If London doesn’t lockdown by the weekend, it faces disaster

[Derbygerbil]

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/03/19/uk/london-coronavirus-diary-npw/index.html

Do any of you live in London? I do. The streets are empty. Public transport is empty. Everyone I know is social distancing

This thread serves no purpose. The ‘scum’ you so horrifically describe aren’t reading.

London is not going into imminent lockdown. This was reiterated today

I think the government should be taking much more assertive action actually but it's my view that some of the over emotional language being used is counter productive and potentially damaging to people's mental health and well being.

I'm in Spain. The UK isn't immune to this. Cases are rising and will continue to do so, exponentially. About 10 days ago Spain had 589 cases. We have 17000 now.

It's coming. The measures taken in the UK aren't enough to prevent the NHS becoming overwhelmed and THAT is the problem.

That's not scare mongering.

Do any of you live in London? I do. The streets are empty. Public transport is empty. Everyone I know is social distancing

It's encouraging to hear that, but it's not true of other parts of London unfortunately

London, overall, has a younger population than Northern Italy and experts understand this which is why they aren’t making anything compulsory yet. Don’t panic, keep following social distancing / isolation rules, wash your hands regularly, and keep on top of your health.

BirdsandSparrow Thank you for your post and telling it like it is.
Stay safe.

Do any of you live in London? I do. The streets are empty. Public transport is empty. Everyone I know is social distancing

Perhaps in your part, but in the inner north (N1/N5), the streets are thronging with people, coffee shops are full, hairdressers and nail bars as busy as usual.

It's not scaremongering to say we are two weeks behind Italy - we are. Our numbers are following their curve almost exactly from two weeks ago. If they don't lockdown London in the next few days I will be very surprised. And it would be a terrible thing if they don't do it.

coolwalking Thu 19-Mar-20 22:59:01
The scum of London won't lockdown. There will be looting and crime will go through the roof.
.......
I presume you don't live in London, coolwalking. London is huge, each area is different, however in every town and city in the country there are undesirable people who will take advantage of a situation and commit crime. Maybe even a few miles from where you live. Where is that by the way?

You should not pick on London for 'scum', I am a Londoner and where I live is very pleasant indeed.

I do live in London and have seen a huge failure in parts of zone 2 to social distance at all. I haven't seen it today as I have been at home, but saw it from the car yesterday on way back from hospital appt. Central London I could see a big difference, but not further out. I have to do same drive tomorrow, will go straight from car to hospital, DP will drop me out and then stay in car to wait. On the way I will see if there is any more sign of compliance compared to two days ago.

This isn't scaremongering - I've been given two "insider" alerts that London WILL be locked down by the end of the weekend at the latest, possibly as early as Friday evening. So get your supplies in and batten down the hatches.

To be fair to coolwalking London does have its fair share of um...problematic inhabitants... I don't know how they will respond.

@Inkpaperstars when the virus came to the uk we were hit on tracing tracking handwashing advice and dare I say it testing
Other countries let it slide
We've been managing the shape of our curve better
Are we fully fighting fit no but we are and have been mobilising at a pace to meet need.
My hospital this week isn't full but there is a real sense of them getting prepared and planning for the surge
No nation is able to just jump to solving a global pandemic it's a 1 in a100 years event
The armchair experts on here forget boris has both sides of the argument knowledge of the infrastructure and despite their name calling on here his experts do have a real and intelligent idea of what's going on and whats achievable
I'm always amazed at the people that sit back and criticise the opticians and experts without standing up for the role themselves if they can do it do much better and so much smarter

That'll be politicians not opticians

@GrumpyHoonMain So to hell with all those who are vulnerable in London? They may be a minority but quite a sizeable one, as the high death rate shows. There's also high levels of deprivation in some parts of London. Plenty of young people will have underlying conditions. Diabetes, fir example, is sometimes referred to as a disease of poverty. Then there's the high levels of pollution. Many young people with asthma in London. Our experts seem to have different information to the rest of the world, most of which has locked down. Do you want to wait until the rest of the UK is as bad as London? If the answer's no, we need action taken now. I agree we shouldn't panic. Calling for proactive measures isn't the same thing.

I am not sure about getting supplies in before the lockdown. I think the shops will be safer in terms of infection risk after people are only allowed in a few at a time. Right now getting supplies in means crowd exposure. I know cases will rise but still might be better to wait. Every time I go to a shop here I resolve to manage with fewer supplies.

I agree Inkpaperstars but so does Paris and many other places around the world. They still managed to lockdown.

Opticians 😊

We're screwed it's going to get bad and quickly. Only 8 days ago I was discussing with a friend if we should go ahead with a trip to Europe as planned and we were both still erring on the side of going. 2 days later we decided it best to cancel and couple of days after that it seemed unthinkable that anyone would travel abroad right now.

We went less than a week from schools will stay open to schools shut indefinitely.

I'm keeping the kids home and staying home bar food shopping for the foreseeable future. If at this point only to protect ourselves.

Yes that is somewhat encouraging trying

Hmm. I’m in Zone 2, pretty central. Public transport is v empty - lets assume a few people have to get to work, essential services eg. The others are DC, like my own, who are still going to school as requested. DS said there were 3 other people in his train carriage at 7.45am this morning - this is usually a very busy morning commute. This week I’ve made a couple of small trips on foot to pick up a few final requirements and prepping for a 12 week close down - eg I went to get something sorted at the dentist on Tuesday. I think there is a strong sense of everyone sorting out some final things and there will be a big change as soon as the schools finish tomorrow.

Italy also has the oldest population in Europe which is why it hit hard

It explains the higher death rate, but the point is that the higher the number of cases climbs over a short period, the greater pressure on the NHS. Most cases will not require icu, but even a small percentage of a big number can overwhelm the NHS.

Sadly the government here made it pretty clear several vita lock-down measures are never coming.