To think the holiday home is my only option?

[Witsendagain]

I live in a different country. I was over here visiting family from the start of March and several cancelled flights/worldwide pandemic later me, my dh and ds(2) can't get home.
My parents are very high risk and don't have enough space for us. On paper my in-laws have enough space on paper but in practice this isn't the case (currently squished in a room filled with storage boxes while dh sleeps on the floor).
No other family can accommodate us BUT my gran has a mostly unused holiday cottage in a tourist hot-spot that she has offered us for the duration and I've accepted. It is literally around the corner from where we were living before we moved abroad 2years ago.
I am now being made to feel guilty by various people because me and my family are 'part of the problem', 'running to our holiday homes and swamping these places', 'overwhelming the medical services' etc.
I'm doubting myself, we can't stay where we are for months, we can't get home, and we are not choosing to be here. We are having to pay astronomical rent and pet care costs in the country we are living in and can't afford to rent somewhere so I really cannot see that we have another option.
Wibu to carry on with our plans despite the naysayers?

DoubleAction Wot?

That's what I said.

And don't be daft. It's common knowledge that there is bugger all medical provision in many rural areas. Proportionally less than in bigger cities.

As it happens, I'm also a long-moved abroad local from a very rural, touristy area. If I were in the OP's situation, I would go to the cottage. I'd still count myself as a temporary and accidental resident though, regardless of where I was born.

*disproportionately (!!)

I said I'd been gone a long time

For your sake, be very certain you do not have the virus before leaving a city to go somewhere rural where the NHS may already be under intense strain.

Once there, take food and self isolate for 14 days. Presumably your grandma know some of the locals, and could fill them in on your circumstances. The news will be all the way round the village before you get there!

Icu beds are allocated in hospitals based on permanent residents. If that was a first home we'd have enough beds for you to stay

My local hospital takes complex cases from all over the S of England. If you live in Kent, Sussex, IoW, you get brought to my local London hospital for all sorts of ‘specialist’ problems.

So access to this hospital for locals is probably about as easy / hard as for people accessing their less equipped regional hospitals.

The whole NHS is for everyone.

What we can do is try and relieve pressure on it by not spreading the virus by travelling.

I agree with those who say you should go to the cottage after stocking up and then stay quarantined for 14 days.
But don’t get me started about all the camper and and caravans that seem to be travelling north on the M6 at the moment!!! 🤬

For your sake, be very certain you do not have the virus before leaving a city to go somewhere rural where the NHS may already be under intense strain

The health service in London, for example, is already under intense strain

lonleylou09 that's sad. I told my DF weeks ago that we wouldn't be visiting him in Kilgetty at Easter. His DP has COPD.

LimpidPools to be fair in many touristy rural areas you would be counted as a temporary/accidental resident unless your family had lived there for three generations - and after three generations you would be considered a new arrival!

I don’t get the camper/caravan thing. Everyone I know who has one tries to avoid using the onboard toilet as much as possible by using the loo block on sites during the day. Surely that would be a huge cross-infection risk?

If you must go then you need to self isolate where you are now for 7 days, to ensure you don't have the virus then once you get to the cottage isolate again. This will decrease the likelihood of you being infected and taking the virus with you plus will reassure the locals that you have not spread any infection

As pp have said, if you go you need to do it right, getting food before you go (of course there's food! Maybe not exactly items you want but shops have food you can stock up on). But you also need to think: will this actually work for long term quarantine? Is this a furnished cottage, does it have wi fi on, will you be able to keep your daughter busy and entertained indoors there? Because it would be awful to go and put anyone else there at risk only to find it isn't actually a good place to be.

Self isolate strictly for 14 days when you arrive. Then practice social distancing properly when you come out of isolation that why you are unlikely to put any extra strain on the local hospitals.
If you are staying there because you need a place to stay that is very different to going to your second home because you fancy living in a scenic area during a crisis.

BritWifeinUSA
Cyprus has - everyone had until yesterday to get in or out

Ha, Aesopfable, you're not wrong! I was 4th generation and it was not sufficient.

Now I'm a foreigner, and it's so much easier than not being allowed to be from the place where you're from.

I say go, this is really a necessity. Stock up and self isolate while you are there. The problem is with idiots who have perfectly nice houses in cities that they can self isolate in and are choosing to treat this like a holiday.

I think you should stay where you are, presumably that accommodation arrangement was acceptable to you when you come over for the holiday, so you should suck it up and not travel . You and your Oh can alternate bed/floor sleeping .

Icu beds are allocated in hospitals based on permanent residents. If that was a first home we'd have enough beds for you to stay.

^^this is irrelevant. It is a national health service and people are moved around if a bed is not available locally. So if rural areas have fewer cases people will take rural beds anyway. The icu beds are allocated based on the number of people in the UK.

The OP has not said whereabout she is now - she could already be in a rural, overstretched area in which case staying put could be a more selfish move.

I live in a tourism hotspot and there is a lot of anger on local pages about holidaymakers coming to the county and carrying on as normal. However I don't think anyone would judge a family who are basically homeless who move into an empty house.

Icu beds are allocated in hospitals based on permanent residents. If that was a first home we'd have enough beds for you to stay.

Seeing that the OP isn’t living in the Uk normally, where ever she is going to stay, there will be the same issue.
This is not the same than someone living in London/Manchester who decides to suddenly go to Cornwall or Wales

If the OP is resident in Norway, she can just come back here. The borders are open for residents, just not tourists.

No, please don't.

I'm in Cumbria and the number of people ignoring social distancing is staggering. It is HEAVING. The police are putting out pleas to tell people to go home and stay there.

We're already one of the hotspots for coronavirus and our healthcare is struggling. Our nearest hospital is 45 minutes away and they've already had a death. The nearest one in the opposite direction is an hour and they do have had a death.

Stay at home and save lives.

I don't think you have a choice OP.

I would spend today buying as many supplies as you can, travel to the holiday home tonight or tomorrow morning and don't leave the house for 14 days. If you're careful you shouldn't be adding extra risk to the area.

But I would go soon because I agree with PP that travel will soon become very difficult if not a lockdown imposed.

Stay home. Stay where you are. If your holiday home is in a tourist hotspot please don't go to it. The tourist hotspot Cornwall has ONE hospital and an elderly population. The tourist hotspot Devon has FOUR hospitals. It's not just about you possibly bringing the virus with you. It's that if you get ill and need NHS care you are increasing the burden on our already overstretched services. And there's no bloody food here either!

The government advice could not be more clear. STAY AT HOME.

@PeterWeg
"my wife is a nurse and she pointed out that a key principle of the NHS is that everyone will be treated fairly and equally."

But we've been told, in plain terms, by Boris, Chris Whitty and Patrick Vallance that we are in a crisis and so crisis measures have taken over and treatment will be given to those that have the best chance of survival.

The fair and equal treatment has gone. If your wife is now saying different then she isn't a Nurse within our NHS.

As for the OP living in one room, many people are doing that for years waiting to be housed. You've got to get on with it, at least for three weeks, so the peak drops.

What is so difficult to understand?

According to other threads the op lives in Norway which is still allowing residents to come back. This would be the absolute best solution for everyone so I don’t understand why the op isn’t trying to do that?