"She was terrified by the government propaganda and visuals of people dying along gasping for breath and she’s never recovered."
That wouldn't have been government propaganda because that didn't suit the interests of the government, that situation was caused by the government itself failing to deal with the virus in the run up to Christmas. More importantly though that was in a different variant that caused those severe situations and not in Omicron. If people have got their vaccines, we are not in that situation now and I don't know if the rational evidence helps improve her and get her away from what we are not now seeing on the pandemic.
Otherwise I don't know if this helps because I tend to think rational whereas most people don't (it will be the images that have affected her - counselling maybe appropriate over that, especially as it may draw out some by now deeply-rooted thoughts and attempt to resolve them?) from the perspective of myself in the lockdown situation I am still in: doctors not wearing PPE would make it more unsafe, therefore even less likely to go out, therefore the fact doctors haven't worn them for a long time makes it even worse - though, in practice, actually I do go to medical appointments that I can't deal with over the phone, with myself having to take even more measures of my own as no-one else is protecting me anymore. If the doctors did wear correct PPE, perhaps I wouldn't have to put so much restrictions onto myself. For me the official lockdowns are not still here - the media incorrect to say that lockdown has ended because, for some people, it hasn't and it still goes on - it is only the official lockdowns that have. At the start it wasn't official lockdowns that determined it - some people, including myself, started going into lockdown even before we were first told to do so, because the risks of the virus were getting more and more. My own comfort level on that was exceeded two weeks before the first lockdown officially started in March 2020.
My lockdown has been the only one for me as there is no point at which I ever came out of it as in any back to normal, I managed one appointment at the barbers shop in that July 2020 time - ever since then the Government has failed to do anything to make society anything but too unsafe. Recently it hasn't got better on this, it has got worse and is getting worse and worse now - even though Delta was notionally more severe, the booster vaccine resolved that - immediately however Omicron completely changed the picture and ever since then too much Covid infection being around has kept me in lockdown, coupled with the vaccines being less effective against everything versus Omicron than they were on the booster against Delta.
I do think it may be something different with your mum though, as her concern is death based on her age whilst mine is with serious non-hospitalised non-death outcomes that the vaccines alone don't resolve and then with the situation worse because nearly everyone else is now out of lockdown completely and doing as if completely back to normal (something I never wanted anyway: I wanted something better instead, such as normal minus its bad aspects that didn't work for me - the good bits of normal, such as Christmas parties and everyone having fun at them, would be nice to have back - I didn't see my family at Christmas 2020 or last year and I won't be seeing them this year because it is now even worse: possibly the biggest wave we're ever having by the end of this year - I don't even think this current one is the last this year, I expect it may slow a bit still going higher, then BQ1.1 and possibly XBB variants to be caught up in it and take it even higher - like the last time we started a new wave without even finishing the previous one last spring and then ONS infections survey gave the highest amount of infection it has ever recorded since April 2020).
Given your mum's concern is death and the vaccines deal with this, she needs her booster jab now if she hasn't had it already (the autumn booster programme is on, even if there isn't really much campaign about it although I'm told people will be contacted and called when they are eligible). Rationally, after being vaccinated again, she shouldn't be as concerned as she is although I know people don't work this way. Nonetheless though it does come badly-timed as public health officials are now advising people to avoid contact with elderly people. The virus is actually a rational concern on this and, after not seeing your mum for so long, it will be disappointing, frustrating and heartbreaking officials are now in effect saying 'don't see your mum'.
Those images of lot of people dying from Covid in ICU - that's not what situation we are now in and perhaps counselling would be useful over that. The Samaritans can help too as they also deal with people who are not suicidal - indeed, she wants to avoid death.
On the 'people out there' she has probably got some similar views to me, and the way you write shows you've missed our point. To me, people going to restaurants, busy shops and on holiday - all this bustling activity and rushing about life - it is reckless and wild. All three are something I would never do in the continuing current situation.
The reason it is "As if it is really risky and wild to eat out" is because of the following thing. It is really risky and wild to eat out. That's correct - you heard me right. We (or at least I) do actually think this is the case and that's because it is. I've heard people before say things like "It's as if [A] is the case" and not getting the fact that the reason it appears as if A is the case is because A is the case. The reason it as if it is this way is because it actually is.
It is really risky and wild to eat out. It is. A restaurant - indoor environment, lots of people, close together, no masks on because that's impossible given they are eating out, it is a really risky and wild environment. It is probably the absolute last thing I would ever do and especially when infections are now high and now even more with them now rising rapidly again. I mean, at a push, even then with precautions having to be put in place, I could manage a one-off meeting although the precautions are now more and more the more the virus is going up and very soon I will call off any such thing until it gets down later but, in any case, really, why? Why create the risk?, I could manage a one-off outdoors brief meeting but really don't want to be doing it and is not essential anyway for me, but a restaurant - it is an absolute no-no.
I realise people are in a totally different world on this, because they were going out in July 2020 onwards and being encouraged by the Government to do so under "Eat Out to Help Out", whilst I was refusing ever to get involved in any such risk and staying in lockdown on some pedantic basis that we didn't have any effective test and trace system ever and therefore it was not safe. So I never got caught up in the incentivised promotion and was never going to do something like that and Eat Out to Help Out was something that saw an increase in virus cases. For many people that did it though, you are not realising that people in lockdown may not be in this place. For someone in the pandemic still in lockdown, they may never have gone to restaurants in it and what you are taking for granted in thinking it isn't risky and wild isn't the case. And her sister is one of the biggest risk-takers by being next to actual people - I mean why?!? It is just even more risk. Someone like the sister, sounds like going around everywhere, loads of restaurants and eating out, worst possible things to be doing, in contact with numerous people in numerous places, she is one of the biggest risk-takers.
And busy shops - I mean I would never. Even if it was quieter, I wouldn't go. The only time I've ever gone into a shop (after the virus became too much in early March 2020 and has never got to any stage equivalent before then ever since) is when I had to buy some petrol in order to cover my visits to medical appointments (the last time I bought petrol was in January this year and with an appointment each month, the way I am going, my one full tank is going to last around three years and therefore I am not going to need to do this for this time) and even when I went into the shop to pay for the petrol, I had spent significant time over my protection wearing, ensuring my mask fully sealed tight-fit etc. and absolutely every element to make sure virus had no chance.
The restaurants will be even more problematic now if they no longer have their "Covid safe" measures that never made any of them safe in the first place. I suspect if they have anything left, it will just be hand sanitiser - to which I would groan in frustration as the hand hygiene rhetoric again of this hopeless society that does not deal with an airborne virus - yes, washing your hands thoroughly is something people should be doing but it is the least effective measure against this virus - and I am also not too happy about hand sanitisers as the bottles themselves, that numerous people are touching, may be a route to transmission of the virus - in fact when we occasionally see the news video of those people at the races before the first lockdown, sanitising their hands, I reckon some caught the virus from the hand gel bottles - they could have washed their hands, then put the bottles back and picked up the virus from the bottles after washing their hands - so is not foolproof, the bottles themselves need to be washed in soap and water for 20 seconds in order to ensure I can then pick one up without anyone else having touched it without it being washed in between - I mean there may be some mitigation as they did have sanitiser on their hands immediately before then touching the bottle, potentially picking up the virus straight away after cleaning their hands and perhaps the sanitiser then neutralise the virus they've just got onto their hands - but I wouldn't bet on it and I don't want to be touching anything anyone else has touched without me thoroughly washing it first or else if I do touch something someone else has touched, including a bottle of hand gel, I then need to wash my hands thoroughly without touching my eyes, nose or face in between and if that involves picking up that bottle of gel...
On this, I am somewhat potentially in a bind - although this has effectively gone away for now - as my measures in washing the bottles to stop Covid actually create more risk of monkeypox. I therefore do not think I will be able to stop monkeypox getting here if that were to take off - fortunately (a) this seems to have been got under some control and not be spreading widely; and (b) I am not too concerned about monkeypox getting through because I think monkeypox is actually poses less severe risk than Covid and this was the case even when it seemed monkeypox might be expanding. Technically I should get gloves out to hold the bottles, in order to try to stop monkeypox and now would have to use bleach against that - this isn't going to be possible when my washing of items against Covid includes items that are freezer or fridge food items, which obviously cannot be washed in bleach. So I think if monkeypox spread, it would get through but I'm not concerned about it anyway as it is less risk than what is posed from Covid and Covid does appear to spread faster than monkeypox as well.
So, instead, I continue with soap, which deals with Covid but not monkeypox, prevents the virus that does pose the actual risks, or else - obviously not for fridge or freezer items - would have to put something like the hand gel bottle into quarantine for 7 days or if was tins that someone has had handled, quarantine for 28 days (thought that's not my actual system - I still have a 7 days for everything and then tins get moved to some other place to do the rest - they are in plastic bags so touching the plastic after seven days without touching the tins deals with it and I wash my hands immediately afterwards anyway just to be sure) or can remove tins before the 28 days but wash them thoroughly with the soap and water to bring them out of quarantine. I know I will look strange to people on here but this is what I think everyone should be doing (as usual no-one else is and this isn't just a pandemic thing: it is also procedures back in normal life that most other people often skip out or don't do what should be done, so it is a pre-pandemic thing as well that also continues in the pandemic, but that's my autism and I think some non-autistic people, perhaps including elderly people who may tend to be more careful over the Covid virus than people in general, are simply paying more attention to what should be doing and are doing it because of the risks Covid poses to them or has posed to them.
It isn't the autistic thing of always doing something, including often when no-one else ever does it which is basically throughout my life including driving at the speed limit including on the slip-road approaching the 30 mph sign which I had a colleague claim that no-one ever does slow for that and actually be at 30 at the moment passing the sign and could not believe that I actually do do it - she couldn't believe this because I am in fact the person that does and I do know that I am nearly always the only person to be doing what everyone should, so actually do slow in advance of 30 whilst being fully aware of people behind me because I know actually complying with the speed limit law is such unexpected behaviour and people risk running into the back of me so obviously very careful slowing down and aware of who is behind. I know - no-one does. I do everything correct and it hugely frustrates everyone else. Most people break the law. I actually have to pull in to the left-lane and let people pass me, absolutely everyone else determined to pass me and break the speeding law (I know, very boring and pedantic pesky little rule - but that's the autistic thing and not these non-autistic people being cautious when washing and quarantining items against Covid).
The takeaway deliveries I did mention earlier some of what your mum thinks there doesn't have any basis - the virus does not live on food. I am 'just in case' on other things though, and it is an approach that has served me well in this pandemic - if our officials and Government had had this approach it would have been dealt with correctly - part of the problem, repeated several times, is there waiting for evidence first. It is called precautionary public health and it is an approach this country has jettisoned. As a result, we'd had way more virus here and still have all this virus here and have a high Covid death rate (that's death rate, not number of deaths - mortality rate here is significantly higher than it 'should' be as it is not this high in other countries and the reason is they deal with the virus). Earlier in the pandemic, we've seen New Zealand act quickly over a single case that could be Delta and within 24 hours was shown to be Delta - I suspect our public health official response to the same thing here would be "no evidence this is Delta, no evidence this is Delta", waiting for evidence first, waiting for that test to come back, and by then, within a day, the virus has already spread even more and now bigger problem, lockdown then needs extended more, whilst New Zealand jumped on it without firm evidence but there was enough reason to think it very likely was Delta, and indeed so it turned out to be.
Us - we are hopeless. I have been substituting my own stricter procedures than this hopeless official guidance of our country throughout the pandemic ever since I consider they put me at risk at the start by having me going around as if normal but just washing my hands asking if I had symptoms and failing to deal with the fact that the virus can transmit asymptomatically. I heard what they said and it seemed a strange thing to tell me at the start as I thought the virus might be able to transmit like this and therefore asking about symptoms always seemed completely irrelevant to me but 'the experts know best don't they?' and therefore I followed what they advised, even though I had my doubts over it all along. Afterwards, when it became clear that the virus could indeed transmit without symptoms the very way I had thought it might, I consider that our officials put me at risk and, after they did it again over masks, only to reverse what they said later on, another example of waiting for evidence first and not acting just in case, I consider twice putting me at risk, I have ignored them ever since because it is clear that, in fact, I know more than our officials do or else more than what they tell us and I have since been repeatedly right time and time and time again on what this virus might be like that the scientists, different groups of them at different times, then later said they did "expect" and came as a "surprise" to them (their words) that I both expected and was not surprised by and was surprised that they didn't expect what seemed clearly possible to me as this virus always seems to take unlikely route with these people whose expectations are wholly unrealistic and experts seem blinded by their own knowlege of pre-existing viruses and expecting this one to behave the same way when it repeatedly shows us it does not, whilst I have no pre-existing knowledge and therefore appear not to be encumbered in this way. That's what it has now seemed for quite some time.
But, anyway, this "just in case" approach of your mother's does have some basis to it, although she is not actually doing it in the right areas and the risks of the takeaway are not what she thinks. I wouldn't have a takeaway delivery, at least not one that was specifically just the takeaway, but for the reason that it would probably arrive out of the blue (not completely obviously, but could be any time of the day) and catch me off-guard with all my measures needing to be done first before I can meet the delivery. My concern is more over meeting the delivery person rather than over the takeaway - I would take a takeaway but would either have to wash the container and any film lid thoroughly first or else dispose of the film lid and possibly the container if the food could be put straight onto some plate without container touching the plate, or else wash my hands thoroughly after touching anything and it is dealing with that which needs to be done as I am shutting off every realistic possible avenue for Covid, I am not doing hopeless mitigation of the type this country in general does, if it ever does anything at all. She's not justified about the food itself, which is perfectly safe, although I would tend to avoid raw meat in terms of Covid, cooked takeaways though, or ones I cook later, they are perfectly fine, my concern would be meeting the delivery person, especially if they are now unmasked, and their own airborne transmission to me is more risk than the takeaway itself.
That is fine once I've had the delivery and then just needs my own procedures afterwards to deal with the surface transmission which isn't a major issue anyway and not much evidence but just in case justified over the container and lid etc., not the food itself which may be cooked inside the container, my concern would be over a ad-hoc delivery just for a takeaway due to the serious risk (in a society that permits the amount of Covid ours does) of the delivery person passing Covid to me by their breathing and then their talking as well. That's the issue and a single delivery for that thing alone would put more pressure onto me by having too many deliveries, so I would tend to put takeaway stuff into a full grocery delivery and then just deal with that in the usual way, with masking by myself depending on the level of risk (in other words wind in my direction, I am a lot more concerned, even if not, then mask anyway but not mask on top of mask and then extra - well-fitting FFP2 mask at the minimum for every delivery, although I use FFP3 as I am not nearly satisfied with supposed 95% effective but prefer supposed 99% instead) and then the washing of the fridge and freezer items that cannot be quarantined and everything else has to go into quarantine (there are no exceptions) basically just because it is impossible literally to wash everything.
If I want something prematurely out of the quarantine, which I try to avoid as much as possible by careful planning that autistic people like to do, then it has to be washed properly (and also perhaps mask when washing some items nowadays as the washing might put the virus into the air and then actually increase the risk of transmission and then I have my use of HEPA filters etc. - you may think I am strange but look - the scientist here, albeit they did have actual person with Covid but this is all the procedures they go to
twitter.com/DGBassani/status/1579111528653258752
which I can't even do all that lot as I lack the resources to be able to do it, but I do all my infection prevention measures, including I wouldn't even have had that person around with their ineffective failure to wear mask properly in the first place, although I have had situations in this house where someone has been potentially exposed and then having to keep people apart and masking for hours on end - very very difficult to do and would like to avoid doing this again by the other person not exposing themselves at the start - it was horrid, that two week period afterwards, just in case they'd caught Covid, from a minor momentary lapse that I spotted, caused me a huge sigh of frustration and then both of us had to do all that lot, for two weeks).
I hope much of the above helps regarding where some people in lockdown may be coming from. Regarding the impact on you of not seeing your mum, I know I must pitch it higher than anything I feel because people generally do experience much much worse than me from things such as this - although my position may be thought to be worse as my mum died of terminal illness well over a decade ago now so that I can't see my mum regardless of what I do. So there are people actually worse off and what makes me feel bad is not my mother not being here which should be bad, whom I loved and was a really good person to me, but instead the fact that I don't seem to take it as harshly as people unable to see their family that are still physically on the planet
In effect, though, not seeing someone for so long does feel like the same as if they aren't and I do feel for you and people in similar situation because you have it much harder than I do and the only thing I can say is try to cut yourself some slack and we can all tear ourselves up sometimes, whilst I'm now actually failing to do my own advice and making myself upset over your situation - shall we all go and cry in the corner, then pull ourselves together (easier said than done I know) and then take it easy on ourselves, I'd advise we all go out and let our hair down if it wasn't the pandemic, but then we wouldn't be in this situation in the first place if that was the case and instead some group hug may be the best thing to do (people can exclude me out of it if they want, as I am heartless) as well as trying to get your mum her autumn vaccine and possibly counselling for the images that have clearly affected her as far as you've established.
Finally, for everyone here, how I am about not seeing people is not reflective of who I am - I makes me appear heartless and anti-social - refusing to meet anyone, not having Christmas parties etc.: the way I deal with this is I suppose it would be described as resignation as to what is the case - that that was then in normal life when I had Christmas parties, and this is now, the pandemic.
For people who say that's gone and say endemic - even afterwards and even if endemic, which I think is not going to happen the way society is going at present, I would still not be having parties until we actually ended the endemic phase and got to a safe situation with the virus in what for me is currently the outside society, unfortunately my own hope to actual pre-pandemic at present seems to be to have absolute calamity and devastation before we get there, not endemic, but a really bad pandemic wave, because I don't have any hope of society doing anything right on the virus to make it safe situation unless it has far worse in the meantime.
Unfortunately it's not bad enough for people to be doing the right thing. It isn't what I want, unfortunately people won't do what I want in the first place in order to be the direct route to making it better, instead they think they know better and persist in the wrong way that worsens the situation as we have seen, or how I have seen as that is actually there, just that other people don't see it. It is actually extended pandemic precisely because it is being handled badly at every stage, exactly the way I have been saying elsewhere for nearly 3 years and absolutely no surprise at all that the situation on the virus is what it now is and not really surprised that the vast majority of people are as if pre-pandemic now and telling me what they are actually; I don't actually have to be in lockdown in the sense that I could go around society but would have to take such onerous measures of my own whilst doing so, given the more dangerous situation that others' pre-pandemic life is creating, that it is in practice impossible for me as protecting myself that way is exhausting so it is just easier to stay here in lockdown and only doing truly essential things in the outside world (and, with me being autistic, truly essential things truly are essential things and I don't make exemptions or say oh not to worry just this once because it does matter and it does make a difference as that one occasion of lowering my guard that I am pathologically incapable of doing will be the one time the virus gets through).
I know of people that have shielded for just two years ("just" two years he says) and then thrown it all away by thinking they could stop, have then caught the virus and died, so I am certainly not going to make that mistake even if death isn't my major concern (I was never going to make the mistake in first place, which is when others that are wrong leads to tragedy) although it is also the case the way I am approaching it is very unusual because there are people who are clinically vulnerable that have had to shield now for nearly three years and are unable to end it because, as I say, it goes on and, as well as people out of lockdown that have lost families/friends, both to the virus and to lockdown, that have it harder than me, also the people clinically vulnerable shielding for three years that also have it harder than me and are not being given any end to it either.
So both groups seem stuck in their situations because as a collective society we are not learning to live with the virus and are not responding to the pandemic correctly, this is the never-ending tunnel I saw at the start when there became a choice of two tunnels to go down; I saw the other one, with the light at the end of it as the route out of the pandemic and saw us go down this wrong one, the one that leads round and round and round with end only provided if we get off it at some stage and go down the tunnel I wanted in the first place, whilst everyone else saw light at the end of this circling tunnel that rejoins itself, I saw a lesser shade of darkness instead, although I am not even sure it is as less dark as I thought as, predictably, what some scientists have hoped this virus isn't has repeatedly turned out to be the case because this virus is how I think it is from the start, a completely mismanaged emergency and then crisis and one that has left people seriously affected in a negative way the way it has and is still doing.