Critical patient numbers still low; and a new perspective on pandemic isolation

'I felt like I was nothing, like I didn’t exist'

Dear members — happy new year! We hope you had a peaceful Christmas period and enjoyed our festive pieces, which prompted some great emails and tweets from readers.

Coming up on The Post we’ve got a very interesting interview with Len McCluskey, until recently the General Secretary of Unite the Union and arguably the most powerful trade unionist of the past decade. He’s been an influential figure in national politics, most notably as a close ally of Jeremy Corbyn, whose leadership of the Labour Party is a major topic in McCluskey’s recently released memoirs. But when Joshi went to meet him for an interview near the Royal Albert Dock, he also asked him some more locally-focused questions: about his upbringing in Liverpool, his relationship with Joe Anderson and his views on the corruption scandal that shook the city. That’s coming out this weekend…

As for today, we thought we would kick off the year with an edition that:

• Updates you on some of the big stories across the city region.

• R…