60-80% will contract this disease

[Alialialiali]

I am currently in self-isolation and in all likelihood have this. My area is a hotspot and in the beginning I was asked to come into the hospital which now has the most cases in the country so if i didnt have it then i may well have picked it up there.

Next year there'll be another virus... then another.... then another. What are we going to do? Shut down the entire nation every time? This is not as simple as the flu but it's not EBOLA either.

The government strategy is to flatten the curve. It's not eradication. Regardless of whatever lockdown you think is coming we are still expecting 60-80% of the population to become infected. And we're looking for that to happen within 12 weeks. That is my reading of the strategy. I feel like a lot of you don't really understand that and are holding out hope for a vaccine.

Anyway, I already know where the voting's going to go on this one. My intention is to let you guys know that outside of your bubble a large proportion of the country thinks like me and even if they don't right now, reality will soon set in after 2 weeks of what we're calling a lockdown. You can't expect 20/30 somethings to stop life and sit in a home they don't own, for a year. And I'm aware that we're saying it's really dangerous for them as 20% of cases that end up on a respirator but survive are under 50... but the probability is low enough for a huge section of society to just not care enough.

Anyway, it's not a question of if but how unreasonable do you think i'm being?

Patrick Vallance explaining strategy:
parliamentlive.tv/Event/Index/cced67ec-c445-4698-a21b-7d9ff8a01354

Chris Whitty explaining that they are not holding out for a vaccine and that eradication is not the strategy.. ie. we're all going to get it

You can't expect 20/30 somethings to stop life and sit in a home they don't own, for a year.

Why not? We just have to suck it up. It’s awful but what’s the alternative?

I was traced as I was in contact with a child on my caseload who contracted it from a relative who had visited Italy. She has complex health issues so is in hospital

They wouldn’t test me though. But said if I start with a persistent cough and/or temperature to self isolate immediately. Work sent me home on Tuesday.

They are not blanket testing in hospitals. They are only testing if someone presents as symptomatic is what I got told when I asked.

A vaccine will not be a available in less than a year because of the need for long term testing. Finding a cure could happen at any time but is highly speculative and may not happen for a long time

I work with some of the specialists working on this right now and whilst you’re right about a vaccine, there is hope. We’re testing pre existing drugs that are already on the market, that can’t cure Covid, but can irradiate or at least ease symptoms. We’re already running second stages of testing and are hopeful. There is likely to be drugs available within the next couple of months that can help.

Having said that: STAY THE FUCK INSIDE!!!!!

Isn’t the plan the exact opposite of 60-80% of people getting it within 12 weeks?

The point of flattening the curve is to spread those 60-80% out so they don’t all hit ICU at once.

Lots of people do think like you, which is what is scary.

Having said that: STAY THE FUCK INSIDE!!!!!

I was going to go with ‘stay at home, save lives’ but this works too.

“You can't expect 20/30 somethings to stop life and sit in a home they don't own, for a year.”

Why, are they more “special” than the rest of us?

It’s stupid threads like this that are increasing anxiety and fear in everyone. Honestly, I think MN is doing way more harm than good at present.

This meme I read says it perfectly

‘Your grandparents were called upon to fight in world wars. You are being asked to wash your hands and sit on the couch.

Don’t F* this up’

Why read them and comment then @maddiemookins16mum ? Theres plenty of other threads/websites/YouTube channels....funny cat stories....?

Thanks Angels that's reassuring!

It sounds like if they can at least reduce the number of people needing ICU that would make everything more manageable.

That's the most reassuring thing I've read/heard over the past two weeks @AngelsSins .....now if Boris could just tell everyone to 'STAY THE FUCK INSIDE' while people can get this under control at least!

Thank you

I don't trust Chris Whitty or his plan.

We had a head start on this, our government did nothing, no extra ventilators, areas to facilitate extra patients etc. Italians have been warning us for the last 2 weeks to do something - 2 weeks ago Boris joked about how he shook hands with lots or coronavirus patients and he laughed at it. Just five days ago our only policy was to wash our hands for 20 seconds.

This government and it's advisors have made a balls of this. Rishi Sunak is the light in a very dark sky. However, where was this money during austerity? When more hospitals could have been built, more medical and more trained.

They will go down on the wrong side of history for this.

I thought the herd immunity plan which you’re advocating had been ditched, OP? When it became apparent the scientists had used the wrong numbers for their modeling. Hence the turn around in strategy.

I was going to go with ‘stay at home, save lives’ but this works too

Ha! I don’t think I’d ever make it as a politician

I personally work closely with a specific institute in Italy, who are running the second phase of trials on a pre existing drug, alongside an institute in China, but they’re not the only lab doing this, different drugs are being tested all over the world. People are literally dedicating their lives to finding drugs that can help right now, and we will get there, there are already a few that look very positive, we just need to do our part and keep this under control as much as we can.

The very low numbers that they are admitting to is contributing to the lack of alarm younger people and adults are not feeling. They are still not ramping up testing. I have a relative who is actually really poorly with confirmed pneumonia though a chest X-ray and COPD, every CV symptom and they still would not test them.

If they had tested everyone - like the who has told them too they could say ‘look, we have over 50,000 cases of CV’ rather than the paltry figure they are admitting too and a hell of a lot more people would take this seriously.

@PlomBear thank you for a little perspective.

I don’t think it’s just the low testing numbers. I think the ‘it’s just flu’,’more people die if flu’ and ‘only the elderly and vulnerable are dying’ messages that are going round too.

It’s why the WHO had to come out with a very strong message to younger people yesterday.

Whitty also said about the test and trace working in SK, however, it is unfeasible here. Well no shit Sherlock... why did you sit on your hands for weeks rather than start this when cases actually were at a minimum and there was a chance of them being curtailed?

Your advisors actually encouraged the spread at the beginning to 'flatten the curve' now it's out of control.

Same as @AnyOldSpartabix .

For some folk*, zero socialising will destroy their mental health.
*
Isn't it better to have bad mental health for 3 months than spreading the disease to someone who will die from it? I find the viewpoint that temperory bad mental health is worse than killing people disgusting.

*‘Your grandparents were called upon to fight in world wars. You are being asked to wash your hands and sit on the couch.

Don’t F this up’*

Exactly. I find it inconceivable that people "can't live" without seeing people up close. I find it so weak.

The government strategy is to flatten the curve. It's not eradication.

Well yeah. Until a vaccination proves successful, of course this isn't an attempt at eradicating covid-19. And I don't think lockdown for a year has been presented in the least as an attempt at eradication. Smaller, mulitple peaks over a longer period of time allow the NHS to cope better with the patient-load, presumably. We shall see.

multiple I meant. Sorry for the typo.

Herd immunity is estimated at 60%, not 80%, presumably because there are other steps we can take to prevent transmission, the most important being washing our hands.
These viruses spring up all the time, OP. It's hit the west hard because we're not 'epidemic aware' as they are in other areas of the world. We're on a steep learning curve. I've already learnt some things that I'm going to keep in place indefinitely.