'Stay local to exercise' is rubbish

[ThePants999]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52062209

Taking public transport to start your exercise is obviously counterproductive.

Driving to somewhere where loads of other people are also going to exercise is not exactly ideal.

Driving to somewhere in the middle of nowhere to go for a walk? Not only is that perfectly safe, I'm going to assert that it's BETTER than walking from your house, especially if you live in a built-up area.

AIBU? And if I'm being U - why? How am I endangering anyone by going out to the countryside by car instead of walking round my town?

@Xenia that's correct. You cannot leave home except with reasonable excuse, which includes 'exercise' without further qualification, so the police have very limited legal grounds to stop that.

Shopping is a bit more restricted as the law says

"to obtain basic necessities, including food and medical supplies for those in the same household (including any pets or animals in the household) or for vulnerable persons and supplies for the essential upkeep, maintenance and functioning of the household, or the household of a vulnerable person, or to obtain money, including from any business listed in Part 3 of Schedule 2;"

It is not clear what 'essential upkeep, maintenance and functioning of the household' means. Presumably going to B&Q to buy bathroom paint would not qualify.

However the restriction is on leaving the house without reasonable excuse, so if you went to B&Q to get some tiles to fix your leaking roof then that would be a reasonable excuse, and there is no restriction on what you do when you are in B&Q.

Likewise it seems that 'basic necessities' is extremely broadly construed given that the list of essential businesses includes

' Off licenses and licensed shops selling alcohol (including breweries).'

If you can go to the brewery to buy beer, then Gary can go to the newsagent (also an essential business) to buy a packet of crisps, just as Fred can buy his copy of The Sun. All these journeys are entirely lawful.

It might be considered antisocial or immoral to go shopping five times a day, but it is not illegal.

I think this 51%/49% vote split perfectly sums up what ive found about people in general. 51% are reasonable and thoughtful and 49% are selfish and think it's all about them. 51% are trying everything within their power to save lives and not go out unless humanly possible, and 49% are more worried about the quality of their lovely walk out. OMG.

The govt. should bring in measures to limit travel to a mile of your house. This virus needs extreme measures to curb it.

The vote split is the reason this is going to go on so much longer than it might.

What angers me is the amount of people arguing about what is and isn’t ‘legal’
“Ah well I have the legislation in my bag so I can argue with any copper who dare stops me as I think I am clever and clearly know what the actual legislation is”

Can’t you see that there is a BIGGER picture here? This isn’t about finding loopholes in legislation or trying to avoid fines whilst finding a way to continue living your life as normal - this is about a collective and national effort to stop people from dying. I don’t give a shit what is law and what isn’t at this point. The ethical point of view is far, far more important.

Can’t you see that there is a BIGGER picture here? This isn’t about finding loopholes in legislation or trying to avoid fines whilst finding a way to continue living your life as normal - this is about a collective and national effort to stop people from dying. I don’t give a shit what is law and what isn’t at this point. The ethical point of view is far, far more important.

Some of us care deeply about the rule of law. Go live in China if you don't like it.

It's not about 'finding loopholes', it's just fact that things are either illegal or they are not. If they are not illegal then don't try to claim they are.

I don't have a problem with shaming people for being antisocial suspending the rule of law is over my dead body quite frankly.

I should say ', BUT suspending the rule of law is over my dead body quite frankly'

And the poster with the law in her handbag was quite clear that her daily life has changed in that she is not going off to her holiday home or whatever, just a mile or two somewhere quiet to walk. This is neither immoral nor illegal, and she's right to challenge any plod who claims otherwise.

Ordinarily I would completely agree with you. Of course in general circumstances I respect the law and the way legislation is formed and enforced. I don’t for one minute want the UK to become a dictatorship ship. But this particular circumstance is completely different to usual every day events. I think people have a moral and ethical obligation to follow social distancing measures, before they have a legal one.

YANBU

I think people have a moral and ethical obligation to follow social distancing measures,

They are following them. People walking on quiet fells are very well distanced, but the police are complaining.

@ShootsFruitsLeaves I simplified the exponential growth. Cases are growing based on yesterday's figures 34%. Using growth rate is comparable across all countries regardless of their testing policies as it the 'rate of growth'. That rate is currently exponential. Epidemiologists forecast a Gompertz curve as the exponential growth eventually and inevitably slows. Of course you can compare logarithmic data, arguably a more meaningful graph than linear, but I didn't think that level of detail would really help people who are struggling to understand that reducing movement reduces risk. Please take the time to understand rate of growth, before making incorrect statements. This is a really informative analysis of what's happening (and it's pretty accessible):

nrg.cs.ucl.ac.uk/mjh/covid19/

There are many villages around here where the only 'walk' involved going through the same gate and passing each other on the same narrow piece of track.

It's not easy to go elsewhere with kids, the roads are still too busy verges to narrow, hills too wild, too many bogs and brambles and fallen trees to contend with, it really is an accident waiting to happen for myself let alone the kids.

But there are several places within 5 miles of my house I can drive to and am very very unlikely to meet anyone (I haven't yet, but it's not impossible).

Surely the local congested track is where all the transmissions will be occurring?

Of course you can compare logarithmic data, arguably a more meaningful graph than linear, but I didn't think that level of detail would really help people who are struggling to understand that reducing movement reduces risk. Please take the time to understand rate of growth, before making incorrect statements.

I said 'logistic'. That is not the same thing as 'logarithmic'. Logarithmic is merely the inverse of exponential. It's not connected to the logistic function.

Perhaps you should take a bit more time to understand this before commenting at all.

The point about this, whether you treat it as a logistic or as a Gompertz function, is that in fact things do not double indefinitely, which is obviously impossible, but level out. Currently we are looking at 6000 to 20000 total deaths, which is at or below recent flu seasons, and total daily deaths are also far below some recent flu seasons, e.g., winter 2014/2015

We do not know exactly what the virus will do, but I don't think misleading simplifications are helpful.

Good grief, there is every class of stupid on here.
You go for a drive and take a walk in open countryside out of complete arrogance but I hope that, should anything happen that requires emergency services, you don’t call for help or take up a hospital bed just because you wanted your own way.
Save resources and stay the hell at home. It’s not hard.

You go for a drive and take a walk in open countryside out of complete arrogance but I hope that, should anything happen that requires emergency services, you don’t call for help or take up a hospital bed just because you wanted your own way.

Don't see the issue.

Where I live (not in the UK) there are no emergency services anyway. I don't worry about going off hiking in a remote location or whatever, I just do it. If I have an accident, ok shit happened. Doesn't stop me living.

Fretting about needing the emergency services while walking your dog a mile from home is the height of stupidity.

We live in a beauty spot. I have never seen it so busy! Every day people come in cars to run here, play football with their kids, walk their dogs. It is so busy that we (who follow the rules) can't actually walk from our homes without encountering lots of people, so we have to go out after 9pm. I wish they'd all fuck off and walk near home.

I agree in principle with you OP, but the thing is if you give an inch many people will take a mile, so a blanket ban is really needed to stop people being stupid.

I do actually drive all of 7 minutes to my local country park BUT I am getting up at 5:30am to do it, and I have yet to see another person there at that (freezing cold) time of the morning. I checked this out with a friend of mine in the police who opined she would not have a problem with it, because it's more socially isolating than walking through my village and encountering other dog walkers on the pavements (yes, even between 6-7am).

However, most people won't exercise that level of common sense...I have no intention of driving up to the country park at any other time of day because I know there will be a bunch of idiots there who are not social distancing, and the local police know it too so hopefully are up there telling people to go home.

The point about this, whether you treat it as a logistic or as a Gompertz function, is that in fact things do not double indefinitely, which is obviously impossible, but level out. Currently we are looking at 6000 to 20000 total deaths, which is at or below recent flu seasons, and total daily deaths are also far below some recent flu seasons, e.g., winter 2014/201

Agree, there isnt the data done on excess deaths in this current period, so around 23k extra winter deaths last year, vast majority of which were caused by respiratory infections.

We are now almost certain to be heading for a global depression, historically, that often leads to war and many more deaths due to poverty etc.

Given the general lockdowns in Spain Italy don't appear to be working, why aren't we isolating those at greatest risk more rigorously? becausing judging what my partner saw yesterday in Tavistock, the older generation is out and about in force (was on a Morrisons IT fault before anyone says why was he out too)

@ShootsFruitAndLeaves. You are unfortunately exemplifying 'a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing'. The logarithmic statement wasn't a reference to your 'logistic' analogy but the point that there are different ways of graphing growth rate. The comparison to seasonal flu is such a poor understanding of a global pandemic of a new virus with a far higher mortality rate and no vaccine.... It's sad that people are still doing this. Please think carefully before making statements that aren't correct, they can actually be genuinely dangerous as they feed in to this complacency which will lead to more people dying in corridors. Perhaps you'll find this BBC article more helpful and it's less likely than you'll misinterpret the very clear statistical facts.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52056111

Michael Gove on Andrew Marr saying the rules for exercise are to go out for an hour's walk or 30 min run. Once a day. No mention of driving into the hills for a ramble.

*in your local area.

Trouble is, if you drive to a deserted spot for a walk, then you get the idiots in the 100s driving to other spots for a walk/exercise etc. The point is to stop this. If one person does it, what's to stop everyone else doin the same thing

Fretting about needing the emergency services while walking your dog a mile from home is the height of stupidity

It’s the fretting over using up a hospital bed while resources are precious few that I think people are worried about. That is not stupid.

Driving to places means using more petrol which means going to a petrol station and being in contact with people unnecessarily.

It's pretty simple to work that out.