Avoid like the plague

During the Middle Ages, Europe and England were hit by the Black Death '“ sometimes known as the plague. This illness caused enormous religious, economic and social change, as nearly 25 million people died over five years.

London was hit by the plague in 1665. The rich (including the lawyers) ran from the City to go to their country estates. The Inns of Court were deserted and during August of that year, over 6,000 people died every week. Nobody knew quite what was going on. There was a rumour that the disease was spread by dogs and cats and nearly 40,000 dogs were destroyed; thus decreasing the risk to the rats which really did carry the plague fleas which spread the germs.

In 2009 we face the prospect of swine flu. Government ministers are now telling us in no uncertain terms that in a few months time there will be a hundred thousand new cases per week. Already there have been deaths from the virus. Quite how will a busy practice survive such an outbreak?

A risky business

Solicitors' practices are probably at high risk of being infected. Especially legal aid practices, where large volumes of customers come in and out all day and quite often politeness demands we shake the hand of our customer. Many of the customers and the vast majority of my staff travel here on tube trains or buses; which will probably be looked at in later years as the main means of infection.

Interestingly enough, looking around at any London Underground train, bus or overground train there is a complete absence of face masks. Whether that is because people have decided that face masks are not part of the English tradition '“ stiff upper lip and all that '“ or perhaps a belief that if you are going to get infected you will do so come what may '“ is not immediately apparent. What is undeniable, however, is that if 70 or 80 per cent of the staff are absent with swine flu, the office could gradually grind to a halt.

Clearly one can have an emergency plan which will involve those infected doing what they can from home by means of telephone, email and perhaps having files and papers delivered to them; although it is interesting to note that in the Middle Ages plague outbreak many people refused to have letters delivered as they believed they contained the very germs which spread the disease.

Remote working can be very effective and with most staff having home computers, Blackberrys and other means of communication this can serve to allow some work to carry on, but, assuming that in the later months of this year vast swathes of the population are off sick, this is going to have any number of knock-on effects. The banks will be short staffed and unable to process transactions. In a legal aid practice there is a very real worry that the Legal Services Commission will be so short staffed they will not be able to deal with the payment of bills. Conveyancing could easily stop if the banks and mortgage lenders are all off sick and unable to approve payments.

On another level, how will the courts operate? If judges, court clerks and barristers are all at home with flu, how will the court system cope? Is there any contingency plan? While perhaps it would not be a disaster for the county courts to radically reduce their work, there would certainly be very real difficulties if the magistrates' courts and Crown Courts could not operate. There is only a small number of judges and given the government estimates as to how many people will be struck down by the disease there can be little doubt that a lot of people will be away from work almost certainly for the recommended minimum of five days and in some cases for substantially longer.

Talking to some bank managers about this recently, they were extremely relaxed indeed about the prospects of major cities paralysed as a result of absenteeism leading not only to businesses ceasing to work but people being unable to travel to work due to bus, tube and overground train drivers being off sick as well. They did not want to address the issue and seemed to think the problem might go away. No one wanted to face up to the fact that the problem could get much worse in the winter months when the virus will thrive and possibly mutate.

Making plans

While swine flu is currently not a patch on the plague there is always the very real risk that the virus could mutate into something much nastier. Quite what will happen then who knows, and perhaps nobody really wants to know. What is important is that dealing with a significant outbreak is going to be very challenging indeed for the legal profession and it would be very interesting to know what contingency plans courts, banks, the Legal Services Commission and the Ministry of Justice have in place.

I have instigated more vigorous cleaning procedures within the office. Individual members of staff have been issued with bottles of antiseptic wash. Anti-bacterial cleaner is being provided for desks, worktops and equipment. Staff are being asked to be sensible as to whether they should shake hands with clients. Everyone has been told to stay away from the office if they exhibit symptoms.

We have a contingency plan in place but our plans are only as good as those of others. It is not much good running a litigation department if the courts are not working.

Thankfully, in the 21st century nobody is likely to suggest that swine flu is being spread by dogs, so at least the office dog is safe.