To think it is utterly crazy that shielders can now meet up with people?

[Biglittlethings]

At midnight last night the Government slipped out a frankly bizarre new alteration to the rules in that shielders, who have been told on the one hand to expect that they will need to shield beyond 30 June, will from tomorrow be able to not only leave the house, but meet up with others from different households.

"From Monday, the 2.2 million people who’ve been shielding can go outside for first time. This will be with either members of their household, or, if they live alone, to meet one other person."

Further information will follow in today's press conference.

Am I the only one to think this is absolutely ridiculous, and not at all in the interests of "the science?"

Johnson and Cummings want to save the Exchequer some money by reducing the numbers claiming pensions and disability benefits. Covid19 does the job very nicely indeed

Its where my mind went. The hospitals can now cope so just get on with it.

Personally I'm just going to carry on as I have been. People can make their own choices.

There's a difference between the virus being in the air a few feet around when you breathe out / cough than droplets remaining randomly in the open air

Exactly, as people have said, it's about eroding legal protection. If the government instructs you to shield, then your employer has to allow you to work from home, or furlough you, and you have to be provided with food deliveries if nobody can shop for you. If the government say you can go out, but you choose not to, then there's no protection against being forced back to work, or being made redundant, or being forced to go to the supermarket and to other places that put you at risk.

@atilathehut

Government are damned if they do damned if they don't. There's another post on here about shielders being forgotten and left to rot then someone else complains that they are now allowed out. If you are not comfortable going out don't go but some need to get out for their MH

Completely agree. Doesn’t matter what they do, it’ll be wrong.

No one is pointing a gun to their head, OP. They don’t have to go out.
Do people really need this level of guidance?

According to their own chart, shielding people shouldn't be going out until we've reached level 1. We're still at level 4.
I think there's a level of balance between risk from C19 and risk to mental health. Clearly we're not getting to L1 any time soon. It's already been 10 weeks
For those who follow the rules, it would be condemning them to months more at home and for many, alone.

Were shielding but only for the 5yo. In theory we don't have to shield, but given all the "keep distant from your family" doesn't work when you're 5, we've all had to shield. DH is working from home potentially until Sept. We've taken him outside becasue I'm concerned for him mental wellbeing as well as his physical. We go to an empty field where its a quiet and short walk, we practise good hygiene, we're cautious and do it weekly not daily. This new guidance brings us in line with their recommendations and what lots of shielding people are already doing.

For those who don't want to nothing has has changed. The Govt aren't expecting you to go to the shops or go to work

I don't think it means they are no longer high risk, just possibly that theres been some acknowledgement of mental health issues of expecting people (who live alone, mainly) to stay away from all civilisation for months on end. The 'science' also seems to be saying that if meeting up outside, the risk is small too. Those who are worried can still stay in. Those who would rather take the risk, are 'allowed' (though they were never 'locked up' to start with really, as much as some seem to think they should have been). Seems sensible to me. Unless there has been a further announcement saying those in the shielding category are actually 100% safe now or something?

Government are damned if they do damned if they don't. There's another post on here about shielders being forgotten and left to rot then someone else complains that they are now allowed out. If you are not comfortable going out don't go but some need to get out for their MH

Indeed. I disagree with this government on a great many things, but this really is a no win situation for them I think, regardless of what they do or say, they are in the wrong. Lockdown seems to be almost as divisive as brexit was! Half on one side shouting, other half on the other..cannot please more than half!

I really think the risk of taking a walk even with someone else if you are 2 metres away is incredibly small.

[quote TheMotherofAllDilemmas]@Bluntness100

It is airborne, why on Earth do you think all other countries are wearing masks?[/quote]
People are wearing masks so they don’t cough and spray droplets, which can travel some distance which is not the same as the virus being ‘airborne’.

I am not listening to them anymore. I am not even listening to the news. I will hold my own counsel. I will do what is best for us, which is keeping up social distancing until it seems much safer i.e. very few cases and virtually no deaths.

Lifting the shield is very different to providing support and an ongoing plan so that people who are in danger are able to mitigate risk and manage their health and business as best they can without losing their jobs or their lives.

This government openly started out with a plan for herd immunity which so clearly meant a mass cull of the most vulnerable that it had to backtrack. Without track and trace, without good nursing home planning and without proper support for shieldies we are back to cull status.

We do need to get out of lockdown but why do it in the first place if it is not to manage infection movement throughout the community? Lifting everything haphazardly means wasting the opportunity lockdown was to get a good plan in place.

I understand people have to shield due to underlying health conditions. But when you see people from work who were sent home to shield but have been here there and every where. Posting on social media. Its really got on my nerves.

One more example of moving to Level 3 provisions when we are still at Level 4 and staring a second spike in the face.

Those who think shielding people shouldn't go out for a walk, please can you link to the scientific study that suggests why this is a high risk activity? All the reports I've read suggest the risk outside is extremely low, lower than was originally thought in fact. It's an indoor disease, if it's coming back strongly it'll be when we're all driven inside by autumn rain. Shielded people will go batshit bonkers if they try to stay in for a full year, having a few months going outside and meeting family (distanced) would surely be beneficial, I can't honestly see the reasoning why they shouldn't.

I'm shielding due to very severe asthma and haven't left our house since I received the letter. DH has taken the DC out for walks as they are young and have boundless energy. This morning I received a call from work (nursery, so can't WFH) to say that in light of last night's announcement, they will be unfurloughing me and expecting me back at work in two weeks. So I have gone from being shielded to having to go to work in a small building with 30 very young children from 30 other families, plus staff having to send my children to school, mixing with, in total, 30 different children from another 30 families, plus however many teachers.

That puts me, a person who is extremely vulnerable going from contact with no one to a minimum of 70 other families overnight, despite the scientists saying that it's not safe. I'm livid with the government and very worried.

My point was we know we have a choice.
But when you receive that letter or have a medical expert tell you they actually you really should stay in because you’re unlikely to survive then it’s hard not to see it as a “must”.
Many of us who received that letter have been on quite the rollercoaster regarding our mental health and doing this in order to keep ourselves out of the NHS.
People are angry at us. So actually sometimes when people are shouting “if the shielded go out they should sign away their rights to care”, it didn’t feel like much of a choice.

Those shielding have different conditions with different needs. They need an individual medical assessment, not some wave of a minister's hand.

@SamsMumsCateracts that's not right at all, the announcement today was very clear apart from the outside once, you must continue to shield

Here https://www.gov.uk/government/news/prime-minister-hails-resilience-of-shielders-as-restrictions-set-to-ease?utm_source=4657c856-c6cb-4d94-b4bc-b277e9805915

I would be sending them this as it states

"Those being shielded still remain at risk and are advised to only leave the house once a day. They should not go to work or the shops and should avoid crowded places where they can’t social distance."

@ SamsMumsCateracts they stated very specifically in the briefing that this doesn’t mean that the shielded are no longer shielding or that they can be expected to go back to work. He was in fact very specific about that, so your employer is categorically in the wrong.

@SamsMumsCateracts your employers are absolutely in the wrong. Could you tell them to watch today's briefing?

“It’s a choice” is being used as a top trump. There you’ve won an argument.

What kind of choice is it between staying at home and going mad or dying and leaving your kids?
I understand why some people do want to shield, I understand why some people make the decision to enjoy the new guidelines.
I can still find the “but it’s a choice” thing being shoved down our throats on every thread about shielding to be offensive and exhausting. We are entitled to discuss the different elements of shielding and how it applies to each of us and shielders and society without being told it’s a choice. We know it’s a choice.

And “I’m sure we will have an ICU bed for you” thing as some kind of consolation prize?
Oh yay! Mechanical vent is available for you, be happy. Do you have any idea how many people never come off a vent? Whoopee! What a choice to make.

That was my understand too. I will be speaking with work first thing tomorrow to sort it out. Hopefully it was just a knee jerk reaction. I just feel like the government has been so ambiguous with everything else, the mixed messages and blatant flouting of rules, that employers are just seeing a green light where there isn't meant to be one. That certainly feels like that's what my boss has done. It's an awful position that I feel the government have put both myself and my employer in. Similar to how employers were told to be flexible with workers with childcare issues at the moment, yet dozens of posts on here prove that there is very little flexibility being given.

This morning I received a call from work (nursery, so can't WFH) to say that in light of last night's announcement, they will be unfurloughing me and expecting me back at work in two weeks. So I have gone from being shielded to having to go to work in a small building with 30 very young children from 30 other families, plus staff having to send my children to school, mixing with, in total, 30 different children from another 30 families, plus however many teachers.

Thats absolutely shocking..really bad. Sorry this has happened to you.

The level of hand-holding people expect through this astounds me.

Nobody has actually said that the shielded have to go out for a walk once a day, just that they can

And I also think the media are hugely to blame for the emotional response this has provoked. The BBC headline said that the shielding are going to be “allowed” to go out, which is not what was said at all, it was stated that everything here is guidance and optional not mandatory. But in the article it came across as hugely patronising as if we needed permission.

As for those stating that it’s unreasonable, if you’re shielding, then don’t go out, it’s not that hard. If you’re not shielding, then why do you think that people who are shouldn’t be able to make their own decisions to go out if they want to.

The reality here is that it’s neither reasonable nor realistic to expect people to shield indefinitely. There may never even be a vaccine, and then what?

Those shielding are often at risk from a multitude of illnesses anyway. This is now one of them, and reality is that we are going to have to learn to live with it. Unless people think that e.g. the immunesuppressed should never be able to go out because of what they might catch?