To be ashamed to be British

[yesterdayschild]

Every day more and more British deaths. When compared to other countries some of them third world, we have an appalling death rate from Covid 19.
Why oh why did the government allow 3000 Spanish to enter just to watch a football match when Spain would not allow them to watch in their own country.
Why was the Stereophonics concert allowed when other countries had locked down.
Why are thousands of people still entering the U.K. with no checks.
Why are our NHS staff still begging for PPE

I am feeling very very low about all of this and wish I lived in some other country.

I’m working for a covid volunteer group and I’m ashamed at how many people need to seek help. Why are we not looking after our elderly neighbours and relatives?

I would be more ashamed to have voted labour who would have completely destroyed the NHS and the economy

That's hilarious.

OP, I feel enraged and frustrated by this too. The Sunday Times and the Observer, from opposite sides of the political divide, have slammed the UK government's ineffective and incoherent response to the crisis.

We have no idea how many deaths there have been here, because they're only counting those who had been tested and died in hospital. Very few people have been tested, and vast numbers are dying in care homes!

If they had quarantined all arrivals (including Brits returning from abroad) and traced all contacts of anyone who had Covid-19, we could have slowed infections down so the NHS could easily cope with them. We would have then had time to make up for the inexcusable failure to prepare earlier, and get correct PPE to protect NHS and care workers.

instead we're frantically trying to put the brake on now, while we're already going over the cliff. Lockdown is going to bankrupt many individuals and small businesses. The multinationals can ride out an economic disaster and then make a profit buying up all their small rivals.

Why haven't we ever introduced quarantine? We're on an island, ffs! There would never have been any need to crash the economy,, if we'd had quarantine, contact tracing and testing. And so many lives would have been saved.

I'm not ashamed to be British, but I'm totally pissed off with the government and I blame its incompetence for many unnecessary deaths.

I don't really understand the concept of being 'ashamed to be British' (or any other nationality). You are only responsible for your own personal actions, not of those of others who happen to hold the same passport. Same with being 'proud to be x nationality'. Jus as you can't take the blame for actions other than your own, neither can you take any credit for other people's achievements simply because you are from the same country.

But maybe the OP should go and live in another country when flights resume. I say this because she clearly has very little experience of life outside GB. If she had, she would know that people in Spain, Italy, France, ROI etc are making very similar complaints to the ones she is making. Should they all be eaten up with 'shame' too?

*The other countries that have high death rates like Belgium, are just beginning to ease their lockdowns, to the level of ours. if you want to have armed police and military on the street, stopping and asking you why you are going out, and have to provide papers, then go to France, Spain and Italy. If you want to be fined €200 for not shopping at the nearest supermarket to you, whether it is crap or not, move to Belgium, and see above for armed police and military.

We don't know that we have an appalling death rate, as we don't know the level of infections overall. Every single person in the UK would have to be tested for that.

I think you'll find the medical staff in other countries are begging for PPE as well - it's a world wide pandemic, with world wide needs for PPE, not just the UK.

I am not ashamed to be British and never have been. Places with large international hubs like London, Brussels and NY have been hard hit. Try looking at population density as well, we are a densely populated island; it's no wonder we have a lot of deaths.*

Your post just illustrates part of the problem that has led to such high death rates (yes we do know they are high because since Mid March there are have been over 16000 deaths in addition to the five year average), exceptionalism. The lessons were to be learnt from the rest of the world but Cummings has said he loves epidemic modelling, fuelled by his own hubris from his success in selling the Brexit delusion, he had to show we could do it differently and better, not close down the economy, even if it meant "loved ones will be lost"

Hong Kong is a big international hub, a densely populated city of 7.4 m people. It had its first cases in January. It straight away acted on all the lessons learned from SARs, the ones that the WHO were trying to highlight to the rest of the world. You are tested within an hour by people who come to your door, if positive you go straight to hospital, even if you are asymptomatic and your symptoms treated from the early stages. All your contacts are traced and sent into quarantine for 14 days, the facilities are not great but nobody minds because they are being kept safe. Anyone arriving from Europe has to isolate for 14 days. They are given wristbands and can rely on someone giving them a very hard time if they do go out. As a result their lockdown is light, restaurants open, you can go out in groups of up to 4. They have had 4 deaths. There are similar stories in South Korea (where they had a potty group of evangelicals intent on spreading the virus to contend with) and Taiwan. New Zealand learnt from them and is now also opening up with the pandemic under control. Germany has also put all those processes in place, including getting people treated early and has fewer deaths too. I am not ashamed to be British, beautiful country, great culture, sense of humour etc but we have been let down and are paying the price for the hubris of the leaders we elected, or indeed didn't.....

You do realise the reason that many developing countries don't have particularly high death rates is that this virus affects mostly the over 70s and their life expectancy is normally between 60 and 70.

I think the vast majority of people on MN would rather discuss (ACTUAL POSTS) someone having something stuck in their vagina, having an STD because you sleep with anybody, next doors dog, my husands smelly feet etc. I will not be reading any more of this rubbish on MN

Judging by your others posts you’re hardly the wordsmith creating top quality content....

I don’t agree. What I dislike is people who are so quick to slag off their own country. The grass isn’t always greener. There is so much good to be proud of.

Not especially. I am surprised by quite so how many people are.
I've had friends tell me that British people are embarrasing because they're flouting lockdown rules.
I responded, you think that's only British people?
She said: Foreigners are better at following rules that British people. (Really?).
I said, OK, how about the reports that €1000s of fines are being handed out in France and Romania (those two countries were in the news that day).
Her response: well at least they'd probably pay them, British people wouldn't

I don't think people are that different the world over, it's embarassing when people stupidly flout the rules, but those people exist in other countries too.

WiseOwl69 exactly, well said.

Being proud or ashamed of a simple accident of birth is weird. Both emotions are best reserved for an individual or group's actions, decisions or lack thereof, not for coincidences of birth.

You can be proud or ashamed of the way the British government behave, or of the way you voted or didn't vote, but not of simply "being" a nationality unless you are an immigrant who took deliberate decisions, jumped through hoops, studied and took a test to gain that nationality.

But maybe the OP should go and live in another country when flights resume. I say this because she clearly has very little experience of life outside GB. If she had, she would know that people in Spain, Italy, France, ROI etc are making very similar complaints to the ones she is making.

I was astounded to hear how much Germans complain about their rail service. When I told them that we in Britain believe their rail service to be efficient and always on time, they laughed loudly.

That's a bit melodramatic

Every single day I listen to our briefings I feel so proud. Genuinely.

The freedom allowed to journalist questions.
The heavy scientific involvement for worked renowned scientist
So much to be proud of

I think the vast majority of people on MN would rather discuss (ACTUAL POSTS) someone having something stuck in their vagina, having an STD because you sleep with anybody, next doors dog, my husands smelly feet etc. I will not be reading any more of this rubbish on MN

What's the betting that the OP didn't mean it and will come back on this thread to say the same thing again? She won't be able to resist.

In my pp, when I said "this government", I didn't mean the British government. Unfortunately the British government have been spectacularly incompetent.
Just wanted to make that clear as the link refers to Thailand. I have a lot of friends and family there and I reckon they are much safer than i am here.

The Netherlands, Belgium and Japan are all developed countries with greater population density and longer life expectancy than the UK - it is slightly odd that everyone ignores that when claiming that population density and life expectancy are the reasons for the UK death rate.

I think I am ashamed of our government and the twisting of information and sound bites. It’s all words without meaning.

What bastard thought they could try to trick the public by counting gloves individually rather than pairs. There claim to have double the amount of PPE.

There is a complete attitude of complacency: which goes something along the lines of we won the war. We are better. It won’t happened to us. Bang fist on podium.

That I’m ashamed of.

I agree @Bringringbring12 and I voted Labour! I’ve been most impressed by the calibre of the other ministers particularly the health secretary and the chancellor. The detailed explanations and scientific information have been great. You just have to look at the USA and I feel very grateful to be British.

Whilst I get the jist, have some family in Spain where lockdown is much tighter, at least you don’t live in the US

I live in the U.S. We have two cases of Covid-19 in our county and NO deaths. We closed borders and saved lives. I was appalled to see the horse racing, football games, busy airports continuing on as normal in the UK.

I am not ashamed to be British.
It is impossible to compare countries. Each country counts them differently. Each country is different with population density, etc
Sweden has not locked down at all.
At the time, the Gov advisers said that lockdown only works for a short duration, so they were trying to get the timing right. And you can see, that lots of people have given up with the lockdown anyway, and there are more people about. (Some people seemed to stretch the rules considerably).

If you look at deaths per million of population then Belgium, France, Spain and Italy are worse than us. That’s the best way of reviewing the data, as we know how many people in the country. But we have no idea how many people have or have had the virus.

I put the blame completely on our useless, lazy Prime Minister and absolutely hopeless Government. They bend the facts to suit themselves, try and manipulate people with their pathetic propaganda and when faced with facts, usually lie their way out. While I would never vote for them, it's small comfort as it's terrifying that this lot of incompetents are in charge. I can't see anything positive at the moment. We could be blundering on for months. They have blood on their hands with their deliberate but fake austerity of the last decade, running down health and social care. Despicable.

Suggest you move to the US OP. Certainly no shame here.

Just because you are unhappy with decisions the government have made why would you be ashamed to be British? FWIW I think the government have done a good job of managing this crisis (and no I didn't vote for them)

Which country do you wish you lived in OP? Every country has its issues. Lack of PPE is an issue in the US and many other countries. I'm glad we live here and not in Spain where they have had an incredibly strict lockdown. I'm certainly very glad I no longer live in the US. Some states are coming out of lockdown and have opened up shops, restaurants, tattoo parlours, hairdressers etc. I dread to think what the infection and death rates will be like there in a few weeks.

@deydododatdodontdeydo

I've read that one of the the reasons that Hitler was so popular early on was that he did get the trains to run on time. So quite clearly trains running on time is very important to German people.

Of course it's all relative really. The trains ran like clockwork when I lived in France (during the third year of my French degree), and, on one very rare occasion when a train arrived 10 minutes late, the guard was so apologetic it was funny. (Apologies sound completely insincere in the UK.)