Our government has dealt with the Coronacrisis so badly.

[pontypridd]

Did we even need to lockdown?

Newsnight suggests that it wasn't necessary.

Perhaps it wouldn't have been so bad had the lockdown been managed well. But now millions of people in this country will have their lives ruined. Millions will lose their lives as a result of this mismanaged lockdown.

We are coming out of this now with more mixed messages and confusion. People are taking it upon themselves to decide to end lockdown - as the government, once again, fails to take the lead.

I feels afraid and scared to live here. I don't trust that our government will ever know what they are doing or be able to protect us.

People are fed up of lockdown now. Lockdown any sooner would have been worse I think.

I think testing and PP should have been sorted much earlier. It’s a disaster however I’m nit sure anyone else would have done it better.

I have no idea @CendrillonSings. FWIW I'm not a Corbyn fan, and a large part of the reason our government has been so interminably shite and can't get it's act together over the last few years is because the opposition has also been interminably shite and can't get it's act together.

I have no strong ties or leanings to any political party. I'm a floating voter.

I would just have preferred 5 years of David Cameron dullness to the absolute madhouse we got.

We needed to lock down sooner but what do you expect from bojo?

@Randomnessembraced

"2) I do not like the slogan "protect our NHS and save lives". In other countries people are encouraged to go and seek medical help as early as possible. It was clear from the outset from certain data that early oxygen and certain meds might help. We have been told to sit at home until late stage. I do not think this is the right approach."
What if the NHS had been overwhelmed though? What if more staff died as a result? This is such a difficult balance to get right. My heart tells me that the advice given out by 111 was appalling and that people should have been hospitalised earlier. If it was my family I wouldn't call 111 anyway but go straight to 999. I don't know whether hospital ICUs and covid wards have been at capacity (prior to the Nightingales being built) but I have no trust now in the 111 service and will never use them again.

Who gave them instructions about how bad people have to be to be sent an ambulance? I don''t believe those instructions would come from Govt. Is it the NHS trusts?

Which meds are you referring to? Several have been mentioned but I thought they'd all been discounted now.

@NotEverythingIsBlackandWhite - for a start, preventatively antibiotics, high quality oxygen and lots of fluids, plus Vitamin D and Vitamin C.

This article mentioned Remsidivir and Chloroquine in February www.nature.com/articles/s41422-020-0282-0 - I remember reading about it then and a friend who is a doctor mentioned it very early on. Chloroquine might work in certain cases but there are potential side effects www.bbc.co.uk/news/51980731

Remsidivir www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52478783

Now blood plasma therapy is being trialled in Germany etc. I think Guy's and St Thomas' are trialling it here now. Hopefully if people do go in early in the future, there are treatment options for them.

I predict that this will be the beginning of the dismantling of the NHS. I don’t know how they’ll do it but I’ve got a bad feeling about this.

As it stands now the NHS is non existent for anything but Covid really.

They’ll never catch up with the backlog. It will never get back to what it was. And that will be the perfect excuse to privatise.

What do you mean by justice? Acknowledgement by the Govt that they should have locked down earlier?

Criminal charges for Manslaughter. Can we also backdate drug possession charges for those in the cabinet who happily snorted coke?

Like everyone else here, I too, can be wise after the event.

So where do I think we went wrong?

I think we should have closed borders earlier (despite the fact that when Trump did so, he was criticised by the WHO), and incomers (whether British or not) should have been quarantined.

I am not sure about lockdown, because it causes such huge economic damage, but think large gatherings should have been cancelled earlier, such as Cheltenham and crufts.

The rules regarding lockdown were a bit vague and are now being ignored in my area, so not sure if an earlier lockdown would have worked better.

Obviously, we should have been doing more testing, but it seems that unlike Germany, we are not set up for it, there was difficulty in getting hold of materials (swabs, reagents, etc), and my perception is, that the NHS were reluctant to utilise many private (and smaller) facilities.

The lack of PPE is a problem in all countries, and i am not sure the NHS procurement dept have been worse than other countries. The stuff from Turkey has turned out to be useless, but elsewhere potential suppliers complained that their emails were not being answered. Ultimately, there needs to be a system where it is manufactured in this country. Also, as I abhor wastage, I hate the fact that after wearing it for 2 -3 hours, it has to be replaced. Going forward, I would like to see reusable gowns maybe, that could be washed/sterilised, rather than it all being wasted.

The initial advice was to use ventilators, so buying up ventilators and preparing by opening these nightingale hospitals was a good thing.

However, it seems that the best treatment is earlier treatment with oxygen.

My perception is, that people have been advised to remain at home, until too late to treat properly ( not sure if this applies to advice from 111, paramedics, 999) or maybe this is just a myth but this seems to be what has been reported.

Care Homes will always be a problem because most are now privately run, so I think there will always be differences in size, facilities, etc, but it appears that some elderly people were discharged to care homes inappropriately.

I don't blame the current Gov for lack of preparedness after the simulation in 2016, but I DO blame the previous Conservative Gov, for not setting out action plans after 2016, for relevant departments

SE Asian countries were following advice from WHO back in January.
Look at how they organised themselves.
Look at the numbers.
Europe should have been paying attention.

"Randomnessembraced

"for a start, preventatively antibiotics, high quality oxygen and lots of fluids, plus Vitamin D and Vitamin C."
Antibiotics treat bacterial infections, not viruses. Giving them out "preventatively" is not going to cure a virus. Once you have a bacterial infection they will be administered. Is there any proof that antibiotics can prevent bacterial infections? I would have thought that,if here was, we'd all get them every winter to keep production in work places from falling. As it is we are not prescribed them unnecessarily because they often don't work due to previous over-prescribing of them.

Remdesivir was shown to have no effect in the first trial and there has been a large study that states antimalarial hydroxychloroquine has no effect.

I suppose all hope now now lies on blood plasma from those who've recovered. It is being trialled here.

@EdwynCollins

"Cummings pal has got the contract for the tracking and tracing app instead of going with the rest of the EU'

What do you mean the rest of the EU? Do you just mean the EU? We are no longer a part of it.

NotEverythingIsBlackandWhite
Last I heard we are still paying

Totally agree

MISTAKE 1 Didn’t lockdown anything like early enough - it was glaringly obvious what was going to happen from what was happening in other countries - we should have learned from their mistakes not made worse ones of our own!

MISTAKE 2 Didn’t lockdown properly

2.1 - advice lacked clarity, authority and enforcement has been pretty much non existent mainly as the govt hasn’t given police enough support to do so, not only allowing public gatherings but actively ENCOURAGING them - Cheltenham races, concerts etc

2.2 - COMPLETELY failed to even bother locking down airports and ports - really should have been a no brainier! Should have refused entry to non-residents and tested the residents returning and quarantining those testing positive or having symptoms. Utterly ridiculous that we’re still having flights coming and going and foreign ships mooring in British ports with crews disembarking into British port towns without any testing or quarantine protocols in place.
⁃
MISTAKE 3 COMPLETE failure to prepare - in terms of ppe, sufficient nhs staff levels, planning how to deal with care home residents and staff

MISTAKE 4 COMPLETE failure to organise and implement an efficient and effective system of tracking, tracing and testing

MISTAKE 5 - FAILURE to acknowledge or act within the KNOWLEDGE that early identification of those infected and with serious symptoms and treatment of same leads to far better outcomes and fewer deaths - callous disregard for patients here.

MISTAKE 6 Financial “support” utterly bizarre - confusion and misinformation on almost every aspect, various Tory mps/ministers telling msm and financial experts contradictory info especially early on, failing to even consider even a temp UBI which would have been quicker, cheaper and easier to implement than the piecemeal crap they’ve come out with.

MISTAKE 7 LYING through their teeth about what’s really happening and what little they are achieving - eg claiming meeting targets on testing purely on how many tests “in the post” rather than tests actually processed and STILL not even achieving own targets.

Excuse after excuse and that’s even IF you get an answer to relevant questions - even when asked by Mp’s of other parties.

MISTAKE 8 Hamstringing the press/msm by severely limiting appearances to only those tv shows they know interviewers will kowtow to them, barring more “challenging” journalists from press conferences, “advising” journalists beforehand which questions will be answered

Government should have acted sooner and harder. Short sharp lockdown perfect summary

@Disquieted1 - those diseases you named are:

Not as easy to spread
Spread due to specific avoidable contact routes that can be avoided without having to stay home - hiv is blood borne and actually a relatively fragile virus not lasting long outside the body, mainly sexually transmitted or via IV routes
Have vaccinations available for some
Colds & flu are NOT as dangerous as this virus, they don’t have the same death toll or impact on potential recovery for most people.

*But at least it's shown how vastly shit the government are and how poorly funded the NHS is.

So now they can change that.

Right?* THIS govt?! Aye right! They’ll use the ensuing economic depression as an excuse to sell off nhs even faster!

@trellishead totally agree. I’ve quite a few friends/family now live overseas and they’re utterly shocked at how badly it’s being handled here. Envy is NOT what they’re thinking/feeling at all!

We’ve half the death rate here in Scotland I believe but our proximity and connection to and governance by England means we are far from “safe”.

The government is advised by so called medical experts - blame them for the advice they gave not. The government which acted on it I don’t for a second believe they followed the actual advice they were given - they’ve gone to quite some lengths to conceal who advised and what they were advised exactly.

I strongly suspect it was a case of

experts “well really the best thing to do is lockdown, quarantine and test to keep death rate down around x”

Govt/Cummings “...but if we don’t do that and do a ‘lockdown lite’ best case scenario (x + y) no of deaths?”

Experts “...well...if people are sensible and you’re lucky...maybe (x + x) no of deaths”

Govt “so the experts say it’ll be fine to lockdown this way (Doing shit all realty) and we’ll get around (x + y - renamed as B) no of deaths” !!!

Aka a load of bullocks where they prioritised the economy (falsely) above peoples lives & health result being they’ve fucked both!

how do you plan for something like this?

It’s called “crisis contingency planning” and it’s a govts job to do this and update such plans regularly. A job I once had was related to this. They are continually advised of likely potential crises and what’s needed to deal with them. They were advised I believe about the likelihood of a pandemic around this time 3-5 years ago and FAILED to take the advice seriously, update previous pandemic contingency plans or resources. This was not as unexpected/impossible to plan for as they’re trying to persuade us. We couldn’t completely predict the TYPE of illness although a respiratory illness is not entirely unpredictable. They certainly would have been advised to ensure nhs staffing at certain levels, and that certain equipment/resources should have been stocked.

Where do you store all this equipment?... questions like this are anticipated and planned for in a good contingency plan.

There are whole depts within govt that exist to create and fine tune such plans, or at least there used to be! I’m wondering now if they too were cut to the bone! Staffed by experts in health, logistics, finances etc who have studied previous similar crises or even functioned in dealing with them, who know how to create models of prediction etc

Well, you could, say, run an operation to see how the country would fare in a pandemic. And you could learn lessons from the problems revealed, rather than quietly binning them. You could even call it something, maybe, umm, Exercise Cygnus. exactly, and this is just one way of planning preparations and testing them.

There is no hindsight. We had foresight! We had a huge advantage. exactly! Plus as several ops have we’re a fucking island - that fact alone should have been used to our advantage!

We have a government who wants chaos because people like JRM make billions out of chaos yep!

We were only aware of it in China in beginning of january first news reports re virus appeared in December

This government don't care about the vulnerable. agreed - but this is hardly new information. This is how the tories always are and always were.

The myth that the Tories are competent is baffling. it mystifies me too.

blaming labour for this is a bit of a stretch don't you think? it’s utterly preposterous!

A the global financial crisis was not caused by labour, it was primarily caused by irresponsible lending in the USA!

B tories have been in power for 10 years, at what point do they stop snitching to mummy that it was the other boys fault?

C austerity didn’t and never was going to work in terms of rebuilding the economy

*But this is a thoroughly chaotic government...they'd be looking on in horror at how our political system has devolved.” Terrifying how true this is

Very well said Graphista.
Of course we now know they didn't even have a WHO rep on the SAGE committee.
There is no excuse. None at all. So many deaths. So many people on the edge of complete mental and financial breakdown. So many children being neglected.
Shameful.

My word GRAPHISTA you should be in charge, no really, please do take the helm.
You are far superior to everyone in government. The first thing you can do is tell everyone the Torys are going to sell off the NHS. Oh sorry Labour tried that one already and still lost!

It's easy to look back and dissect what could have been done in retrospective. Everyone can do this, it's very easy to do.

We have less than 300 deaths as of today
Yes as of today. Who says that in a year's time, the UK will have got read of it and NZ will be battling it because of lack of hurd immunity?

@Graphista please do tell me when you are running for parliament? Are you even a low level politician or just someone who is currently sat on their high giraffe?

For clarity... I wasnt blaming labour for this crisis, nor was I blaming conservatives. Its about time everyone involved took responsibility for their failings.

A party doesnt need to be in charge of a county to make a difference!

Wow! and the best the Tory supporters can come up with is NOT arguments refuting the points I’ve made but school playground name calling and insults - very mature

A party doesnt need to be in charge of a county to make a difference! maybe not - but under our parliamentary system it’s bloody hard to!

I've been communicating with my Mp on certain related issues and he is beyond frustrated that he and other MPs have been asking questions - formally and informally and NOT getting answers. I don't mean shit answers I mean the cabinet are REFUSING to answer mps questions - which I'm not sure is even legal! Talking to friends/family across the country (including Tory voters but certainly mos from all major parties) and they are reporting similar experiences

This is unconscionable.

I’ve worked in govt in support roles, I’m an ex military dependent and also worked for mod for several years and I try to keep myself informed but don’t claim to understand everything.

But much of what they failed to do isn’t even that complicated - most of it is common bloody sense!

A virus that was initially believed to be droplet spread, not easy to kill even on surfaces and then quickly found to be likely airborne should have had them limiting person-to-person contact far far sooner than they did.

Their "handling" of the crisis has been a total farce!

HeIenaDove Thu 07-May-20 20:34:28
inews.co.uk/news/health/coronavirus-latest-covid-19-epidemic-care-homes-thousands-dead-warnings-2845247

Coronavirus latest: Week by week, how the Covid-19 epidemic in care homes left thousands dead — despite warnings in January
Boris Johnson has told Parliament he 'bitterly regrets' the death toll in care homes

An epidemic of Covid-19 has been allowed to flourish in care homes despite warnings as far back as January that the sector was particularly vulnerable to the disease

The Government’s own data has revealed that there were no care home deaths attributed to coronavirus when the UK went into lockdown at the end of March, yet a failure to introduce widespread testing and PPE for staff and residents, as well as an official order allowing Covid-positive patients to be discharged from hospitals into care homes, appears to have contributed to the deaths of thousands of vulnerable elderly people by the end of April

Figures show that the peak of deaths in care homes came two weeks after the peak in hospitals in the middle of April, suggesting there were missed opportunities to protect residents and staff at the end of March when the lockdown was implemented.

On Tuesday, the Government issued figures showing the steep rise in care home deaths in April. In the week ending 17 April, 3,390 people died from Covid in care homes, rising to 5,890 for following week

Boris Johnson told Parliament that he “bitterly regrets” the “epidemic” of coronavirus in care homes, while Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the Government had “worked very hard to protect people in care homes” “from the start”.

But ministers were given repeated warnings that the care sector was vulnerable, including by the Government’s own emergency group of advisers, more than three months ago

The scientific advisory group on emergencies (Sage) began meeting to discuss coronavirus on 22 January, and the issue of care homes being vulnerable was “flagged” “very early on”, according to a briefing chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance gave last week.

Yet on 25 February Public Health England issued advice saying it “remains very unlikely that people receiving care in a care home or the community will become infected” with coronavirus

On 3 March, the Government’s own coronavirus action plan said that “health and social care services will work together to support early discharge from hospital”.

Call for a ban on visitors
On 12 March, former Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, now chairman of the health select committee, called for a nationwide ban on external visits to care homes, which was not introduced until the nationwide lockdown 11 days later.

On the same day, the Government switched focus from testing in the community to hospitals, while only sample testing was carried out in some care home settings.

In the middle of March, the NHS issued an order to transfer 15,000 patients from hospitals back to the community, including care homes, to free up space and allow the NHS to operate within capacity - one of the key planks of the government’s coronavirus strategy.

On 25 March, in response to a question from the Labour MP Peter Kyle, the PM said care home testing would be rolled out “as soon as we possibly can” while PPE would be delivered “by the end of this week”
Significantly, on 2 April, the Department for Health issued a guidance note saying that for patients being discharged from hospital, “negative tests are not required prior to transfers/admissions into the care home”.

On 5 April, i asked Jenny Harries, England’s deputy chief medical officer, when blanket testing would be introduced in care homes. Dr Harries would say only that there was sample testing of up to five people per care home setting.

On 15 April, it was announced that care home residents and staff could be tested if they had symptoms. This was not extended to all residents and staff, regardless or not whether they had symptoms, until 28 April.

At PMQs, Mr Johnson claimed that care home deaths were now coming down, but the government was unable to provide figures showing the death rate had slowed.

This week the Department of Health said while patients who had tested positive for coronavirus would continue to be discharged into care homes, they would now be notified so they could take action

'Unfolding tragedy'
Shadow Care Minister Liz Kendall said: “The Prime Minister says he ‘bitterly regrets’ the crisis in care homes, but the warning signs of this unfolding tragedy have been there for many weeks.

“Boris Johnson was warned about the lack of testing and PPE at the last PMQs he did, six weeks ago.”

Nuffield Trust chief executive Nigel Edwards said: “Serious questions should be asked about the timing and effectiveness of Government’s social care response.

The government was reportedly warned in January that the social care sector was at particular risk from the effects of this virus. This reality, coupled with structural, funding and staffing problems significantly pre-dating Covid-19, have created the tragedy we see today in care homes.

Good posts Graphista.

The myth that the Tories are competent comes from the fact that they talk posh and have been trained to speak publicly/ bullshit.

I work in disaster planning for corporates.

It WAS obvious where this was going by the end of January.

I was trying to convince Executives of it on the 3rd February. We planned. I stopped going into London because of the lack of border closing or quarantining.

Why didn't our government 'following the science' also plan? I don't have a crystal ball. I had facts at that point.

If England opens schools before September we might as well all give up now.

Havent read all but
Yes it was obvious much earlier
Read the worried about coronavirus threads.

Also i did remove dc from school 2w before lockdown and by lockdown there was a parent infected.
2w before was talking to polish friend as they locked down hard and quarantined people and tested them.

I watched with amazement as it took 2w for schools to close. By tnat point many kids were already off

Uk almost only country not recommending face masks
Even USA were temp testing at airports from jan i think.

We did watch with shock as italy returners went back to work.
Honestly the gov went for herd without asking us!!
I dont believe it's what we wanted.
And became until they said about taking it on the chin it wasnt clear totally what they were up to so we couldn't protest. For weeks we did protest to close schools.
We did calcs to show
66mx0.8x 1%
And it was alot higher than gov were saying.
We saw china having to build hospitals.
BJ is clearly not risk averse.
And it's true if their rules dont even stop them getting it and nearly dying then the rules are not strong enough.

So instead average people are now f over.
All the KW and anyone who has kids as instead of going on side of safety (like other countries) we will just shove kids in as was and not worry about any adult collateral damage.

Pity those who want eradication cant move to say cornwall and blockade us in. Maybe wales and scotland too.

It was a complete fuck up, through ineptitude or malice I don’t know.