THE Scottish Government's document Covid-19 - A Framework for Decision Making ("Sturgeon: Normal life not on the cards in near future", The Herald, April 24) is full of caring soundbites but lacking concrete proposals. The message could be summed up as "to suppress the virus we know we need to keep the rate at which it replicates under 1, but it's too early to know how to do this so the lockdown must continue". This fails to consider two vital facts.

The first is that the main reason why the lockdown has not brought replication rates down further is because the virus is spreading rapidly through care homes. These are predicted to account for 50 per cent of deaths in Scotland. Take care homes out of the equation, and rates of transmission in the community are very low.

The explanation is obvious, physical distancing and segregating people from indoor spaces where the virus can be transferred by hand do work. The implication is the Government needs to focus its main attention to halting the spread of the virus in care homes. That should include provision of proper Personal Protective Equipment, but also more comprehensive training and increasing the workforce so that staff working in care homes have time to observe infection control procedures. Alongside this care homes should be placed under the direct control of public health, who should be given the resources they need to implement a contact tracing, isolation and testing regime across the sector. The Framework document says the Government is working on contact tracing but contains no concrete proposals for how it will do this. Care homes should be the place this starts, and immediately. The people living there deserve no less.

The second failure is to distinguish between activities where there is a low risk of the virus being transmitted from those where the risk is high. Had the Scottish Government done this, it could have been starting to lift certain restrictions now. The framework rightly states physical distancing will have a key role in keeping replication rates down in future, but fails to draw the conclusions for the present. There is no reason to continue to ban activities where people can keep two emtres apart, whether these involve work or recreation. Mark Smith ("Garden centres and DIY shops should re-open now", The Herald, April 23) rightly explained how more shops could open safely, while most work that takes place outdoors, including the 173,000 jobs in the construction industry, could also do so. On the recreation side, there is no reason for continuing to restrict people from going out except for exercise or for the closure of facilities such as golf courses and country gardens, where physical distancing can be easily observed.

Relaxing the restrictions in these ways would give people hope, alleviate some economic hardship and allow the Scottish Government to focus its attention on how to manage the much riskier and thorny issues which relate to places where people congregate closely, where physical distancing is problematic and where there is a high risk of transferring the virus by hand.

Nick Kempe, Glasgow G41.

IAN Johnstone (Letters, April 24) is correct: past a certain point, the lockdown we are all observing will be become more and more difficult to sustain.

At the same time, we should all be aware that during the lockdown, excess deaths not attributable to Covid-19 are at a high level. When we add an expectation that extended economic depression will cause yet more illness of all kinds and more deaths, we must see that there will come a point where the cure is literally worse than the disease.

Maybe we have reached it already: we will not know until the UK Government and the Scottish Government are completely honest with us, and publish data which reveal the negative outcomes of their policies as well as the positives.

Peter A Russell, Glasgow G13.

NICOLA Sturgeon was at pains on Thursday (April 23) to highlight the pros and cons of easing lockdown by age group, geographic area, industry, or leisure activity – and the lack of evidence. She effectively said: "Now is not the time.”

She also said the approach has to be UK-wide and requires a "grown-up conversation" with the Scottish people.

It is a similar approach to her efforts to quell demands or Indyref2. For "grown-up conversations" read "Citizens' Assemblies" and "The Big Conversation", for "Covid 19 A Framework for Decision Making" read "The Growth Commission Report".

Ms Sturgeon has won wide respect for supporting the UK Covid approach, and while some may accuse her of jumping the gun she has actually done the UK Government a favour by being the "stalking horse", damping down expectations and preparing the ground for them. Don't shoot the messenger.

Allan Sutherland, Stonehaven.

IT was with great anticipation that I watched Thursday's news briefing and Friday morning's BBC Breakfast to hear First Minister Nicola Sturgeon lay out her framework for coming out of lockdown.

She talked a lot, but said absolutely nothing.

Not one iota of newsworthy decision-making was revealed during a waffling monologue of why, when, maybe, i's and buts.

"So let me be clear" – does Scotland really need an echo chamber of bellicose nothingness which gives the illusion of progress while achieving absolutely nothing?

It seems her appearance was nothing other than self-promoting attention-seeking.

Allan Thompson, Bearsden.

THE First Minister's Friday press conference (April 24) stated that Scotland will very soon have a good supply of home-produced hand sanitiser, a product much in demand at this time. Given the recent bitter row over PPE being for "England only", subsequently proven to be false, does this mean that if the English NHS requests some of this sanitiser to be sent down south this request will be met positively?

Dr Gerald Edwards, Glasgow G77.

Read more: Letters: Give the public a say on the future of lockdown