Omg. The next step in the strategy. And if we all stick together it may work

[Bool]

Next step in UK strategy. Lock down all the over 70s (and other immunocompromised - kids / adults) for 4 months. Lock them down. Then make it illegal to close schools. That means we gain immunity to the virus as a population and keeps the beds open for the unusual cases that are not foreseen.

@ChrissieKeller61 sorry I don’t understand your logic. How are the elderly being ‘thrown under a bus’. The plan is to do the exact opposite and protect them.

How is this action throwing the elderly under the bus? I get it will be really hard for many (most?) of them but I don't understand how it's worse, for them, than being part of an entire population that is under the same restrictions.

I don't get this at all. How are the elderly going to manage for food? Who will pick up their medical prescriptions? I know the answer to 'food ' is online shopping but not all even have the internet and others won't know how to shop online.

It’s so backwards how people are seeing this that they’re going to have to do some good messaging. Which they’re good at fortunately.

The best way to protect the elderly is by keeping total deaths low with a full lockdown now.

3000 people died in Wuhan, and they were comparable to us in terms of size and cases we have now.

The government need to set systems in place to enable a lockdown NOW. This is just putting it onto families and not everyone has one. This is the lockdown equivalent of foodbanks.

@ssash the reason we won’t do a full lockdown is that the entire nation is unable to do that for 18 months which is when there will likely be a vaccine.

How did we ever manage in WW2 Bool? Did we just say, hey, let the Nazis in, no-one will bother fighting this for 6 years?

@NotTerfNorCis this will be done by the rest of us who won’t be on lockdown.

Exactly. Its the government's way of passing on responsibilty. The virus equivalent of foodbanks. Typical.

@nellodee - full lockdown for how long exactly. When will we all come out?

When we have a cure. This is a war. Deaths will be comparable to WW2. Our resolution must also be comparable.

Of course, if we DO go into lockdown for an extended period, deaths will NOT be comparable.

This isn’t what is being proposed at all.

According to the BBC the proposal could be to encourage the elderly and vulnerable to quarantine themselves as much as possible. There has been no talk of locking down the elderly and vulnerable at all.

And tbh, anyone suggesting that is ageist and disablist. Because while you might want to encourage your older and vulnerable friends/relatives to take extra precautions, there’s a difference between that and wanting them banned from parts of the society.

And the derogatory comments about the elderly are still there. About the old people seen in the supermarkets buying only a packet of ham and a couple of bananas, as opposed to the younger people brawling over toilet rolls and baked beans? Who exactly are the selfish ones here?

And how do you forceably lock down the vulnerable who do not fall into the elderly category? Start with the disabled perhaps? We can’t know who is vulnerable in the disabled population so best lock them all down, but then you still have people who are not disabled but who have other health conditions. How do you enforce that?

Whether people like it or not we have to allow individuals to make their own choices without singling out certain sections of society. So while you might encourage your elderly relative to stay home more, it is their choice to do so. It’s their life after all.

this will be done by the rest of us who won’t be on lockdown

For EVERY old person? And how do we go about helping them if we can't go near them?

And in addition, we will work out new ways of living which do not rely on permanent expansion and consumption and might even save the entire planet in the meantime.

Win win.

Yes a paid for benefit, is it something you claim though, so do the really rich people bother with it. I will imagine they will need that money for the benefits that they will have to pay to the young folks that will lose their jobs and homes, obviously apart from the ones that will inherit as there will be no care home fees to worry about paying, so every cloud...

@AlternativePerspective please don’t get caught in the language. Lockdown is a phrase being used at the moment across Europe for putting yourself into self-isolation. Not literally locking people down.

When we have a cure. This is a war. Deaths will be comparable to WW2. Our resolution must also be comparable

What hysterical, alarmist nonsense. 20 million died in Russia alone in WW2. Do you have any grasp of history?

They may well still have a choice but if they get CV care could be compromised. Well most likely will be, but a decision not to treat to put it harshly.

So the government is protecting the elderly like people wanted and it’s still wrong because they are Tories. You couldn’t make it up

'Clogging up the beds' 'oldies'. Your language is disgusting OP. These are real people you're talking about. People like my DH.

Lying asleep next to me, fit and healthy, still working, socialising, living. He will do what he is asked to do as he is socially responsible but please do not dismiss him or dehumanise him.

I'm 59. I'm not sure what this will mean for me. At home too I guess!

@AlternativePerspective you are completely missing the point that if the vulnerable choose to go out and about risking their lives , the NHS will be absolutely overflowing when they need to go on ventilators etc.

@Pluckedpencil agree with every word.

None of the convoluted and impractical theorising about keeping older people and the immunocompromised isolated will work and none of it is based on any sort of scientific reasoning.

Children are the vectors here, and gatherings of children are an ideal way to spread the virus. The way to slow it and try to keep the NHS from being overwhelmed is to close schools.

Boris Johnson is unfortunately prioritising keeping on squeezing the last drop of blood out of the economy until industries collapse as workers get sick and die.

It’s too late. To blunt anyone who was out and about last week and still going out this week is nuts. The horse has bolted