Yet I think you're assuming that you'll get essential worker cooperation for this, as happened in March 2020.
In the case of a more serious variant, this can't be relied upon and planning should be done accordingly.
When you're talking about young, healthy people genuinely risking their lives to keep the lights on, food in the shops, it would be a totally different situation to March 2020.
Yy thekeatingfive. One of the most interesting things about this discussion is the way people who think another lockdown is possible assume the conditions we had that allowed the previous ones can be replicated. Or exactly flipped in the case of the poster who thinks we'd see one if the age risk profile was reversed, with everything else essentially the same. No factoring in of how the experiences of the past two years have changed the fundamentals.
Lockdown needs people who are willing and able to do the necessary work out of the house to keep the rest of society at home. We're already seeing, even without deadlier strains that affect younger people, staffing crises and a shortage of essential workers in many sectors. That would get worse rather than better if people in those sectors felt more physically threatened by covid.
I didn't say that they all have children and grandchildren but many do and they wouldn't want them to risk their lives. They don't need to think the same way way for there to be be little chance of them doing anything that would significantly affect lockdown. The fact is that the great majority of the elderly do not work, and most socialise less than younger people. Also, if they can't go to pubs clubs events and hairdressers because working age people don't want to work due a high risk from covid what would be left for them to do?
You didn't say they all did, but you listed it as a reason why elderly people would comply with lockdown and ignored the fact that they don't all have children and grandchildren who are living. That obviously can't be a factor for the cohort who don't, and the ones who do still don't have a hive mind. As I said, that's patronising.
As for what they'd do, socialise with each other and with every working age person, some of whom are pretty old themselves, who was willing to meet with them and also provide business services. Remember too that there are millions of workers in their 60s. This is really obvious, honestly. I always think it's very telling on MN how some people struggle with the idea of people just not following lockdown rules if they don't want to, and not having to either. There's a resistance to the idea: I know the demographic on here skews more towards living in areas where people had to at least pretend to give a shit, which explains part of it, but the idea that there wouldn't be people who either can't or won't obey incredibly restrictive but impossible to police laws is pretty odd at this stage.