Lockdown is not the answer

[NellyGrace]

We have a vulnerable family member and have been isolating for 9 days. This is unsustainable. It will drive us mad.

Whilst it was just the vulnerable we could cope as we could still go out to walk. We have no garden.

If the crazy want to carry on mixing. Let them. The vulnerable can hide if they choose.

Test like South Korea and isolate the pockets of disease.

We should not be allowing governments to use this as a way to take away our freedom.

What i find rather worrying is that we are destroying everything we know to protect a generation that is close to dying To a point I agree - but many of this generation are fit and well, such as m 80 year old mother, and of course you have plenty of younger people with underlying conditions who are perfectly well if their conditions are managed.

I am not sure we are just like Italy. We have not been testing everyone by a long way. My German friend says they are testing everyone with symptoms, we are not doing that. Are (or were) the Italians? If they weren't, their death rates are massively greater than ours, even though the actual numbers are similar.

Sorry I meant if the Italians WERE testing everyone with symptoms.

I don’t see how it can be implemented all over the country. Particularly in a little rural village like mine. I can see how it would work in a city or busy town.

Sole, don’t you think they know that?

I dont know how we would manage it here - we dont have enough police. Before this happened you'd wait days for police to come out for a burglary let alone have the capacity to patrol every street in every town in every city in the entire country. I honestly dont know how they could manage that with the amount of police we currently have. Plus- they will still have to attend the usual crimes on top of all that. Its mind blowing.

Even if they brought in the army- do we have an army big enough to cover the entire UK?

There doesn’t seem like much of a point in a general lockdown. I was having a conversation with my friend the other day about how easy it would be to evade a lockdown in order to continue seeing each other for example. I’m really not sure how enforceable it would be.

What i find rather worrying is that we are destroying everything we know to protect a generation that is close to dying

I agree. Even Imperial college admitted their statistics didnt factor in the elderly people who would die of other natural causes anyway. Apparently, 500,000 people die every year in UK anyway.
Obviously i'm not saying let them die but is it worth leaving thousands homeless, without jobs, in poverty, dying of suicide etc anyway just so someone aged 80 can live to 82?

I have been isolating properly for 9 days too, and I agree op, it IS very very hard. I have felt like I could be going mad at times too, I totally get what you are saying. I have excellent MH and it has been very challenging, so I am concerned for people with MH issues and anxiety. I have nearly cracked a few times as it is extremely hard to get used to it, however I still very much think we need a proper lockdown.

Yes it will be uncomfortable, at times it might even be unbearable, but it is absolutely necessary, and the faster the better.

@swerfandturf do you have any links to the claim that the death rates directly linked to social isolation in regards to coronavirus were higher than the death rates of coronavirus itself? It would he interesting reading.

I'm not swerfandturf but a study published in the Lancet (highly respected medical journal) concludes recession caused 500,000 extra cancer deaths:
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/25/financial-crisis-caused-500000-extra-cancer-death-according-to-l/

Report on 10,000 suicides directly linked to recession:

www.forbes.com/sites/melaniehaiken/2014/06/12/more-than-10000-suicides-tied-to-economic-crisis-study-says/#117f05977ae2

Causative relationship between unemployment and suicide:
jech.bmj.com/content/57/8/594

Suicide linked to recession/unemployment:
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5451921/

Overview:
www.ccn.com/chillingly-scariest-coronavirus-death-toll-may-not-come-from-covid-19/

There are many, many more. Its quite chilling.

Autum Rose I am self isolating, I had Corona type symptoms this week. After 7 days provided I am fine I have to return to my job in the NHS that ok with you ?

Also please think of the mental health toll on those thousands of HCPs. Particularly the nursing and medical studwnts graduating this week to help fight this. They will have horrific PTSD like shell shock after WW1. But the boomers freedom is more important !

Another reason for not just writing the elderly off as collateral damage and carrying on as normal is the risk of this thing mutating, at the moment the young are at less risk, it doesn't mean this will always be the case.

Attitudes would be different if Corona was taking out those in childhood the same way it is the very old, no one would dare complain about isolation out loud

Italy is already not wasting resources on 'treating' the very elderly, we'll be there in a week or two.

But the boomers freedom is more important !

Name calling? Nice. I hope you aren't nursing me if I'm admitted. Your ageism is showing and it isn't pretty.

Sorry those over 60. My parents are boomers and are happy to be reffered to as such. Sorry if it is offensive.

I think if you need life saving treatment, you'd actually be quite happy (and lucky) to get an oxygen mask and a hospital bed. No matter who was adminstering it. Of course if you needed ICU you'd know nothing about it corona patients are being heavily sedated for thier own safety.

I am sick of this. It is not just the elderly. There are many young people with underlying conditions who are perfectly healthy otherwise. I am one of them in my 30s. Not to mention there are young otherwise healthy people who are on bloody ventilators, one of them being a friend of mine. My life matters ffs. As does my 14 year old neighbor with an underlying condition

@MimiLaRue do you not get it? The 80+ year olds are the ones dieing in Italy. The patients crippling the health service in ICU are the young, middle aged and elderly. Drs are having to make decisions as to who gets a ventilator and who doesn't.

Oh didums. You’re struggling with isolating. I’m disabled and chronically ill. I’ve been pretty much doing this for the past 8 years. But snowflake can’t cope. Bless. Ffs. 🤯

Idk if quarantine is the answer. However, it’s an answer, which is currently working in other countries. Had the government acted immediately and tried to stamp out the virus rather than reach herd immunity unicorn, we wouldn’t be in this position.

I say this with regret, but lockdown must happen. As someone caring for a vulnerable family member, having looked out of my own window and seen the news, the selfish and foolish hordes must be prevented from travelling distances to the seaside and countryside for day trips, walks, holidays and to second homes. They are at high risk of spreading the virus amongst themselves, to those in the communities they are descending on, swamping local services including the already struggling NHS and village shops. On the evidence I have seen, lockdown has been left too late because many people can not be trusted to do the right thing.

@MimiLaRue thank you for providing these. However they are only very loosely connected to swerfandturfs assertion. The extra suicides in regards to cancer could have been caused by anything; financial worries due to the debt a person finds themselves in after a serious illness, the stress and anxiety of the cancer journey itself, other health concerns ie secondary factors such as the heartbreak of infertility caused by chemo...the list could go on. I couldn't actually read the article though due to having to pay for a subscription, only the headline.

The 'unemployed and suicide' one. Many of these people may have been folk who were unemployed due to mental illness in the first place. The article even states "half of the association might be attributable to confounding by mental illness."

I was looking more for evidence to suggest that social isolation itself, which will be for a period of weeks, would cause more deaths by suicide than coronavirus itself.

So many people here and all over Mumsnet haven’t even started isolating yet. Once you do you will realise. It is bloody hard and will test the strongest of us never mind those who are already fragile.

Nelly I agree regarding how tricky isolation could be.

In some ways it's like when you get a power cut. You go 'Damn! But it's okay, I'll just... oh, hang on, no internet. Or I'll... ah, kettle won't work. Never mind, I'll whip around with the hoover- ah...' etc.

If you think your way through a day of it, there'll be lots of "...ah"s.

@NellyGrace so will spiralling numbers of deaths, a number of which were preventable. The health care workers will be affected mentally more than likely, it will be challenging staying home but the alternative is worse.