Is there going to be another pandemic

[Lookingforwardtoautumnnow]

This winter?

Seen a couple of people posting about it, tbf they are conspiracy types, but I have anxiety after having covid & long covid and can’t go through all that again. Can anyone reassure me?

The fact that humans have previously done things to try and control pandemics doesn't negate that lockdown couldn't have happened before widespread Internet.

They have controlled disease outbreak by controlling and limiting movement, setting curfews, and stopping travel and isolating communities in exactly the same way as a lockdown.

I don't doubt the involvement of the internet.

I agree with @WhalePolo, political bias can't be removed. A substantial part of covid management was deciding whose interests were going to be prioritised, which groups of vulnerable we should protect. That's inherently political. Especially in a democracy where politicians are always, rightly, worried about what the electorate are going to do to them.

But those are only some aspects of lockdown. The full lockdowns of 2020-1 couldn't have occurred before the Internet. Which it looks like we agree on?

@sleepyscientist

If you are talking about the small scale Korean study reported in our right wing press who seem determined to pick up any dubious study they can to deter people from wearing masks, you need to balance the findings rationally rather than try and ‘scare’ people. Otherwise that’s not really very scientific is it? Or state that a mask free from TVOCs is maybe better?

@User2346

Hmm. I think comments like ‘let the bodies pile high’, the delay in doing something, the tier system, the ‘let’s go Swedish’, Vallance looking pissed off or not wanting to appear in conferences were evidence of BJ wanting to preserve the economy over lives. He does a good impression of being ‘weak’.

There are plenty of measures you can take to mitigate your own personal risk and get "some" control, so consider what you are willing to do based on your reluctance to accept another brush with it.

Might sound left field but perhaps start with an easy one: consider a flu jab if you are able to take it. It won't prevent you getting covid obviously but it will stop you facing covid and influenza at the same time, which isn't uncommon and makes recovery harder.

You can rule that scenario out easily; it's inexpensive and the appt takes minutes. Worth thinking about.

Bollocks. They Great Barrington Declaration said that keeping the pandemic limiting measures in place until a vaccine was developed would lead to societal harm. They thought it would take at least 2 years to develop a vaccine, so probably right on that score. However it was signed in November 2020, and the first NHS patients were vaccinated barely 2 months later.

@WhalePolo being right wing and concerned about the economy and our kids futures more than nature taking its course isn't a bad thing.

The Korean study is one but the BMJ has also published articles on the risk of skin damage. It's all risk vs benefit. COVID isn't big enough to tip the balance against the negatives, BJ was right we shouldn't have took half the action we were taking at the time.

Sweden policy was one of the best and their excess deaths were lower than a lot of other countries. Hopefully for a respiratory virus with similar characteristics we learn from them.

We had the lead on the vaccine we messed up and put it through a full clinical trial as COVID wasn't that bad. If you had a vaccine for something like Ebola you can bet it would be out a lot quicker.

Again, policing is based on consent. The severity of the restrictions in China was only possible because in China, neighborhood groups monitor and report each others' behavior. It's unlikely ever to work in more democratic societies.

I'm not sure the CCP would ever try to implement these kinds of controls again. The process of hysterically strict controls knackered their economy and has caused birth rates and marriage rates to tank still further; eventually, the controls got lifted in a sudden and chaotic way, without any real explanation as to why China had to be zero COVID one minute and then COVID suddenly didn't matter any more five minutes later. The long isolation worsened China's relations with the rest of the world, and China is now stuck in economic and societal gloom. Not really a very glorious story.

Yep even in China, forced restrictions only worked for a certain time. The regime had no choice but to loosen things up, given the protests and pressure. And that's in a sophisticated surveillance state with literal gulags.

But they did stop their population in their tracks.

I don't agree about lack of compliance if there was anything another lockdown .

I think if it threatened children there would be total compliance.

They were spot harm it caused great harm to society keeping measures in place.

Do you think essential workers would still be willing to play ball if they thought their children might die? What would happen to society if they didn't?

As for China, they stopped their population in their tracks for a while, until they didn't. The regime couldn't pull off another covid lockdown now. And most societies are unable to exert anything like that level of control. Restrictions in democracies only work to the extent that most of the population is ok with them.

Apologies for typos @BygoneDays keeping restrictions in place caused huge harm to society in terms of mental health, missed cancers, cancelled operations, children murdered in domestic violence situations, SEN children my own included regressing due to missed therapy and the list goes on …..

@sleepyscientist it’s a biased view that doesn’t factor in the other side of the argument : that it’s not just about survival of the fittest. That side is valid as well and you can’t just dismiss it as irrelevant. Or present findings with no acknowledgement of its limitations or criticisms.
A good scientific view would consider both sides IMO.

There are a great many studies that show the benefits of mask wearing too. The Cochrane review had a lot of criticism and they admitted themselves that results had been misinterpreted.
Sweden had a well resourced health system, a high vaccine uptake and a population who were prepared to be compliant in other ways, a less dense population. Compare them to Brazil or India who took the right wing populist approach - certainly didn’t work there. One maverick, well resourced country were maybe ok - the whole world doing the same? No.

Do you think essential workers would still be willing to play ball if they thought their children might die? What would happen to society if they didn't?

There were essential workers who left their children so they could walk to last to me round.

Who knows what people would do? It would need a very good plan. That had the confidence of the population.

And no, I don't have that plan.

Last time round tells us nothing about what people would do if they thought their children might die. Most people didn't think that.

That said, I think your post here is better than the previous one where you said there'd be total compliance if children were threatened. In that situation, we would have a totally different set of problems to covid to factor in.

@Whalepolo that is the key ie Sweden although a high tax, high state intervention people trusted their government regardless of their political leanings and were happy to be cautious while still leading a normal life. It wasn’t perfect in terms of care homes but they came out in a lot better shape economically and society would probably to be happy to comply again should the situation arise.

Was that NHS workers they aren't the essential workers

You do realise the essential worker in society you didn't know about, they worked for power and water company's, they worked for food company's processing for they worked to sell food.

There were so many essentials worker who make the country operate who don't get a look in

@User2346

But until they had the vaccine, they did have a significantly higher death toll than their neighbouring countries. But then one of the highest uptake of vaccines in Europe.

A similar approach wouldn’t/didn’t work in India or Brazil.

If you think the Sweden policy is right then it needs to be applied on a global level.

Not just ‘some special countries’.

Yes it would need to be applied unfortunately it will take massive trust in governments to achieve this which sadly is a pipe dream.
Sweden never had a pandemic strategy they adopted ours before our government and public got caught up in the hysteria.

@User2346

Agree. There is certainly not sufficient trust in the UK. And also you could end up with a global situation where the rich, well resourced countries don’t lockdown and thrive economically; whereas the poorer, less well resourced, poor health care systems are forced to lockdown and suffer economically = massive global inequality.
Pandemic wise : we are maybe ‘in it together’ and need a global, coherent, consensus strategy. Our best defence is to work together rather than against each other.

I’m so sorry for your loss

*You do realise the essential worker in society you didn't know about, they worked for power and water company's, they worked for food company's processing for they worked to sell food.

There were so many essentials worker who make the country operate who don't get a look in*

Err, yes.