253 people under the age of 60 with no other underlying health issues had died from Covid-19 in the UK

[whenthejoyreturns]

I'm in no way trying to minimise these deaths at all but I wondered if people were aware of this number. Every day we hear the number of deaths, but this is never broken down into categories that we can relate to ourselves.
30 people under the age of 45 with no other underlying health issues had died from Covid-19 in the UK.
AIBU to want people to know this because I don't think enough people realise.

@cardibach I totally agree

Why are the lives of young people with no additional issues more valued?

I would like to know what exactly people did mean when they talk about the people who have died from covid who have had underlying health issues. Like everyone says surely that could mean so many things?

Is it not that the 22 million is the entire vulnerable group - those with underlying health conditions, the elderly and pregnant women.

I fully agree with OP, the figures don't add up. The majority of the working population is in the low risk category. We purpose built hospitals (NHS Nightingale) that have sparsely been used, not even half their capacity.

Unless there IS something we are not told about this virus, I am firmly in the camp of a whole lot of BS and scaremongering for nothing! - other than a wrecked economy...

Sweden hasn't lockdown and many experts think that their economy will suffer as much as anyone else's anyway.

Exactly, and half the country was employed by the government for five years of WW2 and the economy did a lot more than just recover afterwards, it's how the government plans to grow the economy that's as much of an issue.

I'm also wondering where a lot of the anti-lockdown brigade on MN are really coming from. I notice a fair number very careful not to mention the high risks to the BAME population, and that's an interesting omission given that a lot of the support for anti-lockdown movements here is coming from the racist, far right.

Is it not that the 22 million is the entire vulnerable group - those with underlying health conditions, the elderly and pregnant women.

Yes. That's what people have been talking about - people who aren't vulnerable should be getting back to normal. Bluntness wants to be able to get a haircut from a hairdresser who isn't vulnerable, or have the not vulnerable teachers go back to work.

My point is "the vulnerable" is a large number of people. Basically 1/3 or thereabouts of the population.

I am 43 nearly 44 no underlying health conditions but ended up with Pnuemonia and covid 19 and our health service "fixed" me and sent me on my way so you need an NHS that can cope otherwise that small % of deaths in the below 45 otherwise healthy will rise.

It makes me so angry

We never ever should have gone in to lockdown.

2020-2025 will go down in history as the The Years of the “Big Over-Reaction and Disastrous Consequences”

Absurd. So many deaths and you say it was an over reaction. How many more would it have taken for you to think they mattered?

I think when we talk on terms of how many have died, it doesn’t have the right message. It’s not ok that any of these people have died. It’s a tragedy regardless of age or previous health conditions.
I saw a table of age related risk of death recently. The age group of 25-44 had a 1:44,423 chance of dying of Coronavirus. Older, the risk increases and decreased for younger people. Children aged 0-14 have a 1:5,336,266 chance of dying. This is data based on reported deaths up to May 1st.
I think these numbers are important when considering easing of the current situation

Hooves, yes I agree it is a very large number of people.

I’m fifty one. I have no underlying health condition. Why am I not allowed to get my hair cut my a thirty year old woman also with no underlying health condition.

Because it’s not about you, it’s about all of us. It’s about getting the whole of the U.K. back to functioning as normally as possible without causing a resurgence which will breach the NHS.

I’m afraid your haircut is not near the top of the list of things to get back to normal.

Why can’t a perfectly healthy child go to school and be taught by a teacher below 65 with no underlying conditions. When both the child’s parents are also below 65 with no underlying conditions.

If you hadn’t noticed, they’re trying to arrange this. This is top of the list.

In fact why can’t their grandparents who are also below 65 with no underlying health conditions see them?

Because mixing households is going to massively increase the amount of virus around. Then vulnerable people will pick it up when they go to the shops or doctor’s surgery or out for a walk, and the nhs will be at risk of being overwhelmed.

Because we haven’t got a system in place to rapidly get on top of localised outbreaks and quash them.

Gustavo1

And what is the data on morbidity following infection for those age groups?

Only I think that's also important when considering easing of the current situation.

Not being dead does not mean not living with on going significant illness.

@sandysman - absolutely! In my family alone we have a shed load of what would definitely be billed as 'pre-existing conditions' were they unlucky enough to die of covid. Yet NONE of these people are ill at all. Person 1 Aged 25 army reservist and police officer extremely fit (heart condition, under normal circumstances should have normal life expectancy) Person 2 Aged 23 Cambridge graduate and journalist (brittle asthma normal lifespan expected) Person 3 type one diabetes 55 years - completely well and thriving at the moment. Persons 4,5 and 6 80ish years, controlled high blood pressure - all entirely well and thriving and one still working. Person 7 - 58yr old marathon runner - heart condition but completely well. Person 8 west end dancer 29 asthma. Honestly I could go on...but any of those guys who died would be passed off as 'pre-existing condition'. Probably to mollify us into thinking that the govt haven't made huge balls up and the people we are losing are not worth all that much and were a bit of a drain on the public purse anyway. Infuriating. You are right to be heartily sick of it.

What’s the source of the stats?

I don’t believe any numbers coming out of the governments mouths what so ever at the moment. Testing has been woeful. We have pretty much no idea how many new infections we have in the UK every day. Death numbers cannot be taken as read either. How many died of other conditions but contracted corona whilst being treated. How many were put on the corona deaths toll when actually they had many other conditions serious enough to take their life in the same week? How many had their lives shortened by weeks but were terminally ill via other illnesses although incredibly sad And unfair that weeks or months were taken, it doesn’t give a true picture. Many of the public see 35,000 deaths and imagine these are healthy people who were struck down in their prime. This just isn’t the case. All deaths are sad but it’s the skewed figures that I think will emerge in years to come

* So many deaths and you say it was an over reaction. How many more would it have taken for you to think they mattered?*

At least vaguely in the ball park of the number who die annually from, let’s say another respiratory and contagious condition - pneumonia. Which has an annual UK death rate that varies between 25000-35000.

Although I say “vaguely in the ball park” but actually I think “well in excess of” bearing in mind there isn’t even a hint of suggesting lockdown due to the pneumonia death rate!

Bluntness not only is herd immunity a dangerous fallacy as we can't actutally lock the vunerable away (see the tragedy of agency workers being unwitting typhoid Marys in care homes for example), there is no proof that immunity is retained for a long time and the best estimates I have seen suggested it would take two years for everyone to catch it.

Lockdown is not about protecting the vulnerable or the small number of 'healthy' people who would die. It was about preventing the NHS being overwhelmed. If we'd just let it run rife, the evidence suggested that hospitals would stop functioning, the healthy and the vulnerable would die in much greater numbers as they wouldn't have been able to treat as many people. Non-covid patients wouldn't have been able to access treatment for much longer and more non-covid deaths would have happened.

Economists were also advocating lockdown because they knew the economy would've suffered anyway. In Sweden, where people were not locked down, they have stayed home anyway, not fully, but life is far from normal. If hospitals were overwhelmed here and death rates higher, most people would feel less safe and less inclined to go the pub or the hairdressers etc. Large numbers of people isolating from work would have been a big problem (and still might be).

I agree that we need to get out of lockdown, but do it in a way that makes the sacrifices people have made worthwhile. So hang on a bit longer till the r0 is lower, open up places in as safe as way as possible, keep with the working from home where possible, admit that opening school is about essential childcare (and vulnerable kids) and prioritise places accordingly, get track and trace established, make face coverings compulsory in crowded indoor spaces.

It's not lockdown until vaccine vs open up and to hell with it - there's a middle way.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras
Yes, figures quoted by government when this started. 20 million vulnerable plus 2 million shielded there are not 22 million people vulnerable to Covid 19 in the UK.

Pregnancy isn't an underlying condition putting you at more risk of serious CV complications. Pregnant women are at no more risk than non-pregnant women.

@actuallystripesgalore

Maybe you should check the nhs page I have linked and then you can fact check for yourself...

I am not spreading misinformation.

I have mild asthma - not severe (only recently prescribed clenil 100 twice a day after two weeks of breathlessness and only normally take ventolin sporadically. I get offered the flu jab on the nhs and have been told by the gp I am in the clinically vulnerable (again not shielding/e extremely clinically vulnerable) group. I'll inform my gp that he is wrong that my asthma is not mild or refuse the wrongly offered flu jab as it is mild 🤷🏼‍♀️.

So is anyone who has any kind of pre existing condition less likely to fight this off? This is what I don't get. With all this talk of pre existing conditions.
But obviously there's loads that aren't on that vulnerable list
Were all the people who died on the vulnerable conditions list?

@supercatlady the office of national statistics

I am mid fifties and I have auto immune issues, thyroid disease and coeliac, not something that is a huge problem -I take thyroxine, I avoid gluten. I have a child with the same thing. Yet this might be a “pre-existing condition “. Amongst my closest friends, mid forties on, the majority have something like this. Several have the same thyroid issue as me. Many more have asthma. There are a couple who also have coeliac disease, one who has a blood clotting issue that is fine as long as he keeps taking warfarin. One has an abnormal heart rhythm.
So the number of adults over a certain age with nothing at all that qualifies as an existing condition is probably small anyway. None of my friends have something that would be expected to kill them, as all their issues are well managed.

And who says we need to be less concerned about the 30k plus who were old and did have pre-existing conditions?