A lot of us, I feel sure, think we had a hard year of it in 2022. It started badly, then got worse. In early January, the number of deaths worldwide from Covid-19 was reckoned at 5.5 million, with hundreds of thousands more to follow. But the pandemic looked to be on its last legs, which meant, of course, that the recriminations began, with the pro-lockdown, pro-mask lobby forced onto the defensive.