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?

Sweden didn't do lockdown for the sake of the ecoonomy rather than to reduce non covid deaths. How would not having a lockdown reduce deaths from non-covid disease?

You’re looking it from a very short sighted view. Lockdown will have caused deaths - cancer diagnoses will have been missed because it was very tricky to get a doctor’s appointment in lockdown versus if everything had been open and there had not been so much fear. Ditto many other illness that will have been missed. Heart conditions, delayed chemo etc.

Excess deaths are high in every country (higher than peak Covid deaths) yet Sweden has the lowest of all European countries. That gives us a clue.

You are clearly coming at this from a point of view that nothing else mattered at that time apart from Covid and those are the only deaths that mattered and those are what we needed to prevent. Yet what if prolonging lockdown and pushing the second wave in to autumn/winter actually caused more deaths? Because the death toll from that second wave was far higher.

Also, you are just focusing on deaths. What about the lost education, lost businesses, mental health issues, lost uni years. The huge economic impact? People who couldn’t be with loved ones when they were dying? Elderly people who didn’t see family for months. It’s not all about deaths.

Sweden followed their pandemic plan. When pandemic plans are drawn up, all these considerations are taken into account... rather than just a narrow focus on deaths from virus.

Ironically of course, Sweden followed our pandemic plan. We are the ones who didn't - because people wanted a lockdown. They saw it on TV and that's what they wanted.

There are many reasons why the pandemic plan doesn't say 'do whatever the general public thinks is a good idea'.

You're right, but I'd point out that some of the things you list here will also cause premature deaths. Mental health problems rob years off lives. So does inequality, which we increased with our pandemic response: the impact stemming from access to education over the next few decades doesn't bear thinking about. Loneliness is dangerous, it kills.
Ultimately, the economy can't be separated from health either.

Yes I wanted to add that I thought the mental health issues could ultimately lead to deaths. But thought I’d get jumped on 🤣

Very good point that you can’t separate health and the economy..

Well you might do, but you'd still be right.

It wasn't more difficult to get a telephone doctor's appointment during the pandemic than it is now. If they wanted to see you they called you in. They weren't at home with their feet up. There was a problem with getting hospital treatment but that was partly because many hospital doctors were working in ICU or sick with covid itself. That would have be worse if we didn't have lockdown not better would have been higher. Do you actually think that they would have been more available if COVID infections were through the roof and people needed to be seen for Covid too.

No covid wasn't the only thing that mattered but people with heart conditions, cancer etc were the ones at highest risk of COVID and the last thing they needed was to catch it because there was no lockdown.

You’re obviously a massive fan of the government and the measures implemented @shrimp88, and that’s fine. They certainly need some fans! Some of us would have liked to have seen more consideration taken for those locked up with their abusers, those who lived alone and didn’t see another soul for months on end, those who were so scared of catching Covid that they didn’t dare seek medical treatments for other conditions, children who weren’t seen by relevant care professionals when they needed to be seen, those who missed diagnoses, those with mental health issues, the list goes on.

@GoldenAye It was a right wing government who locked us down

A telephone appointment is far less effective! and people were reluctant to waste doctors time..

so how would the telephone appointments have worked for women married to abusers who were trying to renew their contraception that the abusive partner does not know that they are on?!

I'm not a fan at all. I think a lot of things should have been done very differently. e.g. lockdown should have been sooner and shorter, borders shut earlier, schools could have opened earlier perhaps using ventilated spaces such as parks and stadiums. The claim that not having a lockdown at all would have benefited people with cancer and heart disease is absolute nonsense though.

Perhaps the reflection could be global since so many people think the pandemic, lockdowns etc were just something that happened in the UK. Some even imagining that the whole thing was invented to be mean to British People.

I do think there needs to be a global reflection on why existing pandemic plans got entirely thrown out of the window in favour of a ‘lockdown’, which was something that had barely even been considered by the majority of pandemic planners until the concept came out of China in January 2020, yes. Why were our robust pandemic plans ignored?

😆😆

Good to see quite a few are now challenging lockdowns (better late than never) but interesting to see the Covid Cultist-Shopping Washers are still out in force.

Although global reflection would also be good, each country introduced its own bonkers rules. There's definitely interesting psychological papers in it.

The French might like to reflect on their love of paperwork for example (the little permission slip you had to write yourself to leave the house).

The Italians absolutely loved locking people up, for months on end in some cases, until they finally tested negative after a cobid infection. A national obsession with health tests, perhaps?

And the Chinese ... oh they have a lot of reflecting to do

Spain wouldn't let their children out for exercise, but people could exercise their dogs.

I am so surprised that wasn't a UK thing.

We did exclude shooting (ie of course - pheasant shooting - the toffs sport of choice) from the 'rule of six'

As I said earlier, what makes you think anyone has changed their opinions?. I bet all the people who disagree with you now disagreed with you then and visa versa.

Afaik the numbers of people who now think lockdown/restrictions were too harsh is still quite a small minority but the numbers who aren't sure are higher than they were during lockdowns. And the not sure seems to be the group that's increasing. I saw something the other day, I'll try and find it.

Just to point out, in my area skin cancer deaths have increased massively, because people were avoiding going in to the doctors. So in the last year lots are being diagnosed at stage 4 rather than earlier.

Also in my area, the authorities were hot and bothered over mass resting. In order to create more testing capacity, they suspended routine testing of all pregnant women for STIs. Shock of shocks in the past reporting period there was a big increase of babies born with syphilis, which is a really serious thing.

Many countries are now seeing excess deaths that they can't explain, not caused by covid infections.

I have read the review, and I don't know how you are concluding that. Furthermore, the lead researcher doesn't conclude that either.

What's more, that has been the direction the research has been moving in on respiratory viruses for some years, so it's not like it's new. Which is why at the very beginning of the pandemic no one was recommending masks.

The fact that people avoided the doctor was an issue but it would have improved with better communication rather than no lockdown.

I'd also add that the drop in physical activity during lockdowns will have had wide-reaching health impacts. The government could have made it clear that the law simply said leaving the house to exercise was permitted, that it was guidance that this should be limited to once a day, and that the limit of one hour was just something Michael Gove made up on the spot during an interview...but they didn’t.

Those with young children who believed the "one hour once a day" was law probably spent a lot of their "allotted" time ambling around at toddler pace which would be totally insufficient. Those with mobility issues who needed to stop and rest occasionally couldn't so were effectively barred from outdoor exercise. And lots of people don't have gardens and lots live in cramped conditions so even something like Joe Wicks was tricky to do.