Covid and Lockdown: five years on

On the evening of 23 March, 2020 the Prime Minister, Boris Johnshon gave his teatime briefing ordering the whole nation to stay at home. The new virus, which was already killing thousands in Italy, had spread around the world from China. Lockdown started on Thursday, 26 March 2020.

In the weeks running up to the first Lockdown, restrictions and closures were spreading across the nation. A week before Lockdown, the HebWeb was contacted by organisers saying that the Piano Festival, the Film Festival and the Pace Egg play were all cancelled. The Town Hall, Picture House, Library and the Trades Club all closed. Further afield, Glastonbury and the Tokyo Olympics were cancelled.

Hebden Bridge Group Practice told the HebWeb on 15 March, "Due to the emerging Coronavirus situation we have closed our reception areas in order to protect the population and prevent spread of the virus. For everyone's safety we have converted all appointments to telephone consultations."

The photo above was taken around lunchtime on a bright spring day, the first Saturday of Lockdown. Normally, Bridge Gate would be packed to bursting at this time during the weekend.

From June through to July, Lockdown restrictions were slowly eased. On 5 November, there was a second Lockdown, easing in the runup to Christmas 2020 when it was announced that up to 3 families could meet. The third Lockdown started on 6 January 2021. Everyone, it seemed, was learning to Zoom.

Murphy's Lore's second series started just before Lockdown and was entitled The C Word and then The Lockdown Diaries - see below

Outside, the sun was shining and continued to do so for some weeks. The weather was glorious and many chose to walk in our woods and valleys, even though this may not have been completely compliant with the rules.

By the end of April, 10,000 had died of Covid in the UK. By August, according to the Guardian, Calderdale had the sixth highest rate of any area in the country. (Guardian, Aug 2020). By September, nearly 400 deaths had been reported in Calderdale.

For the whole of 2020, there was no vaccine and there was limited testing available. The first vaccines became available for the elderly and those at risk at Todmorden Health Centre from January 2021.

For nearly three years, from Lockdown 2020, the HebWeb ran a Covid News page which gave regular updates about the situation in our area:

Covid-19 data: what's the picture locally? - July 2020 - September 2020

Covid-19 data: what's the picture locally? - September 2020 - May 2023

To begin with, the HebWeb updated Covid numbers every day between 4pm and 6pm, usually soon after they become available.

The above chart shows how Covid increased in Calderdale over the 9-10 months after the first Lockdown.

This second chart shows how Covid increased in Hebden Bridge for the two years after the first Lockdown. In the 7 days to 25 August 2021, the HebWeb reported that no local authority in England has a higher rate than Hebden Bridge's 671 per 100K.

George Murphy's Lockdown Diary reveals much about the human impact of the pandemic:

• At first it was like a phoney war. We were too busy fighting Storm Ciara and dodging Dennis to pay Corona much attention. The February rain seemed never ending. Round here, homes, shops, businesses and lives were wrecked.  Compared to flooding, Coronavirus didn't seem too bad. It didn't crash over flood barriers and smash against doors leaving a trail of brown, contaminated sludge in its wake.
• At Hebden Bridge Co-op, customers do a 2 metres apart quick step as they pass in the aisles. In the narrower confines of One Stop and Oasis, social distancing is harder. Shop assistants are also on the front line.
• Those that die young make the news: a daughter 21, a dad 34. Meanwhile, the fragile old die isolated from friends, family and the camera's eye. Then one day it happens to someone you know. Emails don't have black borders to warn of their contents and I've just received that email.
• Now that barbers and hairdressers are shut, baby boomer men are posting photos of their long haired younger selves.
• Donald Trump, in his press briefing, suggests we try injecting disinfectant to kill the virus. "Kills it stone dead - in a minute!" The journalists should have asked him to try it first.
• Neil Ferguson, the man who persuaded the government to start the lockdown back in March, told a select committee that if the government had started one week earlier they would have saved 20,000 lives.

See more from Murphy's Lore: Lockdown Diaries

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Before the Bug

In the absence of very much news during the Lockdown, the HebWeb took the opportunity to celebrate our area by digging into our archives, and showing local life before the bug. The home page was regularly updated with HebWeb articles from around the same date over the previous 25 years.

Hebden Bridge: Life before the bug - June 2020

See HebWeb archive for more examples

Created: Sunday 23 March 2025

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