To think we will be on lockdown in the winter?

[BalletPinkRoses]

Every year in the media you hear about how the NHS is struggling/almost at capacity because of increased cases of flu and pneumonia - the so-called NHS "winter crisis".

Surely with even a small amount of COVID-19 cases on top of the usual winter illnesses it will cause the NHS to reach capacity and trigger a lockdown in order to protect the NHS?

(Sorry that this is so negative, I don't meant to be all doom and gloom)

@MarshaBradyo

Numbers are so low in London, it’s hard to know what will happen in the next few months.

But are they really? It's been reported some areas are testing more than others. No tests equals no confirmed cases. Are many tests being performed in London?

If the numbers there really are low for now, I can't see it staying like that.

Hundreds of thousands of unchecked unquarantined international travellers coming through Heathrow and then on to busy public transport. Including from currently heavily infected places like Brazil.

Completely unrelated but I'm ridiculously excited about having used the new quote feature. Clearly little things make me happy.

Hancock talked about local lockdowns yesterday and it’s been confirmed as a strategy today. Effective track and trace would allow short quarantine/lockdown in areas where numbers start to spike. Assumes we ever get effective track and trace, mind you, which I’m not holding my breath for...

@AlternativePerspective Steady on!
I am not the one who decided who had to “shield” I am just hazarding a guess as they cannot lock down everyone again and start the whole furlough thing up again so surely would be common sense to protect the most vulnerable and if they are working then they could get the furlough payment instead .
Fuck sake , was just thinking out loud ..

@ToffeeYoghurt I bet - I’ve seen it but don’t know how to do it. Tutorial please?

Well I'm led to believe by the Mumsnet armchair experts that COVID only kills people who would have died this year anyway, and the only reason we appear to have excess deaths is that the ones for this winter have happened early. So this year's flu season will be a non-event, right?

The idea of the shielded and non shielded has created a real them and us attitude.

Tell me about it!!! The amount of times I have had my mother and father tell me "you can't do that because you're shielding" is very boring.

It's as if at almost 50 years old I have to do what they tell me and I can't make decisions for myself and actually have a choice.

The whole debate about the "shielded people" has become very boring to be honest.

[quote cardibach]@ToffeeYoghurt I bet - I’ve seen it but don’t know how to do it. Tutorial please?[/quote]
I'm like a child with a new toy.
Go to the three dots on the bottom right of somebody's post. The same place you go to report or PM. There's a quote option now.

If it hits around Christmastime we'll really be screwed as nobody will adhere to it

I think the strategy now is localised mini lockdowns, or whack a mole as it's been described. Love that description!

I don't think there will be another lockdown as draconian as this as we cannot afford to. However, most people are very wary now and will lock themselves down if the figures climb in the winter.

I've already said that in the winter I will go out if I have to (school, family and work) but will stay in as much as possible to avoid Covid-19 if it is still around.

@ Fluffybutter perhaps not, but the thing is that so many seem to have this attitude that the shielded should remain so until a vaccine is found when reality is that a vaccine might never be found or if it is then it will take years.

Truth is that there are far worse illnesses than COVID, and many of the shielded are at risk from most illnesses, including the flu which runs rife in the winter.

If COVID sticks around then it will always be around. Even if there is a vaccine people will still catch it and will still die from it, much as they still die from the flu despite the fact there is a vaccine.

Lockdown was only ever to reduce some of the stress on the NHS to ensure it could cope. But so many have the attitude that lockdown is to get rid of the virus entirely.

If people choose to stay at home then they need to do that individually, not because of an advisory when the rest of the population are not restricted.

This time last year I was on a ventilator having had a cardiac arrest the night before.

I have come through heart surgery, cardiac arrest, weeks and weeks in icu/hospital. My only long-term future lies in a heart transplant, but luckily the interventions I had last year mean that I am currently still well enough to not be on the list. But it’s a case of when and not if, and when that happens, and assuming I survive, I will become one of the immunesuppressed as well.

I am currently shielding because with my heart condition if I catch COVID I will almost certainly die, and if I don’t the potential damage to my lungs will likely mean I wouldn’t be eligible for a heart transplant.

I am staying home right now but there has to come a point when living life becomes more than preserving it. I didn’t come through the past year just to stay locked up at home.

And reality is that we’re all going to die of something.

@PhilCornwall1

The idea of the shielded and non shielded has created a real them and us attitude.

Tell me about it!!! The amount of times I have had my mother and father tell me "you can't do that because you're shielding" is very boring.

It's as if at almost 50 years old I have to do what they tell me and I can't make decisions for myself and actually have a choice.

The whole debate about the "shielded people" has become very boring to be honest.

Well go out and do what you want then ! If you are “shielding” but don’t want to then only you can decide what risks to take

I think a second wave is unfortunately very likely, but we won't have a second lockdown like this one.

Either (good scenario) there will have been some improved treatments/ antivirals/ better clinical experience/ even a vaccine that will make widespread transmission less deadly.

Or (bad scenario) young, economically active people won't be able (even if willing) to make more sacrifices on behalf of old, vulnerable people. If there had been no furlough scheme, a lot (of those furloughed) would have had no choice but to break lockdown a lot earlier. We can't afford it again, so it will be back to Cummings' original 'let the old people die' plan. I would be extremely distressed by this, but feel it may be unavoidable unless medicine makes some swift advances.

Hopefully contact tracing will allow the R rate to be reduced, but I am somewhat sceptical... Some people come into contact with a lot more people every day than others. Are we really going to ask a bus driver to stay at home for 14 days, go back to work, drive a bus for a day that had a person with covid on it, stay off for another 14 days, repeat...? There would be no public transport...

We won't go into national lockdown again. Possibly regional/local lockdowns if there is a spike.

@AlternativePerspective I know why we had lock down and I know why some were told to shield .
I don’t think people should be shielding unless they want to , my dad doesn’t want to so he is just taking extra precautions.
My point was , I think that’s what the government could try to do to make it look like they’re doing something useful, like that ridiculous bloody quarantine ,
I’m not saying I think that’s what they should, at all .

I obey the rules of lockdown because it protects my health and the health of my family

But the problem is, that the people who have a higher risk of death from lockdown (via social isolation / poverty) need to do it too, and those people haven't been doing it to protect the health of themselves or their family, they've been doing it to protect others.

The harder it is to do it - the longer it is, the more it costs them, the more they say that the rules don't actually apply to everyone then the less likely they are to do it. Getting these groups to increase their own risk of death is difficult.

Hopefully social distancing and improved hygiene etc for the majority of the year leading up to winter will help to reduce those seasonal flu & pneumonia numbers, even if the COVID cases will be adding to them.

Might I add that I'm grateful for your sensible and hard-won perspective @AlternativePerspective, and hope your transplant can be found soon.

My mother lives in a retirement community. (Independent flats, not a care home, but very elderly residents.) No one has had covid-19. But we were saying yesterday how sad it is that four people have died since the pandemic began without seeing their final spring. Given that the chances of catching covid are now so low in London, for the people in their mid-90s and over, it's hard for me to think it makes sense to miss sitting on a bench looking at the pink roses climbing up the brick wall in this perfect May weather and having a cup of tea with each other. Unfortunately the questions about visiting seem more complicated; many family members are more worried about the negative effects of transmitting the virus to their relatives (whom they see infrequently anyway) than about the negative effects of neglecting them.

• Well go out and do what you want then ! If you are “shielding” but don’t want to then only you can decide what risks to take*

The point I was actually making is that as soon as you say shielding, it's as if the person cannot think for themselves anymore and has become helpless. As I said, I've faced it from family and on top of that from my employer.

Where you were once very capable, in the eyes of certain people you become weak and unable to cope or think.

No need to be abrupt, I was making a point.

No. And the 'second wave' if it happens might not be as virulent. Lockdown is unsustainable and unaffordable.

Hopefully track and trace - if it works and people after DC are willing to comply with it when very, very inconvenient as it will be - plus having dropped the R rate low enough through this one will avert having to do a full blown lockdown again. Gripping onto that hope with both hands.

What I don't understand is why hospitals at this point aren't being deep cleaned and something like designating one hospital in the area as for Covid (and using the nightingales) while keeping any suspected Covid cases out and checking/managing risk carefully, so that 'clean' hospitals can start gradually increasing provision for needed care. That doesn't seem to be in any plan I've seen so far, yet would seem really important.

We (as in as a country following our leadership) are just utterly shit which would help ease a second wave.
We aren’t enforcing people to do a mandatory isolation when coming in from other countries until the 8th June even though people are still crossing boarders. Face coverings aren't mandatory for confined places such as the tube, trains and places like supermarkets (basically any indoor space shared with many other people).
And we also have people who have multiple corona symptoms who still think ‘fuck it, I’ll go out and about in public’

In regards to a second lockdown it’ll be unlikely. As others have said, companies won’t survive a second one (if they survive this one) and government won’t furlough again.

Thinking about this for the millionth time... I think I am in a curious way grateful to Dominic Cummings, whom I can't stand, as he has effectively ended the lockdown and has, I hope, convinced the overwhelming majority of people not to co-operate with any future one.

I actually think that COVID will burn out. If it doesn’t then we face that as and when. But there’s just as much chance it will burn out as not.

And it’s far better to think that than to anticipate the worst.