"Only the elderly/immune suppressed are at risk" - attitude of dicks?

[SylvanianFrenemies]

People who say not to worry about Coronavirus, because "Only the elderly/chronically ill/immune suppressed" are dicks.

Some of us fall into these categories. Some love people who fall into these categories. Some have some essence of humanity. Stop using "Only the xxx" to dismiss concerns. Stop conflating it with flu.

Wash your hands. Isolate yourself as required. Err on the side of caution.

YABU = I agree with these dicks.
YANBU = I am human.

It's just othering. Other people are at risk not me. They are fundamentally different in some way I'll never be.

I agree with you

Every time I read it, I have to restrain myself from whacking out a strident response.

Because they’re essentially saying that people like me don’t matter

They say it to reassure themselves that they will be OK. It comes from a place of anxiety.

I think it is said with the same thinking behind 'at least you know you can get pregnant'. People mistakingly minimising and trying to find the positive.

Hopefully awareness will be raised that these are dickish things to say.

I completely agree. It always reads like “oh it’s fine, only the old and ill will die!” As if... that’s okay?

Can't believe the ratio on this vote.
There must be more arseholes on here than I suspected.

I think you’re maybe misreading their motive in saying this. The intention is probably to stop people panicking and thinking there will be massive death counts and the end of civilisation.
For most children and young to middle aged adults, Covid 19 will just be an annoying and sweaty cough for a couple of weeks.
Nobody is saying that the elderly or those with comorbidities don’t matter, they’re just pointing out that most other people will survive undamaged.
I’m a pensioner myself, but I’m not offended by the perfectly factual statement that I’m at higher risk.
Death rates are 0.2% for young adults, 8% for over 70 year olds and approaching 15% for those over 80.
Babies and children seem to be fine - no recorded deaths at all so far.

I think it can be a way of telling people to stop panicking and to try and calm some of the hysteria about it.
That said it is a dickish way of saying it

It's an I'm alright Jack culture.

Nobody at my place seems bothered and lots of "the flu's worse" messages.

Mostly seems to be coming from those with no dependants or those with younger parents.
They are confident they'll be fine and can't understand the fuss. But it's not me I'm worried about.

I worry about my asthmatic son, ageing parents and aunt, who has a suppressed immune system following cancer.

It's so frustrating when it's made out like those with compromised immune systems are half dead anyway. My 13 year old DD with congenital heart defects and my two DSs with their asthma fall very neatly into that category. If you saw them you'd never know they were anything but completely healthy. They get their flu vaccine every year but it feels like they're sitting ducks at the moment. The statistics I've seen say 1-2% of cases are fatal.

YANBU.

Some of them might just be trying to reassure themselves. Most of us know elderly people and people in weak health.

I'm aware that due to diabetes and being on immune suppressing medication for another condition that I'm more vulnerable. It's just a bit offensive when people make out that people like me (and my parents and MIL) are half-dead burdens on society.

It's a mix of minimising, reassuring and thoughtlessness.

Burdens on society? Anyone who thinks that is being awful. But I don't think that's necessarily what being mean here.

I wouldn't want anyone to get ill and I would self isolate if needed to however a lot of people will be fine and mass anxiety isn't a good thing.

Tin foil hat warning. If we needed to reduce the worlds population who would 'they' want to get rid of? Who costs the most to be looked after?
The elderly, the long term illnesses, disabilities. The coronavirus could be the perfect storm.

I know not everyone means that. But I have seen a smattering of "we are due a pandemic, people who are ill are naturally vulnerable, that's evolution" type comments.

I wrote that even though I have diabetes, my DS has asthma and my DF has major health problems.

Makes sense! But I hope that isn't coming into play.

The way you have phrased your question makes any result of the poll utterly devoid of any meaning obviously.

People use the platitude in the title to reassure and calm panicked people (and people enjoying the drama) that this is not the new bubonic plague, not to promote eugenics.

Would you prefer to tell schools full of panicking teens and pre teens that the virus is a serious threat to all of them when it isn't, and deal with the fall out from that?

I think it’s just a way of trying to remind the people flapping that they’re extremely likely to be ok.

Immunosuppressed people will likely be more informed about the actual risks to themselves and will know when to seek treatment or advice if they need it. The same reason they’re on the ball about getting their flu jabs etc.

The only people I know that are panicking are healthy and reasonably young. The people I know in the group OP outlines, like my mum who is still recovering from cancer treatment, are much more aware of the actual risks and what they can do to limit the risk of exposure.

I have said this without the word only to reassure my dc who were getting panicked at school.
Explaining to them that they didn't need to be this personally anxious about harm because they weren't in the at risk categories.
I considered it to be explaining risk to them.

To be honest I’ve said ‘The only people to be concerned are the elderly and those already with underlying health issues’ just today. It’s mainly to stop people panicking cos other than being as careful as we can there isn’t much we can do. We don’t know much about it and I’m not going to constantly worry about it and I’m immunosuppressed. You can’t tell who has it as you show no symptoms apparently for the first few weeks of being contagious as far as I’m aware. I’ll worry when I have to.

I've long term issues and I'm at high risk.

I also work at a senior level in the NHS and most of the official communications have been fine, but a recent one with the 'reassurance' tone came out basically saying 'only old gimmers and the already unwell died' and it totally pissed me off. I had to share this message with other managers and I was so angry!

Obviously I’ll be as careful as I can as I always am...washing hands etc.

Ok @PoolsOfSunshineThroughTheGlass, I won't use it for my PhD then. It's meant to be biased, because I'm sure I'm right! I'm letting off steam as it's a bit disheartening to see swathes of people (including me) being dismissed as unimportant.

I don't want hysteria, just accuracy. If course it's important to convey that most people will be fine. But it might be nice to acknowledge that taking basic steps is important, because some people are vulnerable.