When was the moment you realised covid was serious?

My friend worked at a cinema and she was talking about how weird it was that they'd cancelled all the chines new year films, but they weren't allowed to discuss it when giving refunds and had to refer people to management if there were any complaints. It must have been some time in Jan and we were all wondering why a virus in China meant cinemas were cancelling films here.
Shopping as the shelves emptied.
My parents choosing to lockdown before the official lockdown was announced as they were high risk.
Going into town to buy DS school shoes, at the point when we'd been told not to do non-essential shopping, but before lockdown. I still thought he'd be needing school shoes and they couldn't wait as his current ones had holes in the soles. Town was empty and I remember coming home and telling DP how surprising it was how many people were in masks.
Schools closing, a y6 mum in tears as she knew her child wasn't ever going back. School was at less than 50% attendance when we did that last pick up, so only a few of us got to say a proper goodbye.

When someone at work came round and asked if anyone had any health conditions as they were to go home .
Getting a phone call from my husband to say that all the work had suddenly dropped off and his boss had asked if he could look for another job for six months until it was over ( if only ) thank god for furlough

I don't mean this to sound as pathetic as it does but when McDonalds posted on social media to say they were closing. I don't why out of everything happening with schools, WFH etc that was the thing that stood out but there you go!

and the week after the first person in the UK died I started feeling ill with all the symptoms.
that was just surreal

When I went to the chemist and thought while I'm here maybe I'll get some hand sanitizer just in case. Everyone had had the same thought- the shops were cleared out and people were asking the shop assistants where they could get sanitizer. It was the first time I had seen the impact on my day to day life and I remember realising what was about to happen and feeling like a tsunami was about to crash over us.

Beginning of March seeing someone in a mask in supermarket

When a friend who works for a huge financial firm in London told me they were shutting down indefinitely and everything else would follow.

When I received an email from my professional body encouraging me to re-register and work on the wards. That 'all hands on deck' feeling hit home, and I went back into the NHS to help out-been back ever since

10th March 2020, the exact date we decided to lockdown, as I am one of the extremely vulnerable. We could see where it was going and made the decision that day after my mum had been to a family funeral (not covid related)

When the Norwegians cancelled an operation of 10,000 International military personnel in late January. DH was deployed on it, and it was a MASSIVE shock to everyone and clearly indicated an enormous concern I simply hadn't had at that point.

www.thedefensepost.com/2021/01/27/nato-arctic-manoeuvres-cancelled/

@Xigris. That’s a powerful post that resonates . I wish your colleagues well

When it was getting bad in Italy. I remember talking to my boss about Italians having to queue to get in the supermarket, & she was very dismissive, very it's all being blown out of proportion etc but I thought then if it can happen in Italy it can happen here.

When I saw images in the news of people in full protective gear spraying the air in the street in Wuhan, followed by talk of school closures talk. Then got a text from school saying they were closed that very same day due to many cases, already!. First lockdown followed soon.
I had to go to work. I have to say I was scared! In a way, I wish I had never seen them spraying the air in the streets. I think this will haunt me forever. I was worried it would actually be much much worst that it has been, and that I would catch it just breathing at work! It lasted a few days. Then more info about the damn virus came in, and felt better.

@ZingDramaQueenOfSheeba just read your post about anxiety. This was very true for a friend of mine who has significant health and generalised anxiety to the point it affects her everyday life. I initially thought she would really spiral when covid hit but actually it was quite the reverse!

March 2020.

1st - cousin was fine
3rd - cousin was a bit off colour
15th - cousin was dead
20th - family was told they could not attend funeral

In I think mid December 2019. I read an article about this strange virus in Wuhan, I knew then it was going to be major. Remember being sat on the end of the bed and just knowing it was going to be huge. Told my family and friends and they all thought I was crazy I could tell.

I was working in a GP surgery last year so remember it being talking about in detail from day one. I remember the first Covid case in the UK, then the first death which then just kept increasing.

It really hit me hard in March, just before the lockdown when I was having my hair done to go to a funeral and hearing the adverts on the radio for holiday homes in Cornwall and Easter activities knowing that nothing would be happening. I realised the adverts were pre-scheduled but it was really eerie.

When the ICU I work on went from 5 ventilated patients to over 20 in the space of a few days. We felt like we were in the middle of Armageddon with not a clue as to how it would pan out. This was pre lock down. We were terrified and the patients just kept coming. They were so, so sick and whatever we did didn’t seem to work.

But oh my God. The team work was unbelievable and most people just got on with it. I am so proud to be part of that team.

We are dealing with the fallout now in terms of illness, exhaustion and PTSD

When Dr Li died. He was only in his thirties. Just looked up the date and it was 7th February.

Although I still went on a train to London and a plane to Northern Ireland after that so must have felt it was far away. I remember lots of hand washing in London though and worrying about crowding on the Tube.

Panic buying terrified me- still makes me anxious now if I go to the supermarket and there are empty shelves
The week of 16 March was the scariest week of my life - it felt like the apocalypse and I felt like society was going to collapse/ it doesn't help that I'm a natural worrier and one of my coping strategies is 'what's the worst that can happen?' Which is useful for normal everyday worries but cataclysmic when there's a pandemic unfolding!
The week after when lockdown started and there was the nhs clap etc and a feeling of everyone pulling together for the greater good was for me personally less scary than the week before when everything changed in the space of a few days
I still find it quite eery looking at things from the couple of months leading up to it and how we had no idea what was round the corner

When a minister, can’t remember which one, probably Hancock, appealed for companies to make ventilators and said the government would guarantee to buy as many as they could make.

Pubs and St Patrick's day are like salt and vinegar aren't they?

Not sure why that was the stand out thing to me. Some of my EsoL.students had already started wearing masks and gloves to class then too which hit home

when my DH started panicking. it was quite weird.
I told him that feeling as if the world was on fire is how I feel constantly, every single day (I was dx with anxiety almost 15 y ago).
it was quite bizarre, that for once I was the calm one because people everywhere were suddenly reacting in a way that was very familiar for me.

I felt understood and that never happened before so it had to be something big to cause that change