labour in 2010. I agree that the massive PFI debts should be cancelled, but it would be better had the last Labour government not introduced PFI projects into the NHS in the first place.

Richard Brown,

Horseman Avenue,

Copmanthorpe, York