THE only thing surprising about the current Covid crisis in Scotland’s universities is that anyone is actually surprised, given that even a blind man could have seen it coming.

Throwing thousands of excitable young students into Halls of Residence during a global pandemic is a recipe for disaster.

Lo and behold, many youngsters are now trapped in glorified gulags, costing up to £7,500 a year, with absolutely nowhere to go.

Many critics are blaming the students themselves for being “irresponsible” and having parties, but is it really their fault?

They are, after all, only 17 and 18 years old and are living away from home for the first time in their lives, and only did what millions of freshers have done before them, including those now in charge of the official response to the pandemic.

Ultimately, the blame lies with the highly-paid officials and politicians who thought it was a good idea in the first place.

Surely, students should be taught remotely at this time to minimise the risk of what then transpired.

But in truth it is simply another blunder by the policy makers who are lurching from crisis to crisis quicker than it takes Covid to spread through an accommodation block filled with students.

Policy makers seem to have run out of useful ideas and are now resorting to edging Scotland closer to becoming a totalitarian state.

Scotland’s ubiquitous National Clinical Director Jason Leitch yesterday said a “circuit breaker” lockdown could be imposed nationally on everyone during the October school holidays to halt the spread.

But he then told MSPs there is no definitive advice about a circuit breaker “pretty much anywhere in the world”.

So why even consider it then, when it will cause more damage to the economy? They seem to be be just making it up as they go along now, following half-baked scientific advice that is increasingly being found to be wrong.

The only way that a lockdown will work is if you can persuade the population that it works, is necessary and show evidence for the reason it has been imposed.

This worked in March, but an increasingly dubious and fed-up population is unlikely to be so compliant now .

Lockdown will not end when the policy makers decide, but when the majority of the population thinks it no longer makes any sense. That day is nigh and the policy makers only have themselves to blame.