To have no sympathy?

[1981m]

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-england-cornwall-52089487

Do you feel sorry for these people trapped abroad due to the Coronavirus? I keep reading articles about people trapped who say they are running out of money and that the Uk government should be paying for them to get home.

I don't think they should, depending on when they left that is. These people left for a month at the beginning of March, another young man left for Morocco on March 15th! Surely it was stupidity to fly at that time? It was obvious we would go into lockdown imminently, lots of other European countries were going into lockdown by then. Now they are moaning that they are stranded and want to be bailed out. Surely it's totally there own fault. They must have been told not to fly especially by March 15th.

I feel more sorry for those trapped because they were away for business or travelling around the world. But not those who decided to go on holiday in the middle of a pandemic.

But where does the attitude of, well it’s all their own fault, begin and end though?

FWIW, I do think it’s the government’s responsibility to help its nationals out overseas regardless of whether it's all their own doing or not. They are taxpayers too.

We don’t ration resources in other areas because someone’s situation is self inflicted.

So you’re fat, get to the back of the queue, no resources for you. You could see this coming, shouldn’t have eaten so much?

I don’t think as a society we should be making decisions like this.

I do have sympathy for those who left weeks or months ago, they couldn't have known that this would happen.

But I definitely do not have any sympathy at all for those who chose to go on holiday once the virus had taken hold in Europe. Those travelling for work are a different case again, I'm talking just about holiday-makers.

The first death occurred in UK on 5th March. Yet I heard on the radio yesterday about a bloke who went on holiday to South Africa and is moaning because the government aren't helping him to get home. He went out there on 14th March by which time there had been 21 deaths. Not only that, but this guy has a heart condition and was refused travel insurance and yet he still chose to travel and now expects the government to get him home because he's running out of medication.

It just beggars belief.

The tax payer should definitely not be forced to pay for the irresponsibility of many of the holiday-makers. I think the government should force the travel insurance companies to cover the cost of all the repatriation flights. Those who didn't bother taking out travel insurance will have to pay for their own flights. There could also be an argument that the travel companies and airlines who were happy enough to keep flying these idiots out to holiday destinations should be the ones organising emergency flights home and also covering those costs. People who are stranded because of work should have their costs paid by their employers. I understand we need to get people home, but there is absolutely no way the state should be forking out for, in many cases, people's selfish behaviour.

My hope is instead of focusing on the "#be nice" twee sentimentality, that people start using their brains and take responsibility for own actions.

For those of you that Claim this was blindingly obvious back in January, really?
So blindingly obvious that the uk govt did nothing...

From what I've read, there is no questioning or restrictions whatsoever on people entering the country. I for some reason thought that all flights had been grounded, but they haven't been.

If you travelled from March+ on Holiday sorry no sympathy from me.

I'm on the fence a bit - some people have genuinely not been able to get home because flights and internal public transport has been stopped and they were already on a gap year or extended trip or whatever before this started.

The ones who are annoying me are the ones who had plenty of notice to cancel their 2 week holidays but ignored all advice and went anyway and then got caught up in a lockdown that they really should have seen coming.

My idiotic friend went skiing to Italy early March with a party of 8 in total. All came back with coronavirus 'oh we're going to the North West, we're hundreds of miles away from Lombardy'.

my friend left for New Zealand at the beginning of Feb.
He was due home today, but a couple of weeks back heeded the advice from NZ government to head home ASAP. At that point he was near the bottom of South Island.
He transferred his ticket and made his way to Christchurch airport. He checked in, then Emirates cancelled his flight. The plane was sitting, fueled and staffed at the airport but Emirates didnt want to take responsibility for those travellers. At that point transit hubs were still open. There was no reason for Emirates to not go ahead with the flight.
Since then he has had to stay in a caravan park close to the airport.
he cannot get through to the British Embassy. Emirates are not answering, despite legally being obligued to cover him an alternative flight home. Insurance company ignoring calls/emails
No info coming through at all.
3 times there have been rumours of flights, with seats running between £7-26 K
He doesnt have money for that. He is scared as people in the caravan park are not following isolation rules, and he is running out of money.

Doodleygirl- if you read properly you would see that we aren't talking about people stuck who went weeks before this kicked off we are talking about people who willingly decided to go on holiday in March when the government was telling everyone to come home and it was obvious it was a matter of days before we went into lockdown. I was watching the news everyday waiting for Boris to say we are in lockdown.

No I don't count myself lucky I wasn't away. We have had to cancel a once in a lifetime holiday to California to see my sister in June. I won't see her now probably for two years. We have potentially lost £000 we are waiting to see. But I decided not to take the mick and be responsible

There are people who believe what the government says. The government was saying it was still fine to travel, so they travelled.

By taking responsibility you really mean that people should assume the government may be lying to them and find out more. That is actually how I live, but I don't expect everyone to live like that.

Mr Brother has a house in Thailand, and goes there every year in November and returns to the Uk round about Easter time. He has multiple health issues and prefers to spend the winters there as he is more comfortable in the warmth. His wife is Thai and loves this arrangement.
However on learning his flight home had been cancelled, after many phonecalls.emails etc was eventually told by the British Consulate there was one British Airways flight out on 30th March they should be on it, or remain in Thailand for the Forseable!
He was on that flight!
He tells me that as a "foreigner" he would be at the end of the queue for healthcare and would have to pay up front (usually over the odds) .Incidently he was trying to get a new flight home from mid February, and cannot understand people who were leaving the UK for holidays after that,

And to be honest, it was February when I was being berated on local FB pages about being WTF about school kids being allowed back at school after ski trips. Told I was scaremongering and hysterical. NOBODY was taking the blindest bit of notice and he had gone already at that point

My DD 19 went to SE Asia in mid-February. At that time we discussed whether it was safe to go and regularly checked the FCO guidelines. Obviously we knew what was happening in China and that ‘CV’ had leaked out, but since FCO weren’t advising against travel she went ahead. She and I both kept a very close eye on the situation while she was travelling - when she got to Vietnam she found the locals were scared of catching CV from the foreigners. We discussed her coming home at that point, but she wanted to hang on a bit longer so flew to southern Thailand where the situation appeared to be better - she found out next following day that it was the last flight for the airline before they suspended all international flights. At this point I was getting seriously concerned, especially as she was travelling solo, so we booked her on a flight home two days later via Dubai. The day before she was due to leave the flight was cancelled. We then had to try and get her on another flight back via Bangkok. There was no availability for another four weeks. She finally arrived home last week and we are £1,000 lighter of pocket. Fortunately we can afford it, or rather the credit card can. Hopefully she should also get some money back from airlines / her travel insurance.

What I am trying to say is that while I agree people travelling mid-March were foolish, and I certainly wasn’t expecting the government to repatriate DD while I could get he back myself, the situation changed so rapidly that if you weren’t really on the ball, but we’re just having a lovely time somewhere, it could be quite easy to miss the sudden changes - one week everything was normal the next it wasn’t. Plus flights were suddenly being cancelled left right and centre.

It’s all very well saying the people shouldn’t rely on the FCO for travel advice, but that’s what we’re told to do. The UK government SHOULD have advised against foreign travel and told people to come home sooner, but they didn’t. I think that in this, as in many other matters, they along with most of us have been caught off-guard by the speed things have moved at.

That is my brother!

And none of this was obvious to most of you in January or even February. I and a few others were posting on MN about what was coming and constantly got accused of scaremongering. Threads were even deleted by MNHQ for scaremongering.
There is an awful lot of rewriting history.

Our daughter and partner are in New Zealand. they had a camper van and were touring and working there. Campsites are all shut and of course the work has dried up. Are they complaining or expecting the Government to bail them out ...No of course not. We had a phone call to ask us what they should do and they had found an airbnb who would take them for a month as there were hardly any flights to Britain or Australia.They had enough money for two weeks and we have helped them for another two. We thought they were better off there than waiting with a lot of people at the airport presuming they could get back onto the North Island. They have enough food with them and a relative has offered them their small holding field for as long as they like which is great of them.
I can understand the dilemma about flights though as after they were settled into the airbnb a woman in New Zealand trying to get back has discover through twitter/ facebook that there are about 9,000 people there.

I will just add that they have been there since November. They were in Australia and Thailand before that.

And of course people rely on FCO for advice That is what people get told over and over again if they are asking is it safe to go to x country. Look at FCO.
What you are all saying is that every citizen should assume their government and the FCO are lying until proven otherwise.
If I could be bothered I would search user names on MN. Because I am sure some of you on this thread saying anyone could see you should not go, are also some of the same people ridiculing parents like me for taking our kids out of school and saying it was only a mild cold for all but those already on death's door.

I think YABU OP esp about the person who travelled on March 15th.
I left the country on a pre plannned trip on Friday 13th March, fully prepared to cancel and lose £4k+ if the Govt had said at any point "please avoid unnecessary travel" or declared Covid19 the pandemic that it later was. They had not, so we went.
Monday 16th March is when the talk of schools being closed begun, and of other businesses following suit. I called the FCO on Monday 16th and Tues 17th, asking whether Brits should return home. The advice on both occasions was No.
We (happily and out of choice) returned home from our trip several days early the following weekend- at cost to ourselves and nobody else- and STILL there was no advice to not travel, and flights were still operating.
So yes, I do think YABU because the Foreign Office and the Govt did not issue travel advice until much later than you're making out.

And the reason the government is being asked to bail them out is because insurance companies and flight companies are refusing to do their bit.

Given that we have a society that has to be told by the Government to wash its hands, there really is little hope for people exercising common sense.

Because, as always, they expect the Government to sort it out for them.

I have zero sympathy.

And the reason the government is being asked to bail them out is because insurance companies and flight companies are refusing to do their bit.

There's a bit of horse and cart there ... the insurers and flight companies are "refusing to do their bit" since they did nothing wrong - in the absence of government advice not to travel, why should they be liable ?

All roads lead back to the government, and the lack of advice not to travel when it was needed.

*the best thing to do would be to camp out at the airport until they can arrange a flight

Thus providing an excellent breeding ground for coronavirus to spread among all the people camped out at the airport. Not the best plan...

YABVU. I was in India until March 17th. I was supposed to fly home on 29th. After days and days of trying to get through to my travel company unsuccessfully I had to pay for a brand new flight, and just got out in time. My airlines said all was fine but even as I was at the airport flights were being cancelled cancelled cancelled. Some people just couldnt get out. But the UK governement advice mid-March was that India was fine and India was saying that if you were already there, it was fine. I was checking it several times a day.
I could see how things were going and I decided to leave early thank god. But I know India, I know how it could get in a crisis and I'm a paranoid personality. Others took the government advice at face value and stayed, and now are stuck. I have an American friend stuck there because she can't afford the cost of the rescue flight her country is sending, and can't get to Delhi to catch it anyway because things are locked down.

In a crisis people will react one of three ways: fight, flight or freeze. Some people froze and were in denial (and governement advice didn't contradict that until it was too late). They had no way to predict how scary it was gonna get. They are trapped in a nightmare. If you'd been in that situation you would certainly have sympathy for them. Actually, if you can't have sympathy for people trapped 1000s of miles from home, with uncertain food and death closing in around them, due to an error in judgement, then you need to look at yourself.