To think there should be some kind of national reflection on the pandemic?

[23rdmarch2020]

It’s coming up to three years since the first lockdown. In many ways, it feels an absolute age ago. From personal experience, my life completely changed in the space of a week and so many things happened in my life that never would have because of the pandemic (some good, some bad). For some, it has been an absolute tragedy. In the space of a few weeks we went from being in our normal lives to it being a criminal offence to step outside our homes without a valid excuse. Obviously people are keen to move on but AIBU to think there should be more reflection on the pandemic than there has been?

Complete waste of time and money. Its pure speculation. You can't possibly say, we should have done it like Sweden did or New Zealand because it would have made a difference because all the data says different approaches had negligible impact. There's already enough of our money been wasted thanks

I expect it probably would be a complete waste of time and money if analysed at that level of understanding, yes.

Complete waste of time and money. Oh see I wasn’t thinking in terms of a government enquiry. I was more thinking of an acknowledgement about how hard those years were and not brushing it under the carpet.

Letting people talk about how hard it was (seeing elderly relatives fall apart without visitors in care homes / homeschooling / raising young kids alone in a small flat / whatever it was..) without it turning into an argument. More just a national conversation or an acceptance that for many of us it was really, really tough and it’s ok to say that? That we won’t get those years back and for many they were important years or formative years of a child’s life (or indeed the last years for some people, and they were much lonelier than they had expected).

It’s not about not moving on - I don’t think about lockdown 99% of the time - but a healthy acceptance that people have had a shit few years and society seemed to change for a while..

I'm not sure that national reflection of people's individual experiences is helpful simply because they are so different - you only have to read through this, and many other threads on MN to see this.

I certainly think an enquiry at governmental level is needed - and not in terms of casting blame - but to analyse which actions/ restrictions were ultimately beneficial, and which ones made no difference, or were harmful. I think many people were absolutely terrified to start with and it was something which nobody has experienced before . But it would be useful to see what lessons can be learned in case of any future pandemic.

https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/when-this-is-over

And I don't just mean governments either, I mean also on an individual basis - what we, as individuals, did and what we, as individuals could have done better.

As an individual I didn't do enough for the mental health of one of my children. With hindsight, I wish I had organised for them to see their friends. I especially wish I hadn't allowed the laptops into the bedrooms, but as that was their only way of socialising and dh was working from our kitchen table where their tech had been until then, I felt it was the right thing to do at the time.

I couldn't have done anything more on a societal basis. I didn't join in with the clapping but I don't think that would have helped.

I think people trivialising it as no big deal have a complete empathy bypass. I'm sure Kate garraway doesn't think it was no big deal or the thousands of people who lost parents and partners , many under 75 with no previous serious co morbidities . When the stuff emerged from Italy you can only run with what is known at the time. Where I do think reflection is not by the general population but is needed is by the powers that be and their total lack of pre planning for this eventuality , you always need some slack in a system to cope with these kinds of eventualities and plans to immediately put into action. I think they need to reflect why they deemed it a good idea to make masses available in big loans without much due diligence at all and why some rules were put in that made zero sense . I still think Sweden had the right policy on this. Also the sheer amount of money wasted on stuff like track and trace- would have been far better spent not letting people who fell under the radar for support , be able to cope. Also in dealing with long covid (I have neurological issues post covid/vaccine) and the aftermath of business disruption in many industry's.

I remember getting angry on here with people who isolated their children in their bedrooms for days and days and left food at the door - no contact. Probably after being vaccinated I mean FFS. You have an ill child. Comfort them. Isolation is a punishment in jail…

I don’t know what I want to happen but people did go batshit crazy. I guess history will judge those people.

I’ve seen the messages from the government- using fear techniques- discussing whether now was the time to introduce a scary new variant. We were all being influenced. That needs to be examined. On the basis that civil liberties were breached for no good reason. I actually don’t care about Boris and his parties. I care about the fear mongering and misinformation.

I don't think national reflection, but individual where needed. The 3 years has flown for me and I really need to get myself on some waiting list for counselling around it all I suspect and that would be my own form of reflection. Covid negatively impacted my two births very significantly in different ways and it still often brings me to tears if I let myself think back. It took away so much from the biggest moments of my life so far. Life is too busy at the moment to properly allow myself the time/head space to reflect on it but I think I need to in order to put all those emotions to rest as currently I feel they sit just below the surface if that makes any sense! I still haven't come to terms with it.

For a lot of people it has never gone away.

We didn't really have much in the way of existing pandemic planning.

Our town is having a memorial service OP perhaps you’ve got one in your local area?

That really isn’t true, and is unfair to the pandemic planners our country has.

Yes, that's just complete bollocks.

https://fb.watch/jrbzo-_dTu/
"This is the global pandemic. It's the most planned for risk in UK history and this is a five to ten year initial disruption"
Professor Lucy Easthope

She commented that the hardest part of march 2020 was trying to get this across to govt departments who were saying what do you mean, this is 6-8 weeks and then it's over.

The disaster planners were on it.

I wouldn’t be up for this at all. I don’t think about the pandemic at all now, it’s done & over for me.

The initial plans talked about a 50 percent infection rate with up to 2.5 percent fatality rate. Much lower than we experienced. They did not involve lockdowns
https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2020/feb/27/what-are-the-uks-plans-for-dealing-with-a-pandemic-virus

"The Denial of the Plan and its implications for a ‘whole society’ disaster response in the UK C19 Pandemic

The UK had a robust ‘contingencies’ assessment framework for assessing and mitigating risk. But as soon as the most likely and predicted, assessed and trained for risk, a pandemic, hit UK shores so much of what we had worked to was forgotten. Both planners and the plans disappeared from public view, leaving society with a pervasive and dangerous myth that there had been no consideration of their needs in extremis. As a seasoned emergency planner Professor Easthope will briefly explore this phenomenon and what is next for the UK when managing and responding to catastrophic events."

https://www.essex.ac.uk/events/2022/01/27/covid19-emergency-planning

Interesting. But then I was a fan of the Swedish approach. It will take a while but this is the kind of info I would like to see. This is also directed at the poster who said Sweden’s excess rates were/are as high as ours.

Here is another brilliant article that I wasn't aware of at the time that really spells out how this unfiltered. It name checks some other interesting commentary.

https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/law-and-social-justice/blog/war-on-dissent-during-state-of-exception/?

"
The opportunities for mutual aid was limited due to the restrictions placed on citizens interacting with one another. We could have assistance during lockdown one for instance, but only if we paid for it. Preston & Firth have been critical of the working class having been disproportionately harmed by lockdown measures, stating: “In the media, international and business travel received barely a whisper, but pictures of people in parks were a cause for national outrage. The middle classes may have a nice garden to relax in, but if you live in an urban block of flats where else are you meant to go?. Authoritarian policing has targeted working class people, particularly if they are Black or Asian. Bizarrely, the left and even some anarchists are advocating more restrictions on freedom” (Preston and Firth, 2021)."

That should say unfolded, not unfiltered

It's not bizarre that the left wanted even more restrictions. It's always been a feature of socialism to want to control the masses 'for their own good'

Good article today about Sweden.

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/23/anders-tegnell-swedens-pandemic-plan-lockdown-never-agenda/ www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/23/anders-tegnell-swedens-pandemic-plan-lockdown-never-agenda]]

Tbh I think we need more of a truth and reconciliation process than a day of reflection. I'd personally like to see about 80% of the UK public in stocks for a day and almost all the politicians. That anger won't leave until there's some kind of understanding on their part of what they have done. I accept that won't actually happen as it's part of the process of denial but a truth and reconciliation process would help.

I did realise this morning though that it was a very long and useful process for teaching my children very many important things in life. Those lessons will last a lifetime and prove very useful for them. That's one upside

Good articles.

I’m very pleased there is a lot of discussion about the Swedish approach at the moment.

Interesting that even the German lockdown chief supporter Karl Lauterbauch said ‘closing schools was a a bad mistake’.

The paragraph where Tenegal discusses his reasons for keeping schools open made me sad for this country though (and others in lockdown). He clearly prioritised the mental health of the young and children
‘I think we are in a period of reevaluation and schools are such a good example and it’s so clear that the benefits were basically none and the damage you could do was so extensive’.

His determination was to keep the public calm and well informed rather than ‘frighten the pants off them’ which was Hancocks strategy.

Also an interesting discussion on how we based a lot of the lockdown decisions on completely false modelling. That needs to be evaluated. None of the decisions the government made were based on science and evidence. Go outside once a day! Why when know outdoors is the best place to be? Fresh air and exercise is so important for health.

And yes @Buzzinwithbez the shocking inequality of lockdown. What a blunt tool. Very good point that such an authoritarian regime targets the working class more whilst the middle classes lounge around in their gardens receiving their Ocado shopping.

There’s a lot to unpick and I know many want to move on but I hope the analysis and discussion continues. Because some very shocking things happened that should not be swept under the carpet.

I'm not in the UK, I'm in an Canada where the lockdowns and other measures were similar but stricter and went on for longer.

Although it's not well known by the public here, among those managing the response people who were less gung-ho and more cautions about other effects , and tried to warn or argue against them within the health community were sidelined and in many cases ultimately moved out of their positions. And when they tried to talk in the media, they were ignored.

And in fact the media is still ignoring these people, will not respond to them, even print letters to the editor. Not cranks, but people with good reputations as health leaders.

I also have been pointing out to people the interview that has come out with the lead researching on masking and other measures for the Cochrane reviews - the gold standard organization for meta-analysis of research. This is not just important for what they found, but because of what he describes as happening with the review that came out in 2020, which should have been important for policy makers. It's extremely shocking and tells us that "follow the science" was, from the very beginning, being deliberatly undermined by the health and science communities. Keep in mind that anyone who even suggested this at the time was vilified as a conspiracy theorist:

[[https://maryannedemasi.substack.com/p/exclusive-lead-author-of-new-cochrane?fbclid=IwAR3mW3LHS7k9WFfF9K5sBPahmmmbTfl8ZDOcqbNCmUCCSC3Qo8-42CY9ekk