THE worsening crisis around the coronavirus pandemic is clearly bringing out the worst and best in human nature. 

There are many stories of solidarity among people and great work done by hard-pressed medical staff, while unfortunately we are also seeing self-centredness and ignorance prevailing with some as they hoard food and other essentials.

There can be no doubt as well that the crisis has exposed how fragile and vulnerable human society can be. 

It is surely a wake-up call for us to build a better, more decent society, one based on compassion and evidence-based decision making.

And this kind of building of society is needed more than ever. 

I fear that the problems we are facing now are a foreshadowing of a much bigger nightmare to come as the climate crisis worsens. 

We must strengthen our determination to work together across the country and across the world to defeat coronavirus, and anything else which is thrown our way, through compassion and the sensible use of evidence. 

Peter Sagar, Newcastle upon Tyne