Do any of arch-lockdowners regret it?

[Refractory]

Just that really.

I haven’t really been on MN since 2020 because I found the near complete support for lockdown far too upsetting.

the lockdowners in my life seem to not think about it much. For them, it’s just over.

with hindsight do you wish you’d been more sceptical?

would love a civil conversation about this.

It wasn’t necessary though. The stats show that it was a very mild decease for below 70 for people in good health.

Children's education suffered
Children under social services care suffered
Violence against women shot up
Rapid on set of dementia increased
Businesses ruined
The economy ruined.
People were ostracised if they didn’t have a vaccine that didn’t stop transmission
Cancer deaths shot up
Huge back log of operations

For a disease that only effected a tiny percentage of the population

No it was not necessary

Also how women were treated in labour and shortly after birth was disgusting

How on earth can people be ok with what happened

It must never happen again

Quite and now everyone is blaming the tories for the shit show fall out.

Harder lockdowns would have made it all worse.

Yes, that “new normal” rhetoric was somewhat scary.
It sounded like that was it now, that’s what life would be like for the foreseeable.
And there were some people who seemed to be happily embracing it too.

Our family were arch lockdowners and none regret it. Some family have compromised immune systems.
All but myself eventually got Covid, thankfully when more was known about it and managed not to be hospitalised.
I still wear a mask on occasion.
I know people who were very sick with it and some died from complications arising from Covid.
It was not, and remains nothing like the flu or a head cold.
The point missed by most is that it is a new virus and nobody regardless of job, country, sector, etc knew how to deal with it.

with hindsight do you wish you’d been more sceptical?

No

😆 🤣 😂

It wasn’t mild though was it? As I said earlier, two million people are now disabled with long covid. The largest age group of suffers is 35-49, so not elderly. The infection rate would have been astronomical if we’d mixed freely. Who would have been working in the hospitals if more staff had caught it? Who’d have taught the kids if more teachers had caught it? The whole country would have been infected very quickly. In March 2020, one in 40 Covid sufferers ended up in ITU, given the severity of the virus back then. ITUs were at capacity even with lockdown. It would have been complete carnage without.

It’s all well and good saying that it was over the top now that Covid has mutated into a much milder virus.

That's so sad, I'm so sorry for what happened and for your loss 💐

I agree. Someone on this thread said they didn’t leave the house at all for two months or so during the first lockdown and would happily do it again.
Surely they had groceries and such delivered to their home during that period? So they were quite happy for somebody else to leave their house to provide services.

For me the whole difference is in the existence of the vaccines; obviously I know vaccines aren't perfect but at least they afford their recipients a degree of protection, which wasn't there for covid at the beginning.

I don't agree lockdown wasn't necessary. We saw the pictures and heard the truth from our friends in the NHS, the NHS was being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of very sick COVID patients all arriving simultaneously. Not surprising as we haven't really had a major pandemic in about a century before this. Lockdowns slowed the rate of transmission and flow of patients so that the NHS could scrape through (just barely due to the chronic lack of funding under the Tories). It wasn't just about saving people with COVID but about avoiding a complete a total breakdown of a health system which millions of British people rely on. All services would have been affected, all operations cancelled, cancer patients would die though lack of treatment and lack of staff to give treatments. We've already seen this to a degree with waiting lists etc, it would have been far worse if COVID had been allowed to simply run rampant at speed and create a mass casualty situation larger than what was already seen. The NHS staff are real people who deserve breaks and holidays like any other employee...they are not robots. In fact if anything they deserve more breaks due to the distressing but life saving work they do. It irritated me immensely that the Tories have tried to take down the NHS (amongst other numerous public services!) which many British value highly, including myself as it's saved my life and my children's more than once. The one right thing the Tories did was lockdown but they still should have followed other countries examples and done it sooner, rather than pretend there was no problem for so long.

Surely whether it happens again or not depends on risk. Would you want to carry on as normal with a virus more like MERs (up to 34% death rate) than Covid?

We largely followed the rules - DH had Covid not long before the lockdowns started (thank you people coming back from Italy and not quarantining themselves! He served a customer in work who actually announced they'd just come back from Italy and shouldn't be out), took him months to recover. We did visit my parents once - we delivered some food and stayed for a socially distanced chat - and I went out for walks around 1am even if we'd been out in the daytime.

Going into lockdown sooner would probably have been better. And the eat out scheme was clearly stupid.

That's absolutely heartbreaking. I'm so sorry.

People that were lockdown sceptics were proved lucky imo, not right

I know 4 people who died in the early stages of the pandemic, so no regrets at all.

it was done when there was no option. A lot of trouble is taken each year to create a suitable flu vaccine and get it out to the old and vulnerable in our population. the nasal vaccine now offered to children is not only for their protection but to protect their older relatives

Just seeking clarification here, are you saying lockdown drove your parents to want to die by suicide? If so why? That’s quite an extreme reaction in otherwise mentally well people. Or if I’ve misunderstood apologies.

I do agree it could’ve been better handled for instance in regards to rules which affected single people and also they should have driven home to people more about the need to keep active.

Yes people may consider it obvious, but some people were so focused by the main message that was being pushed about staying home and busy juggling WFH and homeschool etc, and being confused by the constantly changing rules that they just didn’t go out much at all and became even more vit D deficient, and overweight or their general strength and fitness declined due to lack of activity.

I supported the lockdowns and stuck to them.

I think that, at the time, we were making the best decisions we could with the information we had available. Hospitals were struggling to cope with the number of Covid patients they got - ICU patients being nursed on ordinary wards and in operating theatres was unprecedented, in my experience.

When I was in hospital with Covid early in the second wave, I talked to the Charge Nurse on the ward, who told me of queues of patients on trolleys stretching from the ward all the way back to the ambulance drop off point, and the ambulance centre manager begging them to admit patients faster because he had almost no ambulances and crews left on the road - they were all in the queue.

It seems logical to me that the lockdowns reduced the spread of Covid, and that if there had been more cases in total, there would have been more cases requiring hospitalisation, and the hospitals would not have coped.

It is also worth noting that there is a statistic that says that over 70% of people hospitalised with Covid, have gone on to develop long covid. I am in that group - even though I wasn't in ICU, and didn't feel really ill - I just had low oxygen saturations - but I am now disabled by long covid. I can't stand for long - even having a shower is hard work - and I can't walk any distance. Any effort - sitting at the table peeling the potatoes and sprouts for Christmas dinner, for example - leaves me shaking with fatigue, and just going to the loo downstairs leaves me breathless. If it wasn't for dh doing pretty much everything, I wouldn't be coping.

I wouldn't wish long covid on anyone - and if the lockdowns prevented more people from getting it, I can't say that's a bad thing.

However, I do think that, in hindsight, we needed to consider the long term consequences of lockdown, and to put in place measures both then, and since, to mitigate those.

Yes, the lockdown drove them to suicide. It's an extreme reaction. I agree, but the isolation and the inability to access their usual medical care destroyed their mental health. They simply couldn't cope

Yes, Long Covid is a nightmare.

Dd is 18 next week. I’ll be too weak to celebrate. It’s robbed me of so much.

Yeah I got COVID earlier this year and I can still feel the effects. I'm someone who is very active and very fit and the initial illness was kinda rough, but okay. It's been 3-4 months now though and although not debilitated like some people have I have not just bounced back to full fitness either.

So OP "would love a civil conversation about this" but posts and then hasn't come back nearly 12 hours later. Right.

S0livagant
Could have been, I don’t know and it doesn’t matter if that particular image wasn’t what it said, there were more than that one and my relatives are mostly nurses and doctors with two working in care homes that had more people die than they’ve ever seen and they lost young fit healthy co workers too. Unprecedented times is what I mean really I suppose

https://factcheck.afp.com/photo-shows-coffins-dead-migrants-after-boat-capsized-coast-italy-2013

These photographs were falsely labelled as covid deaths. I do think it matters if false information is circulated.