Horrible cold & flu virus spreading that isn't covid - yet no restrictions?!

Well is the death rate high or is it just a lot of people feeling miserable?

I suspect you've forgotten just how dire things were in March 2020.

What sort of restrictions exactly? People aren't being hospitalised or dying - colds and flu type viruses are endemic so we just have to live with them. Take your own precautions if you are bothered - masks, hand sanitiser, avoiding crowded places - but you can't expect the general population to be that bothered about a perfectly normal, albeit unpleasant, virus.

YABU. There is no evidence that the current "virus" is killing people at the same rate that Covid did at first. There's a massive difference between the perfectly normal cold-like symptoms that may be uncomfortable but unlikely to kill you and Covid which killed huge numbers of people Worldwide!

Yeah, husband and I have had it this week, it's a particularly rough cold. I'm not normally knocked by cold/flu type viruses but this one had me in bed for a couple of days. They go around every year and always have, sometimes worse than others, sometimes nastier symptoms than others.

Do you suggest we lock down the country every time there's a bad cold going around?

My husband has been really unwell for the last 4-5 weeks; a myriad of different things, with each week bringing something new. After developing a rash and joint pain/swelling, he went to the GP. They were great and done a range of blood tests. It's Parvovirus! We hadn't heard of it outside of animals but it's actually not that uncommon in humans and he has had the full textbook of symptoms. Seems it can hang around for months but isn't contagious once the rash is out.

Lots of unexpected viruses out there, it seems.

People get ill, it's part of life. Do you really think anyone would follow restrictions? People should make more effort to stay healthy and avoid illness, like handwashing, masks if they are sick, healthy eating, gut health, outdoor exercise.

What would you like to see happen op?

Surely you must understand the difference between an unpleasant virus going round your local area and a global pandemic that put millions of people world wide in intensive care, though?

Yes, some viruses are really unpleasant. But unless hospitals all over the world are being overwhelmed by people who need putting on ventilators, it's not even remotely akin to the Covid pandemic.

Unless people are dying from it in record numbers, it doesn't need a lock down

A bad cold doesn't require a lockdown because it isn't hospitalising or killing people in large numbers like COVID did.

You can't be genuinely bewildered by this quite obvious difference!

It was the number of people needing hospital treatment that was the issue with Covid.

There's always horrible viruses around but they don't necessarily put so many people in hospital. As we know lockdowns don't stop you getting ill they just slow the spread down.

Did you get the flu vaccine, advised for older people and those at risk? Flu can be really nasty too, people die from flu every year, but not in the numbers that Covid caused and there was no vaccine for Covid initially.

It's called Flu,

It was around before, it'll be around after.

Not every illness is covid.

What restrictions do you suggest?

The unprecedented draconian restrictions placed on us in the Covid pandemic were originally purposed with managing hospital capacity.

As cold as it sounds, we can’t turn to restrictions each time a few people sneeze, and deaths temporarily spike.

Aside from the civil liberties argument (which should never be cast aside as it was in 2020/21) look what it did to our economy. I’m sure you’d be the first to be screaming how unjust the world is should inflation spike and you lose your job.

I hope to god that this is a goady thread and you don’t genuinely think restrictions should be looked at.

Well if its not fatal then no it doesn't need restrictions.

I find the posts talking about how lockdown was wrong entertaining, did you not see what happened in North Italy where doctors were having to ration ventelators essentially deciding which of their patients they would kill.

And the hospitals in the UK were getting over run. If a new strain of flu causes the same damage then yes intervention would be necessary, if it is not causing hospitalizations and death then no a lock down would if course not be needed.

COVID was initially a systemic disease that had the ability to kill people. No one in the world had any immunity to it. Large numbers needed hospitalised.

I work in healthcare - believe me, the nasty cold you describe hasn't had any impact on us.

There are flu bugs every year. Always have been.

So Covid hospitalised a number of people in multiple different countries and increase death tolls drastically - which is what prompted the various restrictions / lock down cycles

i would assume this illness isn’t having the same impact / effect hence the lack of restrictions.

Well you said yourself that it’s not covid. We locked down before as covid was new and unknown and people were dying. Now we have vaccines. It’s less dangerous for most the the population. So there are unlikely to be restrictions for a bad cold/flu virus.