How long do you think we can tolerate this lockdown?

[TeethingAgain]

I know it's necessary and for thy e greater good, but how long do you think society will tolerate it before (more) people start flouting the rules? Are there psychologists who the government are consulting about how long humans can be expected to live like this? I know people say we are just being asked to sit on our sofas but that's a very simplistic way of looking at a gargantuan change in lifestyle and social habits which are engrained within us.

I think people could manage 8-12 weeks and I think the toll on mental health will start to outweigh the physical health benefits.

The point about impact on kids is a big one for me. My little one is an only child and being without company of other children for this length of time isn't something she's ever really known. She's doing okay but it's a long time in a little person's life.

@hopsalong - brilliant post! Sums up the inequality of the sacrifices being made.

I think the hardest thing is the invisibility of a virus

Very true.

As I said I'm following all guidelines, but sometimes I do fear that we've taken blanket action out of fear.

Italy situation is frightening.

London situation also looks quite frightening.

I live up north... so we currently have 108 critical cases in a population of 5.4 million spread out over 31,000 square miles.

What worries me is that we're all on lockdown now... it'll rip through the hotspots like London, Manchester(?), Birmingham(?), and their peak will start to lower meanwhile we haven't even started getting close to our peak incline yet. So we'll have pockets of the country on the downward, and some where it hasn't even been given the chance to properly spread yet.

I realise there is a lag in the figures and the action we take today causes the effects in 2 weeks time. But it does seem like we're all on slightly different trajectories and I thought the process was supposed to be like switching a tap on and off.

I don't understand why you'd switch the tap off in Dundee at the same as you'd switch the tap off in London?

I'm clueless about public health and the mechanics but I guess it probably all has something to do with areas of high population density, economic activity, travel infrastructure, geographical distance and pop spread, plus health/lifestyles, age and poverty/wealth split. Pretty much everything really.

London might be on different trajectory but also has more hospitals and beds etc, Dundee obviously doesn't have as much. It's all probably proportionate in some ways. I dare say some academics will make a career out of writing about all of that once this is done though.

thought a pandemic would reduce the population by at least 30%

Why? That is not a requirement for the term pandemic.

I'm also unsure as to why people being afraid of early death is such a revelation for some...

I'm getting sick of being socially responsible now. It's every man for himself

Wow - that took all of a week. Don't judge everyone else by your low, shitty standards.

Yeah I just pulled Dundee out of thin air

What I mean is, if there are "only" 108 critical cases here, in a population of 5.4mil, then presumably it's not really taken hold yet. That will still need to happen if the cure / vaccine is 18 months away. There's too many people here not exposed to it, and therefor not recovered from it, yet.

So we could be in a situation where London is recovering and passed the peak, but parts of England, Scotland, Wales etc which have been locked down haven't even started there peak yet.

So the whole thing just drags out even longer while we "wait" for all the little peaks to happen.

I don't even know if that's true because I'm an engineer not an (insert job that would know)... but it does worry me.

This is a killer virus?
Not a joke

People are actually dying!!!

People need to grow up and get a grip
They are being asked to sit indoors on the sofa with Netflix, with wine / chocolate etc

The older generation must be shaking their heads, i am ashamed of what is going on in the UK right now, with people not listening, and not isolating
Still socialising and going out and about.
Selfish twats

No underground in Dundee (that I'm aware of) but it definitely has people living on top of each other in tenement flats and large housing estates. Glasgow has both. Edinburgh and Aberdeen maybe a little less densely populated but that's no surprise given they're a little more affluent. Thing about Scotland I suppose is the large open areas between a lot of the cities and towns. Then you have the islands, of course. Remote and difficult to get to but also often elderly populations and a captive audience for a virus if it takes off.

Point really being, Scotland might be behind but spread might be a little easier to contain in some ways.

They are being asked to sit indoors on the sofa with Netflix, with wine / chocolate etc

Well I'm the younger generation and I'm shaking my head at that statement.

It pretty much sums up some of the excellent points raised on this thread that we're clearly not all experiencing the same "killer virus".

I'm certainly not sitting on my sofa with Netflix and wine.

If the gov actually asked me to do that, and gave me the means to do that... then I'd do it.

That's so far from most people's realities it's laughable.

Bucket it's not just about avoiding the virus, it's about not spreading it to other people at such a rate that NHS is swamped. Flattening it simply means more people will survive. I get the distant invisible enemy thing (or I did until I started to know people who have it and people who have been bereaved by it) but if some temporary misery saves more lives, frankly I'm all for it. It's a horrific way to die.

If this was a smallpox epidemic (high risk of death or disfigurement for everyone, including children), we would all be too terrified to leave our houses or even think about doing so, for a long time.

In this pandemic, it is, for the most part, a situation where the majority of people are at no particular risk and are being asked to make sacrifices to shield a minority of medically vulnerable people. Most decent people will do that for a while, but not indefinitely.

As PPs have said, austerity, recession and the like will kill a lot of people as well.

I don’t know. I’ll do it because I have to and I’m lucky enough to be keeping a job throughout it but I’m a single mum in a flat with no garden and the the thought of it just being me and her and home schooling and working full time and only being able to go outside once a day is quite a different prospect to those who have a nice garden and partners to help share the load. My mental health is shaky at the best of times but I’ll cope. I feel sorry for those with money issues on top of what I have to cope with, or domestic violence or old people on their own. It’s a big ask but I’ll just have to suck it up and do as asked. I worry for myself though and I worry for others in worse off situations than me.

I would rather take my chances of 0.2% even if it meant signing a DNR. Just being honest

Except the death rate is much higher than that. At least 3-4%. Where are people getting -2 from?

You wouldn't need a DNR - the chance of successful CPR in someone with Covid-19 related SARS/ viral pneumonia is tiny.

As long as it takes

I think that if you're introverted by nature, you can't quite appreciate how hard this is on more extroverted people

I'm quite extroverted, but not daft enough to think dying a horrible, premature death alone or waving goodbye to your parents over Skype (if you're lucky) is harder.