To ask if you have a relative aged 65+ at Christmas you should ALL lateral flow test?

[Fmesanta]

Don't want to be the martyr as I know there are a range of views within the family but AIBU to expect all the adults coming to test before they do if we have guests over 65 years old?

I've been working in the office & people have had colds
Nobody has been doing daily tests
No masks
No social distancing

Most people are vaccinated & some have had their boosters

Then we have visited various xmas out door markets

Will be visiting relatives at xmas

Tests are not compulsory

It is the inconsistency

Don't need to test to go into work
So I'm not testing for anything else

The only people that I know who have tested are people who work in schools, hospitals or travelling abroad

Nope. They arent accurate. If vaccinated and boosted get on with life( or live like a hermit if thats your preference). LFT makers must be laughing all the way to the bank.

If I were 80+
I would definitely choose spending Xmas with family & friends

We don't test before going into a shop
We don't test before going to the gym
Etc

@Fmesanta

Don't want to be the martyr as I know there are a range of views within the family but AIBU to expect all the adults coming to test before they do if we have guests over 65 years old?

I'm over 65 and I wouldn't expect it.

@WouldBeGood

I honestly think people have gone mad.

Me too.

Leave them to it. Drowning in a sea of plastic and convincing themselves they are superior and 'moral'.

All these people testing before every event!!! Doesn't anyone give a shit about plastic pollution anymore?!

To all those saying they can't get tests anywhere, online has had them recently, today even. People have been handing them out in shops round us, boxes and boxes of them.

@Aishah231 caring about pollution is so 2019. Single use plastics are the new god, cos Covid

@TerribleZebra

What do you do when the 89 y.o. guest is the one refusing to test? 😂. Short of shoving a swab her nose as she enters the house I don't really know what to do. My mum is immunosuppressed and so we need to be sure everyone is covid free.

Surely it’s up to your mother if she wants to be around people that may or may not have covid? As has already been said, a negative test only means you’re negative at the time you took it. A couple of hours later you could have become infectious enough to test positive. It’s everybody’s responsibility to make their own decisions. I know my own dm who’s 86 doesn’t give a rats arse if people take a test or not. As she pointed out the other day, ‘I’ve lived a long and happy life, I don’t want to spend another Christmas alone, and I’m likely not going to live til next Christmas, so I’m willing to take the risk’.

Made this in honour of LFTs

We do LFTs before meeting anyone,and expect others to do likewise. It's common courtesy, but especially when meeting anyone older or vulnerable for other reasons (asthma, immunosuppressed etc)

@Siameasy now that’s clever!

I can't see the big deal I really can't
They are free, available and easy to use and give someone protection.

But they’re not free are they? China isn’t supplying them to us free of charge. Someone is going to have to foot the bill for all these millions of tests.
It begs the question are they actually cost effective? Is the strain and cost taken off the NHS as a result of us doing theses tests greater than the cost of us all doing them. If not it’s a pointless thing.

Not an age thing but should be doing it when meeting groups of people of any age!

I don't like taking the tests so didn't bother doing so before Xmas.

My strategy was just to quarantine myself for two weeks before visiting relatives. That seems like a much more sensible solution to me and avoids plastic waste.

@MorningStarling

I don't like taking the tests so didn't bother doing so before Xmas.

My strategy was just to quarantine myself for two weeks before visiting relatives. That seems like a much more sensible solution to me and avoids plastic waste.

If you don't work outside the home or have other commitments fair enough. Do you have children and did you keep them off school too?

@I8toys

Not an age thing but should be doing it when meeting groups of people of any age!

Out of interest is this something you see yourself doing for years to come?

I guess we will always have new variants and boosters so will we also always test before contact with other humans?

It's automatic now every time I meet relatives, go to events - gigs, theatre. We have teachers and teenagers in the family so always seen to be testing and have boxes around the house. Son has to test weekly at Loughborough uni to get his room key to work. Seems to be a normal part of our life now.

When I had Covid my LFT was negative in the morning, I felt unwell mid afternoon and tested again and it was positive.

So important to test just before you meet..

[quote Fmesanta]@Siameasy

Yes I absolutely would feel better if attendees tested before coming to Christmas dinner involving 90 year old granny and if heaven forbid we could just have some way of mitigating her contracting COVID then why on earth would we not???!!!!

I'd carry the burden of it if the following day someone tested positive it hadn't piped up in advance and asked to test as a precaution. (Rightly or wrongly, I still would.)[/quote]
I agree.

I know LFTs are not 100% but they can pick up asymptomatic cases and prevent transmission.

My DF is undergoing chemo. We always test before meeting him (as well as distancing). A few weeks ago DD tested positive on LFT so we cancelled the visit.

Certainly worth doing LFTs to try and avoid passing covid to vulnerable relatives.