it was and it will probably be again with blessing from the masses (you included i assume?)
SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)
- Thread starter Don't Kill Bill
- Start date
Yeah! Let’s get Whitty up against Denise Welch. That’ll be a proper battle of the minds.
No, I just think you keep making these statements as though everyone has lost their mind because of the virus, but then you serve us up the most hyperbolic posts in the thread.
Already is to family's who like to link up! I'm in a family of 7 (mum, dad, 4 siblings) and as it stands i won't be able to join them (they all live together still) on the 25th, huge house and all non vulnerable, absolute madness. Luckily i can go to my cousin's if it comes to it but there will be many people in a similar boat facing a lonely Christmas.
Someone i meet when i was on my break claimed to have a source within government who said they're going to be shutting borders in October, i laughed at the time and told her she's chatting shit but with all these further developments and the Govt subtly planting seeds i'm getting a little nervous.
Well it wouldn't be celebs on the panel but lets say it was then on the flip side i can't imagine Piers Morgan coming out too well trying to outsmart Sunetra Guptra or Johan Giesecke.
Isn’t Sunetra Guptra the person who wrote that study in April saying 50% of the UK had already caught it? I don’t quite know what the debate would be. If we carry on as we currently are without any further interventions hospital admissions and deaths are inevitably going to rise substantially. So what’s the debate? Are overwhelmed hospitals and 1,000 deaths per day worth me having the freedom to still have house parties? Or sit on a bench which I’m fairly sure you can still do...
250 deaths yesterday in Spain. 140 in France today. Trending upwards. You argued with me a few weeks ago that the increase in cases didn’t mean hospital admissions/deaths would go up. At that point there was a chance it was just increased testing. Well now we know - they are starting to go up and all data says the epidemic is increasing. So what’s the solution? If you were in charge looking at the data coming in and what’s happening elsewhere what would you do?
An utterly trivial upside to the whole shit show we’re about to enter is borderline frauds like her and Prof Karol Sikora being belatedly exposed as attention-seeking bullshit artists.
And Prof Ferguson on the other end of the spectrum claimed all hell would be breaking loose in Sweden by now and it's one of the few countries in Europe not experiencing this spike.
What I would do? I could be wrong but personally I think the govt and Whitty should explain what needs to be done to slow the spread while using statistics to explain why.
And Ferguson, but ofcourse you won't call him out because he bats for your side
OK Mr Rees-Mogg.
We'll ignore the fact that testing is known to be the key element to control the virus. And ignore that testing capacity hasn't increased for 10 weeks, despite the return to school being well known about.She was actually on Question time last night.
And Ferguson, but ofcourse you won't call him out because he bats for your side
Eh? I have no “side”. And I’m fairly sure you won’t find a single post from me on this thread commenting on Ferguson, either criticism or praise.
If anyone’s made a fool of themselves by being tribal about this from day one you’ll find that person in the mirror.
To be fair to Chris Whitty, he came out last month and said that if we re-open schools then others will have to close so the R number is kept under control. Looking at the data now, he was correct in his assumption, but clearly ignored by Johnson.
I actually think this sums up why everywhere is so fecked right now. We’ve scientists pulling one direction and politicians pulling another, so we end up with a half-arsed plan which is a mish mash of the worst elements of both strategies.
Absolutely. Sweden at the moment is looking good. We’ll see if cases are at the same level in a few months. Ferguson got that wrong - he can probably claim he didn’t know enough about Swedish culture as an excuse. Not sure what Sunetra’s excuse is? That’s a pretty monumental feck up. Almost like she has an agenda and works backwards from that agenda and presents data to then support it.
Explain to who? Who would then decide? There are numerous different options to slow the spread. My understanding of a representative democracy is the Government will be given that data and they will then make decisions on our behalf combining that data with expected societal/economic impact. Brexit was a referendum so obviously there was a very public debate - the public got to decide the answer.
He’s the happy professor guy right? Positivity regardless of the actual data.
Lucky you that your family is all non vulnerable. What about the people that have been shielding since March, and are constantly being told that they will have to continue to be lonely, so that people like yourselves can continue as normal.
It must such a traumatic experience that you might have to adapt from your normal Christmas Day routine for one year. If you don’t want to do a full lock down that’s fine, but you can’t expect to carry on as normal because you’re not at risk. It doesn’t work that way.
29th August
Well it's not exactly a first with Ferguson, he's got a history of disastrously bad predictions.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/six-questions-that-neil-ferguson-should-be-asked
I personally believe if you explained things througougly and properly explained what needed to be done the vast majority would comply, it would certainly in my opinion work out better (in the short and long run) than extreme scare campaigns and making it illegal to take two walks in a day.
I think you have too much faith in the general public using common sense
I never expected to "carry on as normal".
I knew a pandemic in Europe was only a matter of time for quite a while (the general hygiene levels and complacency alone saw to that) and was fully prepared for restrictions to "normal" life. What I never expected however was the Draconian cherry's on top, sitting on a park bench and taking a lone walk to the peak District being made illegal (for the first lockdown and inevitably the next one) and now if you pass a friend in a park who's in a group of six it's illegal to stop and chat. I genuinely never expected a govt to even try things like that let alone the masses giving it blessing, and not only that some were even begging for Boris to take our daily exercise right away.
A general public who begged for lockdown and didn't even want to come out of it?
So yes I believe if they were explained the situation properly with a (rough) exit plan the vast majority would have complied with what was being asked of them.
Boris Johnson is a cnut.
From what I've seen from years public facing jobs in the past to commuting into Manchester in the present, he has a ridiculously misplaced amount of faith in that. His idea that just getting the required factual information out to people is simple is nowhere near that either. We see countless examples of people being uninformed or ill-informed every day.
Fair enough. You didn’t respond to anything in my post though. You just waffled on about stuff that is all very unlikely to happen to 99% of people.
This is my main issue with people who complain about restrictions being in place. You’re quite happy to be indoors with 6 other people, because you’re all healthy.
If you used common sense you’d realise that it isn’t good for that many people to be in contact with each other right now. Instead, you’d rather moan that the government is introducing stricter rules. This is happening because people aren’t adapting to what is needed to keep cases down.
Can you not see the issue?
I do completely agree the public aren’t to blame for this. The message has been go out and spend. Go back to the office. Have a tenner on us to eat out. All of that combined with the low case numbers in many areas, Boris’ “back to normal for Christmas” and the cancellation of the daily updates has led to the belief that it was beat and gone. I’m also with you on the exercise and outdoor activities. To me the evidence from quite early on never backed that up. I assume it was to keep messaging simple but would hope that any new lockdown would not have those type of restrictions. They’ll furlough much of hospitality and those areas will close. Which is an absolute pisser for them just when they were trying to get going again but I don’t know what choice we have.
Maybe I'm giving people too much credit but I don't think most people will do that. Some will say feck it but what can they do if it's another lockdown. Pubs, restaurants, shops and cinemas all closed. They can't do anything. Some will try to break the rules by meeting up, having parties and some will protest but probably be small enough for police to handle.
I like the 2 week half term October plan. Make it clear it's only for 2 weeks not 4 months, business will get support and furlough will carry one another month. Majority will except imo.
I guess I'm hinting that businesses will also ignore any lockdown notices, and Boris would probably just go "Oh well, we tried..." and let it happen. Because so far his policy has been so light touch that he can avoid taking blame for anything (or at least he's given himself enough room to slither out of trouble like the dirty cheating fat assed snake that he is).
I just can't see a couple of weeks being enough. Eventually we're going to go around in circles and when Sunak stops the funding there's going to be folk like that prat who owns Witherspoon's who will say "Get back to work or I'll sack you". And at that point a lot of people will have no choice but to leave their homes regardless of whether or not they're showing symptoms.
This really is a situation that has no good ending, isn't it?
Attack the post, not the poster.
It entirely depends on which rule.
No pissup or massive gathering involving more than 6? Fine, if that's what needs to happen so be it, i take issue with shit like it being illegal to quickly say hi to a friend in passing just because he's in a group of 6. As for the Christmas example it should be case by case, if the rules still here on the 25th i'd begrudgingly suck it up and spend it at my cousin's instead but would i judge a family for stretching it slightly to avoid an awful decision? No, quite frankly!
This post deserves a like button
If you pass a group of six and you stand two meters away to talk to them, do you think you’ll get arrested or something? Are you that paranoid?
I guess if you sit down and have a drink with them, someone might say something, or if you’re really unlucky a policeman might be nearby and they’ll tell you to move. If you refuse then it might escalate into a fine.
The problem with a short 2 week lockdown is that the week after and the week before as a general rule everyone will stretch their liberties to the maximum of what's allowed. That's what's been happening after the last lengthy lockdown which has almost certainly caused the current spike. People who would normally have a BBQ with 4-5 friends who would then drive home, had several BBQ's with lots of alcohol and a dozen friends who then spent the night. People who usually would have a couple of pints in a beer garden and walk home stayed in the beer garden all day and went inside the pub for a few more when it got chilly. Parents who would normally drop their kids at school and barely say a word to other parents were chatting at the school gates and then going back to Toby's mum's house for a cup of tea with all the other mums because they hadn't spoken in 6 months. People who might have sacrificed their summer holiday abroad absolutely needed one after the stress of the last 6 months (I certainly did).
A 2 week break would obviously be less of a collective relief but with no vaccine in sight is this what the new plan is? Every 8 weeks we have a 2 week lockdown; meaning people cram as much socialising in to the 8 week period as possible to make up for the inevitable lockdown that's on the horizon? Meaning every pub/cinema/gym/restaurant/kitchen is rammed and social distancing can't be followed. Likewise reducing pub opening hours just means more people crammed in to the same space over a shorter time.
This is before even considering that the affects of the last lockdown are still very much alive. My wife has one client accused of a crime in January that would garner a 30 month sentence if convicted (15 with good behaviour). His trial has been pushed back several times the latest of which is March. If convicted (assuming it goes ahead in March) he'll spend a few weeks in prison because 95% of his term would have been spent on remand. If he's found innocent he'll have had 14 months in the prime of his life taken away with no just cause.
She has another case where two children are being removed from their parents due to neglect. They should have been removed at the end of March and had an adoption placement lined up straight away. By the time they're removed next year (proceedings again delayed numerous times) due to the age of the oldest child essentially their options will be to split them up and adopt the youngest or put both into long term foster care. This is likely to ruin the lives of these children irreparably.
Another lockdown just as the court system is starting (painfully slowly) to hear cases in person again would be disastrous and life altering for many people. This is before talking about the impact across the nation in terms of mental health as well as many being in financial ruin.
This virus is going to be with us for a long, long time, a fact which has been obvious for more than 6 months. We need a long term strategy. We had one at the start: protect our hospitals from being overrun and put a protective blanket across the vulnerable; our populist politicians abandoned the former due to the public clamour for lockdown and abjectly failed at the latter.
While I agree with most aspects of your post, UK never had a long term plan in place, Minus herd immunity which despite government denial was definetly floated around while Italy was getting ravaged.
I also don't agree that lockdown occured due to Public outcry, though if it was. Was it not the right call? UK did not do enough prior to lockdown to avoid a lockdown, the entire time it was slowly reacting rather than being proactive.
Perhaps if the government had an aggressive track and trace system in place, playing whackamole with high risk areas from the off. During Italys peak sweet feckall was done on UK's side.
After lockdown restrictions on air travel came into place. The UK have the most deaths in Europe, one of the worst in the world by capita despite being a fecking island.
The fecking 'World beating app is out next week?'
Which then brings you to the lovely Tory corruption of giving contracts to companies with no assets and connections to torys. PPE, app yada yada.
Public deserve a bollocking but this government are completely and utterly guilty of fecking this up. To slow to act despite China providing adequate evidence of the dangers of this virus, someone builds 12 hospitals in a fecking week in one region and basically imprisons residents in apartment blocks you fecking pay attention and do something. Italy get ravaged still do feckall..
I totally agree the government response has been inadequate and incompetent at every stage. Unfortunately Boris rules by popular polling as he has no real ideas or strategy of his own. That's why we've seen several U turns in as many months in terms of lockdown, herd immunity, schools opening, school results, face masks, evictions, free school meals, NHS surcharge etcetc.
Guiding a country through a pandemic by tracking polling figures and implementing what is popular at any given moment is a dereliction of duty.
I'm not blaming the public whatsoever; before and after a lockdown it's obvious they would clamour to socialise as much as possible. A politicians job is to use that obvious social science and develop policy around it.
Probably already been shared but an interesting thread
I tested negative for COVID. Text came through this morning. I’m not sure what it is. Probably just some other viral thing or whatever. But thanks for the kind messages again.