To be really fucked off that COVID has become the new millennium bug?

[PulseFinger]

Remember the millennium bug? Yeah, never happened. Not because the threat didn’t exist - the threat was recognised, measures were put in place to prevent catastrophic consequences, years of work was done to ensure information and IT systems were kept safe. But ‘the millennium bug’ became a joke about experts overestimating a threat, about hysteria, about all those silly people who fell for it. Not like us, the genius majority, who knew the whole thing was a load of froth about nothing. Shut up, doom-sayers, you were wrong.

AIBU to think COVID has become this generation’s millennium bug?

The bitterness and bile recently thrown on Mumsnet at anyone who dares to bring up the work they did during the pandemic - junior doctors, for example - has boggled me. It’s not a surprise that people want to put the pandemic behind them - it’s foolish and short-sighted, but it’s what society does. Exactly the same thing happened after the Spanish Flu. Lockdown was shit for the majority and had many, many negative consequences for the economy, people’s mental health, etc. So, I get it - people are bored of talking about it, think it no longer matters to them, want to move on. But the extent to which people are willing to re-write such recent history in order to belittle anyone who doesn’t share their perspective has really taken me by surprise.

As a newly identified virus moving rapidly through the population, SARS-CoV-2 was an unknown quantity in late 2019/early 2020. The response of the WHO to designate it a pandemic and the response of governments to try to control its spread was entirely appropriate. The work of hundreds of thousands of medical professionals meant that the majority emerged from the lockdown periods relatively unscathed in terms of their physical health. Seems like public health policy doing its job, to me.

“Yeah, well, we should have just let old people/the vulnerable/anyone who isn’t me because the sheer power of my ignorance makes me immune to disease DIE, shouldn’t we? Let the rest of us get on with our lives!” WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY, JANET.

The NHS didn’t completely buckle under the strain, which meant significant numbers requiring hospitalisation were able to access treatment. And people are somehow seeing this as proof that we DIDN’T need to be in lockdown? Lunacy.

I’m so fed up with some people, with the benefit of hindsight, minimising the threat posed by COVID. Apart from anything else, it’s fucking insulting to those who died, those suffering with long COVID and related conditions, young people left with lifelong cardiac and respiratory issues, the clinically vulnerable who still have to live with a high level of risk in alongside an increasingly complacent general public. Mavis down the shops is not somehow magically more qualified to comprehend the implications of the unchecked spread of COVID than a swathe of epidemiologists just because she says so and “that’s her opinion!!1!”

If you do disagree, I’m genuinely, grimly fascinated by what you, as an armchair expert on epidemiology and public health, would have advised, in March 2020?

Tldr: a vocal minority (on Mumsnet) persists in claiming that COVID wasn’t a genuine threat to public health; AIBU in wishing they’d stfu?

Did you bother to read the rest of the OP?

Tldr: a vocal minority (on Mumsnet) persists in claiming that COVID wasn’t a genuine threat to public health; AIBU in wishing they’d stfu?

But it wasn't a genuine threat to public health for the vast vast majority. We knew that then, we know it now. 🤷‍♀️

Oh god. Well, I'm glad you enjoyed it dear.

I wouldn't make the comparison myself, but the response from some people now to Covid to try to underestimate what it did I agree with.

Please don't forget that 20,000 people needlessly died from government inaction in March 2020, and periods of restrictions (so-called lockdown) were at least a third longer than would have been needed for the same impact because of this.

But equally, despite knowing about covid, far too many people weren't taking precautions back in Feb and early Mar 2020. The Govt tried getting people to take responsibility and take their own steps to minimise risks of Covid expanding out of control. Unfortunately far too many people ignored it. I remember the day Boris announced pubs had to close that day. Our village pub was heaving with people wanting "one last pint" before pubs closed - there were so many people at ours, there was a crowd on the road outside blocking it which meant the police had to come and close the pub "early" to prevent a traffic accident. On what planet did those pub-goers think it was a good idea to squeeze into a tiny, already full, pub when they knew there was a pandemic? Same with our village school where the headmaster got all the pupils and staff together in the cramped school hall for a final assembly on the day of closure! Then, these same people were surprised when the figures showed a "spike" in covid infections in our area! I think the Govt gave people a chance but ultimately the people didn't listen, hence why we ended up locking down like lots of other countries at that time.

I agree OP.

Got a Janet earworm now though.

It's OK to have different opinions, but it's now recognised that lockdown caused unnecessary amounts of damage in all sorts of ways. We learn from experience, so trying to hype up the drama and hysteria yet again is completely pointless.

@Male101 really?? Really??

They were horrific for people who lost their income

They were horrific for people with care needs left living on thier own.

They were horrific for isolated elderly people with little or no digital skills

They were horrifc for people stuck in dangerous and over crowded accomodation.

They were horrific for people in abusive living situations.

I did not suffer too much but over night my workload increased by about 30%
overnight - i was regularly working 18 hour days, all of it has to be done on a tiny laptop on my kitchen table. At the same time Mr Monkey's work collapesd and we lost 40% of our household income. It wasn't amazing.

I read one report which said China had already stopped exporting PPE and bought up all the available stock from European countries months before the pandemic was declared. While global economies collapsed only one went from strength to strength. Oh and which country was it that supplied the global demand for testing kits afterwards? How odd..

Not everyone got paid.

Approximately 3 million people fell through all the cracks of government support and didn't get any help.

Types of people this included were

• PAYE freelancers, such as supply teachers
• directors of limited companies - small business owners
• people whose employers refused to pay furlough - this happened more often than is acknowledged
• people who went self employed after April 2019
• anyone who earned less than half their income from self employment in previous tax years, even if they were now 100% self employed
• anyone self employed with profits of £50k (but if you made a profit of £49,999 you'd be eligible)
• people who had just started a new job - there was a cut off date for being on payroll

Landlords and homeowners got mortgage holidays, but there was no help for renters.

Some of us were banned from working, denied financial support, and left in severe financial difficulty as a result.

I remember the day Boris told us households were not allowed to mix, then had a series of illegal parties with his chums.

I presume you didn't lose your job or your business or your home due to lack of financial support?

I presume you weren't at Uni and didn't suffer the pain of isolation in a tiny Uni flat, not allowed to socialise, no clubs or societies or sports, library and gym closed, stuck watching lectures on your laptop screen whilst all the lecture theatres were empty, Uni campus security questioning you as to why you were walking around campus (a campus which looked more like a zombie apocalypse as literally every building was closed, locked and in darkness)?

I presume you didn't have a health condition and suffered appointments/treatment being cancelled?

it’s almost as common as a cold. Really not a big deal, just something we all live with

for comparison, 70% of polio infections are asymptomatic. It’s still considered an ‘issue’.

There’s a disconnect between affects of contagious illness as experienced by individuals and the affects of contagious illness at a population level.

Fwiw I don’t foresee lockdowns again in our lifetimes. As far as unique circumstances go covid ticked a lot of boxes including being a completely novel disease (and so no knowledge or treatments/vaccines to tweak) and a relatively long infectious/asymptomatic period. Anything deadlier would have burned itself out before going global.

I got paid but didn't work
I lived rurally
We could spend all day outside in our big garden

It was hell. I hated it. Never again. The worst thing about Covid was the way it turned people into absolute Nazis.

Oh, and I never knew anyone who was "terrified" or "petrified", even tho I know many NHS workers. Most people were - at worst - frustrated and just got on with things, even whilst disapproving of lockdowns.

@Nimbostratus100 There is a reason why Eyam is famous to this day. Because what they did was seen as an unusual sacrifice.

Of course there have always been lockdown and quarantine policies but often it was the only tool these societies had and they could not be total as people did have to work and leave the house in order to live.

That however does not negate the fact that endless lockdowns are a sign of lack of choice (in days before effective medicine) or policy failure.

Agree op

in hindsight lockdown was horrific obviously but the alternative is likely to have been worse in terms of casualties

also back in March 2020 we didn’t have any knowledge of this illness - but we did know how infectious it was and it was very clear from maths what would happen if we left it to spread - and airtravel had already resulted in this spreading into almost every country in the world

we didn’t have vaccines or antivirals or even ltf tests. And the argument by most was that we should have locked down earlier

so everyone now saying we shouldn’t have locked down at all generally has a short memory - it was a scary time where the world was dealing with something unprecedented

Is it Chinas fault our government ignored advisories regarding pandemic preparedness and let stocks deplete and rot?

I think we had to lockdown in March 2020 but still think it was awful. You can think both of those things simultaneously.

It was also initally a very badly applied policy, thought up by mainly privileged middle class people who had no idea of the impact on people not like them.

I agree with this.

Lockdowns were akin to using a sledgehammer to crack a nut but at that time we didn't have the tools we have now so all we had available to us was a sledgehammer.

I think history will probably judge that time period quite harshly. The PPE scandals, partygate, the seeding of COVID into care homes, the excess deaths, the reluctance to actually take charge and act will all be taught as crashing mistakes and examples of government incompetence.

I remember Fauci saying something like this- basically that any successful response will look like an overreaction, of necessity.

You're obviously right, OP, that people arguing that the response was too much based on what didn't happen are making a logical error. That said, it doesn't follow that the response was necessarily correctly judged either. I think the government hugely underestimated some of the harms of lockdown- this would be forgivable if it wasn't for the fact that it's since been revealed some of their decisions were made for political reasons or with a finger in the air, rather than with regard to the scientific evidence they had, and the fact that many of them were happily flouting the rules themselves.

Probably "I opposed lockdown because I simply couldn't afford the consequences"

does that mean you'd have supported it if you were okay financially?

I worked in IT in the lead up to millennium and it was hell. Ridiculous hours worked and I didn't get to go out and celebrate the millennium as I was on call.

20 years later and I worked in NHS through the lockdowns. Ridiculous hours, terrified staff, terrified patients and colleagues that died. The NHS didn't choose to reduce services in other areas - there really was no choice. There wasn't enough staff or space to go round.

You are not being unreasonable

Yanbu.