Page 11 | Anyone still suffering lockdown fallout?

EmmaEmerald · 2024-02-08T19:56:10+00:00

I don’t want to tag any of the original people who helped me out a lot as I know this thread will attract a lot of nasty folk but every so often I feel absolutely in shock still at how the fallout goes on. suppose I’m seeking reassurance it won’t be like this forever but it might be, I guess.

PropertyManager · 09/02/2024 23:27

BMW6 · 09/02/2024 21:30

So in your scenario if you catch Covid you don't go to hospital, you stay at home and recover or die.
But that person has already infected others who go on to infect others, because you have not instigated lockdown.

So all these sick people are staying home, in exponentially increasing numbers, recovering or dying.

Who is staffing the food shops? Who is looking after those who ARE in hospital with non Covid illness? Who is setting broken bones?
Because None of these people have some kind of natural immunity to covid - they will be sick at home too in ever increasing numbers.

Or just staying away from work and isolating themselves because they don't want to catch it.

So where will you get food when the shops are closed because they can't be staffed?

And who the fuck is going to take your dead from your homes?

Without Lockdown you are totally fucked.

And I'm sure that will impact far, far more than any lockdown ever could.

If you think I'm exaggerating read Plague History and think about the population then compared to now.

Edited

Show quote history

Where did I say not to lock down, of course lock down, but keep those with an unknown infectious disease out of hospitals, and keep the same operating.

During the Spanish Flu, the infected were not invited into regular hospitals, all manner of provisions were put in place from village halls and scout huts to the pre-existing TB sanitoria.

You really don't want people with a highly transmissible infection in a regular hospital.

ZeppelinTits · 10/02/2024 01:07

I understand how you feel, OP. Obviously I don't know your own fallout, but for me the experience of the pandemic and lockdowns felt deeply isolating, distressing and traumatising. It has affected me, inwardly. Outwardly I am happy, smile and go out without fear. I do lots of activities and go to gigs. But I also feel quite numb, I don't really look forward to stuff anymore, and I don't really trust people. I've noticed my friendships have felt...changed, and thus many have drifted.

I did lockdown as a single mum in a tiny cottage with no garden in a small city. It was hell. We used to run up and down the house to try and get exercise as we felt so cooped up and crazy with just one walk a day. I didn't have a car and we didn't live anywhere with nice walks so we just looped round the same routes in our tiny city again and again. Now when I pass those routes (we've since moved house) I shudder at the memory of the Daily Walk. DS's Dad also got diagnosed with cancer in early 2021, and his treatment was massively delayed, I think due to covid backlog. His cancer was advanced but he didn't start treatment until late summer 2021, and he died in spring 2022 after the cancer returned - if it had ever left. I miss him every day. DS was destroyed by his Dad's death and is only now, aged 15, recovering from the horror of it all.
It was a bad time for our family and I feel profoundly changed by it. I will never be able to go back to the person I was before. I feel a huge sense of loss and grief when I think about 2019 me, and present me. I try not to dwell, but sometimes stuff reminds me, and it makes me cry.
I'm sorry for those who have suffered so much, in all the different ways that there were to suffer during what was such a strange and horrible time.

TooOldForThisNonsense · 10/02/2024 07:53

BMW6 · 09/02/2024 21:30

So in your scenario if you catch Covid you don't go to hospital, you stay at home and recover or die.
But that person has already infected others who go on to infect others, because you have not instigated lockdown.

So all these sick people are staying home, in exponentially increasing numbers, recovering or dying.

Who is staffing the food shops? Who is looking after those who ARE in hospital with non Covid illness? Who is setting broken bones?
Because None of these people have some kind of natural immunity to covid - they will be sick at home too in ever increasing numbers.

Or just staying away from work and isolating themselves because they don't want to catch it.

So where will you get food when the shops are closed because they can't be staffed?

And who the fuck is going to take your dead from your homes?

Without Lockdown you are totally fucked.

And I'm sure that will impact far, far more than any lockdown ever could.

If you think I'm exaggerating read Plague History and think about the population then compared to now.

Edited

Show quote history

Not everyone would have got it at the same
time.

Lockdown was a terrible decision.

TooOldForThisNonsense · 10/02/2024 07:54

SomeCatFromJapan · 09/02/2024 17:47

It definitely feels like a very different world to 2019. Spiralling cost of living and runaway inflation. The social contract feels broken. It was the last straw for an already struggling retail sector and many town centres are grim, post-apocalyptic looking places now. People seem more polarised and more extreme in their views. There's a sense of hopelessness now. Remember how the world felt in for instance 2012 when we hosted the Olympics? If you compare then to now, it really is a different era.

An element of rose tinted specs maybe as we were still being hammered by Tory austerity

TooOldForThisNonsense · 10/02/2024 08:02

notacooldad · 09/02/2024 17:08

I’m curious about the posters who have said that their friendships haven’t recovered. What has happened that you haven’t reconnected.

From my own POV we picked up where we left off. We are doing excatly the same things as before lock down such as eating out, cycle walking, afternoon teas out, tris to the city and holidays.

I think a lot of people just can’t be arsed now they got used to being at home and are happy to continue that. Some have health issues due to the NHS grinding to a halt for such a protracted time.

Iwasafool · 10/02/2024 10:00

PropertyManager · 09/02/2024 23:27

Where did I say not to lock down, of course lock down, but keep those with an unknown infectious disease out of hospitals, and keep the same operating.

During the Spanish Flu, the infected were not invited into regular hospitals, all manner of provisions were put in place from village halls and scout huts to the pre-existing TB sanitoria.

You really don't want people with a highly transmissible infection in a regular hospital.

Show quote history

How would they staff all these extra facilities? Isn't that what made the Nightingale Hospitals fail, no staff.

Sladuf · 10/02/2024 10:59

NeedAnUpgrade · 09/02/2024 09:53

There’s definitely a sense of life before and life after lockdown.

I was surprised at the amount of people that turned so militant and suddenly supported all rules and restrictions that governments put in place. On the other side were complete conspiracy nuts who were convinced it was all part of a global plan to control people. There didn’t seem to be any middle ground, if you disagreed with one thing then you were immediately put in the other camp. I guess this is mainly due to the increase in social media usage, where any form of nuance is lost.

Personally I saw a really selfish side to some people. They had to have it worse than anyone else because they were struggling. It’s all a bit strange still when I think about it. It almost doesn’t seem real now.

I’m sorry you’re still struggling OP. I think talking can help if you’re able to access therapy. But you’re definitely not alone in the way you feel.

It definitely showed a lot of people up. The curtain twitching element/the sort who would admonish people for not wearing masks, when they may well have had legitimate reasons not to for instance.
It was like a religion for some. As for the banging pots/letting off fireworks/make as much noise as possible at 8pm on Thursdays, that was a real life equivalent of The Two Minutes’ Hate from 1984. I never took part.

Re the loss of nuance, I fell foul of it so many times. I was labelled a tin foil hat conspiracy theorist on another forum for questioning 1 way systems in supermarkets. Low and behold a few months into it I then read at least 2 supermarket branches had been told by their local councils that their 1 way systems, largely due to the layout of the stores from what I remember, were resulting in customers not being able to keep 2 metres apart.😂
That’s before you get on to the point that religiously adhering to the 1 way systems meant you walked up/down aisles you didn’t need anything from, this spent more time in the supermarket and potentially passed more people in the process. Surely that was counterproductive?

user1471538283 · 10/02/2024 11:10

I don't think I'll ever be the person I was before COVID. It's not just the lockdown it's the sheer terror of a pandemic.

I worked long hours whilst coping with horrendous noisy neighbors who loved lockdown and had parties and the hot tub. All I saw was the sheer selfishness and entitlement of people. My mental health suffered and it took years for it to get better.

I knew that during this women and children would suffer most and we'd see an increase in mental health issues.

I do alot less than I did before. I couldn't imagine being in a crowd of people now.

Arbor · 10/02/2024 11:17

seafoamgreenhair · 09/02/2024 22:05

MN, a fascinating little town on the internet, where many - despite having devices that allow them to peruse the internet outside its borders - have managed to stay completely unaware of how governments in democracies and non-democracies all over the world implemented lockdowns (and also such outrageous notions as mask-wearing and social distancing) to prevent not just their health and other systems being overwhelmed, not just unnecessary deaths, but bodies literally piling up in the streets, as they did in some places, or makeshift mobile morgues made out of refrigerated trucks to deal with the extraordinary number of corpses being a common site in all cities and towns, during a global pandemic.

Despite having access to news of it, and of the measures taken that successfully saved thousands of lives in the previous global pandemic 100 years ago - which involved (gasp) lockdowns, called then "quarantine", and (gasp) wearing masks - they feel it was something unique and horrid and "political", occurring to upset them and curtail their ordinary lives unnecessarily.

It is odd to read sometimes as someone from another country. Despite our pandemic mitigation measures being among the most onerous in the world, I don't hear anyone talking about them now. We even had the army going around to houses individually checking to see if a covid-positive person was isolating, and the military and police had highway checkpoints and entire suburbs ringed off. Imagine if those things had occurred in Britain!

We seem okay though.

DriftingDora · 10/02/2024 11:20

Wherediditgoto · 09/02/2024 21:04

My brother would have died then. I bet you wouldn’t think that if you had a loved one who nearly died.

Show quote history

PropertyManager probably thought putting it* *in French would make it sound better. Oh, how hilarious. Not. 🙄

Universalsnail · 10/02/2024 11:20

Yes.

Lockdown caused me severe autistic burnout which I haven't fully recovered from. It meant I had to move out I'd the family home.

The fact everything has gone video calls still has pretty much excluded me from huge chunks of life because I can't cope with video calls. Literally barely get any medical care anymore as it's all video calls.

My kid keeps school refusing and often refers to how he could stay home in lock down. Middle child is really behind in reading and writing as she didn't do any work in the pandemic but never managed to catch up.

Still have long Covid

Just to make a few things. The pandemic was tbh a life changing event.

Sladuf · 10/02/2024 11:26

scalt · 09/02/2024 16:24

For those arguing the difference between lockdowns and the pandemic: it is vital to make that distinction. The government and the media are constantly gaslighting us with "because of covid" "because of the pandemic". Many of the terrible things described on this thread are squarely because of LOCKDOWNS, not covid. The OP's original question was about lockdown fallout, not pandemic fallout.

As for how terrible it might have been without lockdown: it's only because of the internet that lockdown on this scale was possible at all. A mere ten or twenty years previously, there might not even have been so much panic. The internet meant that blind fear and panic spread round the world in minutes.

I saw first hand the effects of lockdowns on children. It is unforgiveable that it went on as long as it did. Children were robbed of a large part of their formative years. "Only a year" to us is a quarter of a four-year-old's life. The fallout of this will be felt for decades.

Lockdowns went on for much longer than necessary. The government made promises they knew full well they could not keep, such as "just three more weeks" again and again, and "we can eliminate covid". Nope. If the government had admitted early on that lockdowns only delayed infection, not eliminated it, and that lockdowns were causing immense damage for extremely obvious reasons, I would now be respecting the government, and maybe even a short lockdown that it might have been. But because they dragged lockdowns on and on and on, until they could manipulate the figures enough to be "seen to have beaten the virus" (and yes, I very much believe the government manipulated figures A LOT, and is probably still doing so). The government was so desperate to save face, and could not bring themselves to say "actually, we can see that lockdowns are causing terrible damage, and the virus isn't nearly as dangerous as we said it was", they dragged out the misery for much longer than was needed. (If it was needed at all.) As far as I am concerned, Partygate is the proof that the government knew that things were nowhere near as bad as they were telling us: they had access to much more information than we did. If it really was a deadly threat, they would not have partied like that. Because they infantilised the population, and cried wolf on such a massive scale, I may never believe in any "government emergency" again. That is my lockdown fallout.

I have always doubted the integrity of government since I was a teenager; although I hadn't yet learned to distrust the media. My approval of government was very low indeed when Tony Blair declared his illegal war just because he wanted to. The last four years have been the final nail in any trust I ever had in government, and the media. I used to be an avid Radio 4 listener, but I haven't even switched it on since August 2020, with the constant talk of how bad "corrrrrrronavirus" allegedly was, and Boris Johnson casually saying "we have to squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze the brakes on reopening". Now I don't believe anything the government says at all, or what the papers say; and if there's a sensational story, my immediate thought is always "what is the government trying to hide?".

You’ve nailed it. Lockdowns were decisions by politicians and that’s where the emphasis can’t be lost. Politicians chose to keep them for longer and very few in this country were prepared to question it. The overreaction to Omicron when we had reliable experiences from South Africa to draw upon is one of the best examples of this. The so-called Opposition were anything but. The fact it took a few backbench Tory MPs to revolt over the Plan B response to Omicron just before Christmas 2021 spoke volumes.

I was cynical about lockdowns and restrictions from pretty much day 1. That was because Neil Ferguson and Scotland’s then Chief Medical Officer, Catherine Calderwood, had been caught out not following the restrictions. This is partly why the reaction to “Partygate” made me think, “yeah, and…?”
Bearing in mind Neil Ferguson and Catherine Calderwood and their respective roles had been caught out in April 2020, I can’t believe it took so long for so many to not smell a rat. If a top government medical officer doesn’t seem to be taking things seriously…
You also had examples like Tahir Ali, one of the Labour MPs, attending a wake where over 100 people were present in April 2020.
These people had access to more information than the rest of us. None truly believed that the situation was as grave as the official narrative.

I’ve started but to date never finished reading Laura Dodsworth’s “A State of Fear.” It’s an excellent book but I could feel the anger rising after reading a few pages at a time, so would have to put it down.

HelenDamnation1 · 10/02/2024 11:53

PropertyManager · 09/02/2024 20:45

What we should have done is accept at the beginning that there was no way that the hospitals could cope with covid patients, and actively keep covid patients out of hospital - and if they died, they died, cest la vie (or cest la mort really!) - and thus keep other services running.

Sometimes you can't win, and acceptance of that is key.

Show quote history

I'm NHS and I 100% agree. Yes it was a fucking pandemic, it was going to kill people - mainly the very elderly and vulnerable. But what we have now is 500 preventable deaths per month from the relatively young and healthy as we tanked the economy and hence the NHS.

This is only going to escalate. We traded the safety of the elderly for the rest of the population.

Iwasafool · 10/02/2024 12:46

HelenDamnation1 · 10/02/2024 11:53

I'm NHS and I 100% agree. Yes it was a fucking pandemic, it was going to kill people - mainly the very elderly and vulnerable. But what we have now is 500 preventable deaths per month from the relatively young and healthy as we tanked the economy and hence the NHS.

This is only going to escalate. We traded the safety of the elderly for the rest of the population.

Show quote history

So how were you going to cope in the NHS when the situation got like Italy? Or were you just going to lock people in houses and collect the bodies at a later date?

KittensandPerverts · 10/02/2024 13:42

Arbor · 10/02/2024 11:17

It is odd to read sometimes as someone from another country. Despite our pandemic mitigation measures being among the most onerous in the world, I don't hear anyone talking about them now. We even had the army going around to houses individually checking to see if a covid-positive person was isolating, and the military and police had highway checkpoints and entire suburbs ringed off. Imagine if those things had occurred in Britain!

We seem okay though.

Show quote history

I'm in the UK and I don't ever hear anyone talking about it now in real life (i.e. outside a forum)

JenniferBooth · 10/02/2024 13:42

The so-called Opposition were anything but. The fact it took a few backbench Tory MPs to revolt over the Plan B response to Omicron just before Christmas 2021 spoke volumes

I remember OM and i planning how we would break it get round it were they to try another lockdown that Christmas. And the ones who insisted "its just the once so suck it up" at Christmas 2020 were all for repeating it the following Christmas.

Im politically homeless because of this Will never vote Labour again. And Labour compounded it and made it worse by gaslighting the public later and saying they didnt try for longer harder lockdowns I know what i heard and saw with my own eyes and ears FFS!

JenniferBooth · 10/02/2024 13:48

scalt · 09/02/2024 16:24

For those arguing the difference between lockdowns and the pandemic: it is vital to make that distinction. The government and the media are constantly gaslighting us with "because of covid" "because of the pandemic". Many of the terrible things described on this thread are squarely because of LOCKDOWNS, not covid. The OP's original question was about lockdown fallout, not pandemic fallout.

As for how terrible it might have been without lockdown: it's only because of the internet that lockdown on this scale was possible at all. A mere ten or twenty years previously, there might not even have been so much panic. The internet meant that blind fear and panic spread round the world in minutes.

I saw first hand the effects of lockdowns on children. It is unforgiveable that it went on as long as it did. Children were robbed of a large part of their formative years. "Only a year" to us is a quarter of a four-year-old's life. The fallout of this will be felt for decades.

Lockdowns went on for much longer than necessary. The government made promises they knew full well they could not keep, such as "just three more weeks" again and again, and "we can eliminate covid". Nope. If the government had admitted early on that lockdowns only delayed infection, not eliminated it, and that lockdowns were causing immense damage for extremely obvious reasons, I would now be respecting the government, and maybe even a short lockdown that it might have been. But because they dragged lockdowns on and on and on, until they could manipulate the figures enough to be "seen to have beaten the virus" (and yes, I very much believe the government manipulated figures A LOT, and is probably still doing so). The government was so desperate to save face, and could not bring themselves to say "actually, we can see that lockdowns are causing terrible damage, and the virus isn't nearly as dangerous as we said it was", they dragged out the misery for much longer than was needed. (If it was needed at all.) As far as I am concerned, Partygate is the proof that the government knew that things were nowhere near as bad as they were telling us: they had access to much more information than we did. If it really was a deadly threat, they would not have partied like that. Because they infantilised the population, and cried wolf on such a massive scale, I may never believe in any "government emergency" again. That is my lockdown fallout.

I have always doubted the integrity of government since I was a teenager; although I hadn't yet learned to distrust the media. My approval of government was very low indeed when Tony Blair declared his illegal war just because he wanted to. The last four years have been the final nail in any trust I ever had in government, and the media. I used to be an avid Radio 4 listener, but I haven't even switched it on since August 2020, with the constant talk of how bad "corrrrrrronavirus" allegedly was, and Boris Johnson casually saying "we have to squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze the brakes on reopening". Now I don't believe anything the government says at all, or what the papers say; and if there's a sensational story, my immediate thought is always "what is the government trying to hide?".

THIS!!!!!!!!!!!!

JenniferBooth · 10/02/2024 13:51

People are still being dragged through the courts for Covid breaches. The fines are crippling many And the fines for the general public were a lot higher than the ones the politicians got

Crikeyalmighty · 10/02/2024 13:54

I don't think either party could win because approx 50.% of population were curtain twitching and sticking totally to rules and I think some secretly loved lockdown and the other 50% would have been quite happy with a far more lax situation and yes your own judgement (more like Sweden) - you were never going to please vast swathes of people whatever you did- the Tory's have mainly an older voting public- so I think would always ere on the side of what the older population would prefer. If Labour had said- bollocks to this they would have been crucified by the mainly right wing media.

Crikeyalmighty · 10/02/2024 13:57

We lived in Copenhagen through this and there were differences in the handling- and I think made it easier to cope with . There was none of this frighten everyone with daily news slots for a start and schools were back in really quickly

HelenDamnation1 · 10/02/2024 14:48

Iwasafool · 10/02/2024 12:46

So how were you going to cope in the NHS when the situation got like Italy? Or were you just going to lock people in houses and collect the bodies at a later date?

Show quote history

Attempt to care for them elsewhere, or frankly yes, let them die as humanely as possible. Pandemics kill people.
Go read the thread about the young woman dying in A&E. There will be many many more of this. But hooray, we saved a few people who were rotting away in care homes.
Have you every run a paediatric A&E or oncology department? I have. And I choose kids over the elderly any day.
Btw I worked throughout the pandemic and no one 'locked up' gave a shit about me, let alone their supermarket worker or amazon delivery team.

JenniferBooth · 10/02/2024 14:57

HelenDamnation1 · 10/02/2024 14:48

Attempt to care for them elsewhere, or frankly yes, let them die as humanely as possible. Pandemics kill people.
Go read the thread about the young woman dying in A&E. There will be many many more of this. But hooray, we saved a few people who were rotting away in care homes.
Have you every run a paediatric A&E or oncology department? I have. And I choose kids over the elderly any day.
Btw I worked throughout the pandemic and no one 'locked up' gave a shit about me, let alone their supermarket worker or amazon delivery team.

Show quote history

My posting history ( particularly re social housing) i always point out to the SH haters that the supermarket worker or delivery driver Amazon worker (who brought people their shit during lockdowns) likely lives in social housing.

LlynTegid · 10/02/2024 15:34

Life before March 2020 does seem to me to be so long ago that it could have been in the last century. There are still things I planned to do in 2020 that I have not yet done, and some I will never get the opportunity to do albeit some seem trivial in the grand scheme of things.

The long term impact is real and could have been a lot less had we a competent government, regardless of political party. Schools returning in some form even part time in June/July 2020 would have reduced the impact on children, as one example.

I want to see justice for the corruption and the avoidable deaths that happened, though not holding my breath that it will happen.

OceanicBoundlessness · 10/02/2024 15:52

It's funny. Dh and I visited a nature reserve today and I commented that during lockdowns the carparks would have been closed denying people access to all that space.
Little reminders like that spring up all the time.

Wherediditgoto · 10/02/2024 15:55

scalt · 09/02/2024 16:24

For those arguing the difference between lockdowns and the pandemic: it is vital to make that distinction. The government and the media are constantly gaslighting us with "because of covid" "because of the pandemic". Many of the terrible things described on this thread are squarely because of LOCKDOWNS, not covid. The OP's original question was about lockdown fallout, not pandemic fallout.

As for how terrible it might have been without lockdown: it's only because of the internet that lockdown on this scale was possible at all. A mere ten or twenty years previously, there might not even have been so much panic. The internet meant that blind fear and panic spread round the world in minutes.

I saw first hand the effects of lockdowns on children. It is unforgiveable that it went on as long as it did. Children were robbed of a large part of their formative years. "Only a year" to us is a quarter of a four-year-old's life. The fallout of this will be felt for decades.

Lockdowns went on for much longer than necessary. The government made promises they knew full well they could not keep, such as "just three more weeks" again and again, and "we can eliminate covid". Nope. If the government had admitted early on that lockdowns only delayed infection, not eliminated it, and that lockdowns were causing immense damage for extremely obvious reasons, I would now be respecting the government, and maybe even a short lockdown that it might have been. But because they dragged lockdowns on and on and on, until they could manipulate the figures enough to be "seen to have beaten the virus" (and yes, I very much believe the government manipulated figures A LOT, and is probably still doing so). The government was so desperate to save face, and could not bring themselves to say "actually, we can see that lockdowns are causing terrible damage, and the virus isn't nearly as dangerous as we said it was", they dragged out the misery for much longer than was needed. (If it was needed at all.) As far as I am concerned, Partygate is the proof that the government knew that things were nowhere near as bad as they were telling us: they had access to much more information than we did. If it really was a deadly threat, they would not have partied like that. Because they infantilised the population, and cried wolf on such a massive scale, I may never believe in any "government emergency" again. That is my lockdown fallout.

I have always doubted the integrity of government since I was a teenager; although I hadn't yet learned to distrust the media. My approval of government was very low indeed when Tony Blair declared his illegal war just because he wanted to. The last four years have been the final nail in any trust I ever had in government, and the media. I used to be an avid Radio 4 listener, but I haven't even switched it on since August 2020, with the constant talk of how bad "corrrrrrronavirus" allegedly was, and Boris Johnson casually saying "we have to squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze the brakes on reopening". Now I don't believe anything the government says at all, or what the papers say; and if there's a sensational story, my immediate thought is always "what is the government trying to hide?".

Absolutely, totally agree.