WHERE were you when...? It’s a question often asked when we reflect on something so significant it feels like history in the making even as it’s happening.

Most of us know exactly where we were when, on March 23, 2020, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced that the country was going into lockdown. We were sitting in front of the TV, trying to process the unprecedented events that would change life as we knew it. It meant working from home, for those who could, home schooling our children, and only going out for exercise and essential shopping. We could no longer visit friends or relatives. A wave through the window or an online video chat would become a lifeline for parents and grandparents. Shops, pubs, restaurants, theatres, cinemas and everything else we’d taken for granted suddenly closed. Live performances and sport events were cancelled. Holidays seemed a thing of the past, as travel plans were scrapped or postponed.

And, as cases of coronavirus started to rise, and hospitals set up special wards to deal with the surge, people with other conditions had treatments and scans put on hold.

Back then, no-one knew how much the pandemic would change the course of the next 12 months. It was initially hoped, rather optimistically, that the virus would be under control by summer, then it became clear that we were heading for a second wave and a long winter of further restrictions.

It is just over a year since the first coronavirus ward was set up at Bradford Royal Infirmary, 10 days after the first confirmed case in Bradford. A year on from the start of the first national lockdown, more than 840 people have died from Covid in the Bradford district’s hospitals. The virus has touched thousands of people districtwide, and many of those who have lost loved ones to it have been unable to say goodbye in hospitals or at funerals.

The past year has been devastating for many reasons, not least the impact on the economy, education and mental and physical health, which will be felt for a long time. But there have been moments of joy too. Having a baby in a pandemic is undoubtedly a challenge, but it’s happy news to share, and the T&A has been celebrating Bradford’s new arrivals on our ‘lockdown babies’ page. Theatres have found innovative ways to entertain us at home, with local societies and choirs streaming shows online, and Bradford-based charities such as Cancer Support Yorkshire, Carers Resource and dementia friendship group Pathways have continued to provide vital support online and by ‘phone.

Hope has swelled in 2021 with the vaccine roll-out, and the number of Covid patients in Bradford’s hospitals is dropping. And this month, as we begin to navigate the road map out of lockdown, pupils have returned to schools, and care home residents have been reunited with loved ones. It’s time to reflect on the past, and look to the future.