To think the lockdown needs to end now. Part Two

[Dowser]

This is too important a discussion to give up on and as it looks like rumbling on for some time yet we need to be able to air our thoughts good or bad, vent, rage.
Whatever..because I think everyone will agree , no matter which side they are on
The current situation is shit.

Beyond shit. We need to get back to normal

It is shit and I wouldn’t want to be tasked with making these decisions for all the money in the world.

It needs to end. The lockdown is causing more harm than the disease at this point.

No, I dont think it needs to end now. It needs to be a gradual process, watching R.

Agree it needs to end. My children are suffering for no good reason. It's ridiculous how long this is being dragged out. Lock down was to flatten the curve. We've done that and it needs to end now.

Of course the current situation is shit. But we need to get infections down to a small enough rate that track and trace systems stand a chance of working/effectively reducing transmission. Once the R rate increases to above 1 (and apparently it's heading that way) cases can increase exponentially. Then you have the situation where hospitals are maxed out and NHS staff are again doing relentless massive shifts to cope with increasing numbers of severely ill patients.
I'm guessing the people pushing for lockdown to end aren't the people who will be dealing with the fallout of it ending.

All we needed/need to do was hold out for a few more weeks but in easing it now we've set ourselves up for another peak and a longer lockdown when hospital admissions become overwhelming again. We're simply not going to be able to ignore the second peak and get on with our lives.

The argument that the current lockdown isn't sustainable doesn't hold. What do people think is going to happen when numbers of patients rise again? The only way to control that will be another lockdown. Or do we just ignore them and let NHS staff "take it on the chin"? It's not the sort of situation we can just sweep under the carpet.

You won’t get the infection rate down while this is going on:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52949014

The whole thing has been a waste of time, people have lost their jobs for nothing 😞

@TabbyMumz

No, I dont think it needs to end now. It needs to be a gradual process, watching R.

Ok and how do we pay for this as we cower in our homes paralysed by fear?

It needs to end, I agree.

The ONS says daily new cases are down to 5,600. The threatened spikes never appear. The use of R to guide policy is increasingly being called into question. Track and trace isn't going to be of much use - people will not get tested/give contact details as the 14 day isolation will cause financial difficulty for so many. If the app ever becomes widely available, people won't use that either - again for financial reasons plus all the concerns about data. The face covering policy is useless - huge numbers will be exempt and it's clear that many of those who will wear them are so clueless about their use, they won't be protecting anyone.

We cannot stay locked up while an incompetent government bumbles around in the dark cheered on from the sidelines by the hysterical. Life should get back to normal.

"Ok and how do we pay for this as we cower in our homes paralysed by fear?"
Well in case you havent noticed, ths Government gas been paying out millions to keep peoples salaries topped up. And she is cowering, paralysed by fear? Think they need medical help if they are.

The lock down has ended has it not? We are now in the socially distancing phase. This is to prevent us being back in the same situation we were in back in March. Are people who are saying lockdown needs to end really saying socially distancing needs to end? Well you could ask the virus nicely to go away now but I don't think it will listen. Everyone wants this to be over but how is it possible right now when we know how quickly the virus would spread.

Continuing the lockdown is just hiding from the inevitable. We need to get back to some normality not just to preserve jobs and the economy, but to allow people to properly grieve losses, in the content of family and community relationships. Childrens needs don't cease, they don't stop growing and developing just because of lockdown, the longer this goes on, the more we are risking raising a generation who are anxious, scared of intimacy, overly compliant with governments and organisations who just view them as data to be mined. We have human needs other than physical health.

In any case the virus, like others, is becoming less harmful the more widely spread it becomes in the population.

If we hadn't locked down the NHS wouldn't have coped.

Few people are saying we shouldn't have locked down at all. A growing number of us are saying it's time for a to return to normality for those who are not vulnerable.

@mrshoho

The lock down has ended has it not? We are now in the socially distancing phase. This is to prevent us being back in the same situation we were in back in March. Are people who are saying lockdown needs to end really saying socially distancing needs to end? Well you could ask the virus nicely to go away now but I don't think it will listen. Everyone wants this to be over but how is it possible right now when we know how quickly the virus would spread.

Tell the people who work in entire industries that are still closed that 'lockdown is ended'.

It needs to end over the course of June. Restrictions lifted by July. People who choose to stay home can do so.

It is interminable atm. I’d take schools back first even with rest lifted slowly.

Having seen photos of the protests yesterday, it seems social distancing has ended. It makes me so angry that people have had their lives destroyed or worse over the last 3 months, yet idiots are packed together like that for a protest, whatever the cause may be.

Track and trace will never work in our culture. Too many people will feel ill but stay silent because saying something will cause whole school bubbles to close, people to come off work and lose income. If this type of system worked STDs wouldn't exist.

As long a social distancing is in place and there are local lockdowns if needed then it's over anyway.

Sadly, a local school had one of it's bubbles burst on the second day because an idiot parent sent a DC to school without waiting for the result of the test. Which turned out to be positive.

If people behave responsibly we won't need a second lockdown. But there are always fools prepared to risk someone else's health through their selfishness.

Inthefanilytree

Have you any evidence for your claim that the virus is becoming less harmful?

Everyone else. Germany is close to back to normal. They held out in lockdown until the virus was at a controllable low level in society. Since our virus is. It at a controlled level , what do you think would happen if we go "back to normal"

Are you expecting to be over half a million dead by this time next year or do you envisage more lockdowns ?

A return to "normality" means a return to being unable to treat cancer patients, unable to see children who require treatment and perhaps leaving dying people to die alone at home. There will also be tens of thousands of others who will have a painful illness that may leave them permanently disabled - and if you go back to "normal" that could include you.

However there is now the prospect of a saliva test that might give results in an hour, a real game changer. You can open up just about everything again if people isolate for an hour after taking a test that shows clear. Schools can open safely, work is safer, travel becomes possible again.

Forgot - no evidence that the virus is becoming less harmful, China think their latest outbreak was a more harmful one.

We need to get the country back to work asap