I WAS baffled to see pictures of vast crowds of revellers celebrating New Year in China.

I was equally confused to see similar scenes in New Zealand, where 30,000 people had fun at a two-day music festival.

Despite having had more stringent rules than the UK regarding people entering and leaving these countries, in terms of the vaccination, they are at a similar stage to us.

I would have thought that without country-wide jabs, it would still be necessary to be ultra-careful and carry on with social distancing for some time yet.

But these countries seem to be more or less back to normal, with people congregating like there's no tomorrow. It’s a mystery to me.