Will you self isolate if covid positive test?

[Monopolyiscrap]

Compulsory self-isolation is ending if you test positive with covid. Instead, people are being advised to choose to self-isolate.
In reality, I think many people will not. I would not get paid if I self-isolate but am well enough to work, so why would I forego a week's wages?

So will you self-isolate if you test positive with covid?

YABU - Yes I will self-isolate
YANBU - No I will not self-isolate

It amazes me how naive some individuals are about how the economy works.

In simplistic terms, we just can’t afford to have people sitting at home on endless furloughs. If people aren’t earning, they’re not paying taxes and contributing to - at the end of the food chain - the NHS. The NHS runs out of money, we’d be in an even worse situation. We’ve lost sight of the the reasons restrictions were brought in. It wasn’t to save and protect us from a life threatening disease - it was to ensure the NHS didn’t become overwhelmed because had that happened on any government’s watch, it would have political suicide. They (whatever political persuasion was in power at the time) would have been forever unelectable again.

I also wonder because we are no longer a religious society, whether we fear death more too? In the past, people accepted the inevitability of the end of life because they believed they were going somewhere better. Now, we try to keep everyone alive for as long as possible and can’t seem to accept that elderly people generally die of something. Very few of us are lucky enough just to fall asleep in our armchair by the fireside. Most of us will sadly get ill with something that will eventually finish us off. Covid has merely brought this unpleasant fact out of the care homes/hospitals and shoved it in our faces and reminded us all of our own mortality.

I won’t be testing either!

@Theluggage15

Sorry Pinky, you’re wrong. The U.K. response to covid was ranked one of the strictest in the world. Obviously disappointing people weren’t welded in their houses!

Who by?

I'm certainly not suggesting locking people up at home ad infinitum. Lockdowns were not to protect anyone, the government only put lockdowns in place to stop the NHS collapsing certainly not to protect any of us.

Does no one think UK workers deserve sick pay when they are ill - with no exceptions? I do. In my mind the solution to the abject refusal of our government to recognize this isn't to propagate disease.

All that will achieve is more pressure on the NHS, more impact on education and more economic issues.

Not sure where anyone is reading the UK's response has been ''robust''. The UK has been criticized time and time again through out this pandemic for it's lack of response. UK residents have been subjected to the most stringent travel restrictions countries can impose as a result. It's astonishing to me how little people seem to know about Covid19 policy abroad....

In a few years when you are STILL unable to freely travel, your child has missed more and more school, your employment is less secure then even now, just remember you agreed with this approach of ''pretending'' we aren't in a pandemic.

Does no one think UK workers deserve sick pay when they are ill - with no exceptions? I do. In my mind the solution to the abject refusal of our government to recognize this isn't to propagate disease

What are you doing to campaign for this then, given you’re so keen for people to stay at home and think they deserve adequate remuneration for it?

@ShallWeTalkAboutBruno

Does no one think UK workers deserve sick pay when they are ill - with no exceptions? I do. In my mind the solution to the abject refusal of our government to recognize this isn't to propagate disease

What are you doing to campaign for this then, given you’re so keen for people to stay at home and think they deserve adequate remuneration for it?

sick pay for endless isolations, non vaccinated who have been in contact etc etc.....no! because its us mugs left in the workplace trying to cope with endless absence....and yes, its played to the MAX!! people are not daft and are faking it to get paid time off

what about us lot still working....stressed,resentful,rundown??

Does no one think UK workers deserve sick pay when they are ill - with no exceptions? I do. In my mind the solution to the abject refusal of our government to recognize this isn't to propagate disease.

What is the solution then? Because it’s not going to be fixed in two weeks - so in two weeks when people don’t isolate because it will mean they can’t put food on the table, are they selfish? Or are they victims of the system? Should they all quit in protest, to make a point? How will that help them?
What are you actually suggesting people do in 12 days time if the restrictions end on 24th?
You can campaign, and you can never vote Tory, but it’s still not going to provide adequate sick pay by the end of the month. So are those individuals who can’t afford to isolate all selfish bastards? Or do they have no other option.

@Pinkyxx

I'm certainly not suggesting locking people up at home ad infinitum. Lockdowns were not to protect anyone, the government only put lockdowns in place to stop the NHS collapsing certainly not to protect any of us.

Does no one think UK workers deserve sick pay when they are ill - with no exceptions? I do. In my mind the solution to the abject refusal of our government to recognize this isn't to propagate disease.

All that will achieve is more pressure on the NHS, more impact on education and more economic issues.

Not sure where anyone is reading the UK's response has been ''robust''. The UK has been criticized time and time again through out this pandemic for it's lack of response. UK residents have been subjected to the most stringent travel restrictions countries can impose as a result. It's astonishing to me how little people seem to know about Covid19 policy abroad....

In a few years when you are STILL unable to freely travel, your child has missed more and more school, your employment is less secure then even now, just remember you agreed with this approach of ''pretending'' we aren't in a pandemic.

But you expect people who feel completely fine and do not feel unwell to isolate?

@Pinkyxx

I'm certainly not suggesting locking people up at home ad infinitum. Lockdowns were not to protect anyone, the government only put lockdowns in place to stop the NHS collapsing certainly not to protect any of us.

Does no one think UK workers deserve sick pay when they are ill - with no exceptions? I do. In my mind the solution to the abject refusal of our government to recognize this isn't to propagate disease.

All that will achieve is more pressure on the NHS, more impact on education and more economic issues.

Not sure where anyone is reading the UK's response has been ''robust''. The UK has been criticized time and time again through out this pandemic for it's lack of response. UK residents have been subjected to the most stringent travel restrictions countries can impose as a result. It's astonishing to me how little people seem to know about Covid19 policy abroad....

In a few years when you are STILL unable to freely travel, your child has missed more and more school, your employment is less secure then even now, just remember you agreed with this approach of ''pretending'' we aren't in a pandemic.

The problem here, isn't staying at home while ill. It's the expectation to stay home while perfectly healthy but testing positive. We don't routinely test for flu to see who has it asymptotically.

Isolating itself caused huge issues with employers in January. Having large numbers of your workforce not being allowed out but actually not ill caused significant issues.

We don't do that for any other illness that we may or may not have.

Testing in itself isn't wholly accurate either. My oh passed covid on to his vulnerable mum. But was testing daily. Was testing negative for 3 days after seeing her and on the 4th day tested positive. She tested positive on the same day. She hadn't been out and the only person who she had contact with who subsequently tested positive was my oh. The testing just lets people feel safer without actually being safer.

You also need to stop referring to the uk when discussing covid as all 4 nations have had very different responses to covid. None have faired particularly well despite more severe restrictions in some parts for a significant length of time.

If people are absent from work fraudulently that needs to be addressed by management. Incidentally how do you know people are "faking it"? I agree though that the unvaccinated by choice having to isolate and getting paid are a drain on their colleagues. That certainly needs to stop.

@Pinkyxx

You’ve dodged the question

You said you want people to isolate to stop “spreading germs”

2 questions

1 how do you deal with fact that many asymptomatic
2 “germs” just covid germs and all germs?!

@ForksAndSpoons

“I don’t see Germany going down the UK’s path quite so quickly,” said Knobloch. “But then you need to bear in mind there are broader philosophical differences in our health system, with avoidance of death still playing a fundamental part in the German system, while Britain’s system places more emphasis on maintaining the ability to work.”

I think this is it in a nutshell. Most countries seem to want to avoid deaths. The UK wants to avoid people people not being able to work. I don't blame people. The provision to self isolate without too high of a personal cost is not existent.

Wish I could get my parents out of the country.

Yes I would self-isolate and I agree with ForksandSpoons post. I'm in Scotland though so we have to self-isolate if we have it, which I think is much more sensible.

I'm not sure why people are implying England is unique in what is happening, Norway has done the same:

www.politico.eu/article/norway-drops-coronavirus-restrictions/

People are advised to stay at home for four days if they have covid but are no longer required to. That dreadful Tory libertarianism that puts the onus on the individual to decide seems to be alive and well there.

Their border policies are actually even more liberal than the UK now, they don't even test the unvaccinated.

@ilovesooty

If people are absent from work fraudulently that needs to be addressed by management. Incidentally how do you know people are "faking it"? I agree though that the unvaccinated by choice having to isolate and getting paid are a drain on their colleagues. That certainly needs to stop.

over 100 staff and they 'talk' about how to maximise time off, how to be away from the workplace as we can't do anything about it. other staff do tell us.

how have we got time for this? we are too busy running around trying to cover the people off...

there are plenty of youtube videos showing how to create a positive LFT. At one point people only had to say they had spent time with a friend /relative who has now tested positive and they got 10 days off, fully paid. and they did it on a few occasions

I'm surprised youtube doesn't have a policy to take such videos down

@GirlInACountrySong I would have thought it should be a priority to develop a robust but fair absence policy. If people are openly taking the piss it won't do anything for staff morale and it will encourage further absence. Companies shouldn't be looking to government isolation policy to do their work for them.

I'm self employed. I don't get sick pay and I can't work from home. If I don't work I don't get paid.

I wouldn't work if I had Covid, just as I wouldn't work if I had flu or an illness where I was too unwell to do my job. However I won't be testing for covid if I don't have symptoms.

I'm not sure why people are implying England is unique in what is happening

It's also going mostly unacknowledged that not everywhere made LFT free in the first place. They were never free in ROI or France. I don't know about other countries, anyone?

29, 516 people died of flu And pneumonia in 2018. (ONS.uk) that is 568 a week.

Less than Covid, but pretty substantial don’t you think?

Where were the masks and the lockdowns? Where was the drama and calls of selfishness for spreading germs?

I really wonder if these lockdown/mask wearing evangelists really understand there is, and always has been, more than one type of germ in the world?
Covid isn’t even in the top 10 causes of death in UK, and yet it soaks up billions of tax payers money 😡

@Scianel

I'm not sure why people are implying England is unique in what is happening, Norway has done the same:

www.politico.eu/article/norway-drops-coronavirus-restrictions/

People are advised to stay at home for four days if they have covid but are no longer required to. That dreadful Tory libertarianism that puts the onus on the individual to decide seems to be alive and well there.

Their border policies are actually even more liberal than the UK now, they don't even test the unvaccinated.

It's a weirdo, covid virtue signalling strain of English exceptionalism.

@TheKeatingFive

I'm not sure why people are implying England is unique in what is happening

It's also going mostly unacknowledged that not everywhere made LFT free in the first place. They were never free in ROI or France. I don't know about other countries, anyone?

Never free in Spain.

The testing just lets people feel safer without actually being safer.

This, many times over.

I've never particularly liked ltfs for this reason. (Posted numerous times about this) There were numerous trials over mass testing. Two were discontinued because of doubts over the effectiveness of it. The government just set up more trials until they got an assessment of the scheme they liked. Questions were raised about the ethics of them at the time, precisely because they lulled people into a false sense of security in assuming that because they were negative they didn't have covid and weren't infectious. The public at large have really failed to understand this, thus confirming the ethically concern that was voiced at the beginning were very much valid.

Having been in a situation TWICE since December where I have symptoms at the same time as a household case or in the days immediately before one, where I have constantly tested negative and have since found that for a small number of people tests seem to just not test positive despite having covid, its really focused my mind over this issue.

It is one of the reasons it wasn't taken up everywhere because it affected behaviour but didn't necessarily drive down the overall risk. (Google Risk Homeostatis - the principle being that everyone has an 'acceptable level of risk' but if they are given a safety device to mitigate this they will often adjust their behaviour, taking riskier behaviour because they feel safer, therefore mitigating any benefit that might have been gained by said safety measure. Numerous case studies are available on this concept).

I think one of the problems in the UK now is how we have come to take free testing for granted and thats lead to the cost spiralling out of control, making it questionable in terms of how much its benefitting us and how we might be better ditching it and spending the money on health in other areas and saving more lives in the long run. In terms of cost per lives saved, it might not be the most efficient use of money.

With the above in mind in terms of costs per lives saved, this graph is worth considering.

Wow that has plummeted. Very good to see that.