To think restrictions won't back?

[covidwoewoe]

Wfh and masks I am fine with.

But the thought of restrictions like closing things and limits on socialising is causing me serious upset.

Trying so hard to live in the here and now but I hate the uncertainty.

I'm absolutely fine with masks. I have no intentions of complying with anything else they may through at us. Anyone CEV who want's to stay isolated in their home I'd even contribute financially to assist.

Anyone who goes down the route suggesting not permitting unvaccinated by choice to medical assistance better make sure they don't smoke, drink, take drugs, drive a car, get old, take part in any sports or in fact anything else that's likely to end them up needing medical attention because you can't pick and chose what treatment taxpayers get from the NHS.

There have only been a couple of dozen days in the whole pandemic when cases were higher than they are at the moment.

But we must have had more where hospitalisation was higher and rising faster than now. It seems to be stable, for quite some time now.

@CherryBlossomWinter

England and the UK have very high rates of cases compared to Europe, which has really managed to keep cases low.

UK is in a terrible position and it’s really weird that no-one can see it. So many deaths a week. 1 in 12 children have Covid! It is utterly bonkers.

Most of this could be managed better by mitigations such as good ventilation. Masks on public transport (which everywhere in Europe is sign pretty much). School children need to wear masks and have good ventilation.

The UK is a Covid outlier.

11000 deaths since ‘freedom day’.

@antoniawhite ..... that's not right at all...?

@MarshaBradyo that's what I look at and hope continues! Even if they doubled we'd still be below the level we were at in the Nov 2020 lockdown.

No? Can’t find my source now so may have misremembered. Apologies, if so. Should have checked.

@antoniawhite wait no it's my eyes! I read that as 120k since July!!! Sorry

I think the vaccine push (particularly for children and boosters for 50+) would be lost if restrictions return. Furlough can't come back, so there would be mass unemployment, which also costs the government a tremendous amount.

I hate to say this, but from a scan of the news in the last hour it seems rates are highest in young people up to 18 and several local authorities are reintroducing bubbles and masks in schools.

Vaccine passports are a pretty ineffective tool as far as I can see. In Ireland you need a vaccine passport to do pretty much anything and their Covid rates are growing rapidly in recent days regardless. Also much higher compliance with mask wearing over there which also doesn’t seem to having much impact.

Maybe bring back masks if anything but can't see anything else happening. If they try and ban household mixing again people will just do it anyway. Plus furlough has ended so if want to lock down lock down that would have to come back..

@PiddleOfPuppies

I think the vaccine push (particularly for children and boosters for 50+) would be lost if restrictions return. Furlough can't come back, so there would be mass unemployment, which also costs the government a tremendous amount.

Why did Sunak say he would bring back fourlough immediately if need be?

Do you have insider knowledge?

we can't afford anymore furlough....just got to get on with it now

The NHS is on its knees because of years of underfunding, mismanagement and cutbacks by a Tory government. Covid was just the straw that broke the camel’s back. Even if covid vanished tomorrow it will take the NHS years, decades probably, to get back on track.

Herd immunity doesn't seem to be working as a strategy either when even vaccinated people who had covid in 2020 are now catching it a second time.

Bringing back isolation for household contacts would seem like a sensible measure to bring back alongside masks and WFH before another lockdown though.

The reality of it is, some of us are still shielding because that's what we've been advised to do by our medical team because of medical necessity. No income though because shielding has "officially " ended.

Dec-Feb will be nasty. I expect it will be similar to last year, lots of messaging from
Boris that he is definitely not going to allow more restrictions, then total shock when the virus doesn’t listen to Boris and continues to mutate to become more contagious because that is what viruses do. Lots of ‘we will not close schools’ then total astonishment when schools have to send kids home because the schoolteachers are all off sick with covid.

They won’t close shops and schools until the hospitals are near breaking point, my guess is a 3 wk stay at home order in January. Right after telling us all that driving up and down the country for xmas mixing is fine (like last year) and then denying that there was a huge spike in covid cases shortly after xmas (like last yr).

Dunno what state NHS is in. The usual wait time to see a doctor at my local A&E is 7 hrs at the mo.

There isn’t much we can do but if you have a choice please wear masks / work from home / take what small stros you can. If you’re a headteacher please go back to bubbles. Currently my headteacher is boasting about how wonderful it is to be able to have whole school assemblies in one room again. 🤦‍♀️

The big issue this winter will be flu imo. Lack of immunity as a result of lockdowns and lack of cases last year making it difficult to create the vaccine.

The other big issue will be hospitals full of people whose treatment has been cancelled over the last 18 months and/or who still can’t access GP services.

And yet the lockdown lovers will still demand restrictions to overcome issues caused by restrictions themselves

I doubt they'll be back, because the level of restrictions that would be needed to really make an impact on cases would not be politically palatable and would cause their own problems.

(I know, I know, people are absolutely convinced that masks + WFH would fix it. But the fact that there are 3 out of 4 UK countries where we have kept those and seen cases go soaring even higher than England's would suggest otherwise.)

Our local hospitals are also overwhelmed at moment with non-covid cases.

I currently have covid but thankfully with no symptoms and found out by chance, so I’m one of this week’s cases. Isolating for the next week.

I very much doubt the restrictions will be back unless pressure on the NHS reaches cataclysmic levels.

12-15 year olds can get vaccinated now and things are starting to work through in that age group. I suspect if a major new variant came in they would consider further restrictions but I honestly don’t think people would comply with them (where they were of a personal choice nature - e.g. seeing friends etc) and as someone else has said, the vaccination effort would be lost as people would see it as pointless.

You were right @antoniawhite it’s been around 11,000 deaths since Freedom Day. Have people got so blasé that these deaths don’t mean anything?

1 in 6 of all cases in the UK have been since freedom day. Cases do matter for several reasons. One of main ones being we still don’t know the long term effects, and strong evidence that for maybe 1 in 10 people there are serious effects for a few months or more.

Health services are struggling with waiting lists from the last year or so, trying to manage seasonal infections and covid. Our case numbers are just too high and the thing is, they needn’t be this high.

The UK is the hardest hit country in Europe. We just need to be more like Europe. We don’t have to lockdown again, if we focus on masks, ventilation and contact tracing in higher risk areas such as public transport, healthcare, schools and hospitality.

The UK is the hardest hit country in Europe. We just need to be more like Europe.

Except that some European countries are being hit harder than we are at the moment, and several UK countries have kept measures 'like Europe' and are getting hit even harder than England which hasn't... but details, details.

Cases are about to explode IMO. It is absolutely rife in secondaries. No precautions, no cancelled events.

@CherryBlossomWinter

Where are you getting your facts from? We're not the hardest hit in Europe at all. No where near it.

We have more cases simply because we're testing more.

But our deaths pp is lower than many, which is surely the relevant figure? Especially given that we're including anyone who died of something else, if they happened to have covid too; and many countries aren't.

My stepfather has just died, of diabetes leading to infection and septicaemia. He had covid too in the last few days, that will go down as 1, and yet his death wasn't due to covid.