Time to get real people

[cookingmywaythroughlockdown]

Ok I think it's time to get a grip on reality!

Coronavirus is pretty nasty but it isn't apocalypse now time. Most of us are going to get it at some point and we will be just fine. So will our families and friends.
The UK cannot stay locked down for much longer without producing a national disaster that will reverberate for decades. So - you will be going back to work, your kids will be going back to school. Wash your hands well and enjoy your lives.
I'm just so sick of the posts prophesying carnage and really enjoying competitive isolation. For most people living like this is borderline harmful. For some it is already actively harmful.

We have to come out from under the bed. Wear a mask, wear gloves if you like but be prepared to live a normal if socially distanced life.

All epidemics burn themselves out eventually. We are much better placed to treat and protect the vulnerable then ever before. At some point soon we have to just get on with it.

The projected deaths of left to run unhindered was 250,000 for the U.K.

But what time period? In the last two ? A year? Overall until a vaccine?

According to the ONS 118,00 people died last year between April and June. It was considered an unusually low figure.

As @TrustTheGeneGenie wrote
All of our loved ones will die at some point. Not everyone is scared of death. I love my family but I am under no illusions that they will be here forever.

Do I want them to die from Corona? No.

Would you feel differently if it is you, not them, who dies?

I tend to agree, to be honest. The way particular people are acting regarding this pandemic is absolutely mind boggling. Let me explain.

I can absolutely understand the anxiety and fear that those who have been told that they are vulnerable and/or to shield are feeling. I'd imagine that provisions will be made to enable them to remain at home as much as possible. It isn't a flawless system, and I'm sure a lot of people would rather take their chances than remain in semi isolation for a year or so, but hopefully they can make their own choices.

I can also understand the anxiety and fear that generally healthy people are feeling because this has killed people who would appear to have been fairly young and healthy. People also don't want to pass it on to vulnerable family members, and are worried about them too- I get that.

However, I do think in the classic Mumsnet terms, a few of us do need to 'give our heads a wobble'. If you're not vulnerable and/or shielding, you will need to return to work in the near future. We need people to get the economy going again. We need services to resume.

I think it's incredibly selfish to suddenly start kicking up a massive fuss about having to return to work, when thousands of the population have not had the luxury of being able to sit it out at home, relatively safely. I think of all the NHS and care staff who have had to treat CV patients when they didn't even have PPE. I think of the retail workers who had to deal with swarms of panic buyers flooding the stores, with absolutely no measures being put in place to protect them.

These people had to work through the peak, to allow you to live. Some of them have died, working, to protect you. These people, literally with no choice, laid their lives on the line to allow you to be cared for if you fell ill. To allow you to buy essential groceries so you didn't starve. To enable you to pick up vital medication.

It's now your turn to help out the rest of society. Just be thankful that when you do return to work, at least your workplace will have had ample time to research protective measures and put them in place. NHS workers, care workers, retail workers, et all? They didn't get that luxury.

BolloxtoGender

Not everyone whe understands what lockdown is for is being hysterical and judgy.

Would you feel differently if it is you, not them, who dies?

No. Something will kill me. Statistically my chances of dying from this are small.

Well bloody Said @stretchedmarks

This was Boris's strategy initially and look what happened to him!

I didn't think people were kicking up a fuss about going back to work soon or I missing something?

I think most people who agree with lockdown are just doing as they are told by the government.

I think we should be made to social distance in shops for a long time though. I don't understand why this bothers people apart from its slower.

One day the virus will be gone, but people like the OP will still be here.

Well a percentage of them will be anyway.

@stretchedmarks who is saying they are refusing to return to work? It is the OP saying we need to get over it. Those questioning the OP are saying they cx would rather follow the advice of the government and not be calling for lockdown to end prematurely.

One of the problems with lockdown will be persuading people to leave lockdown. For many it won’t be a choice as they will run out of money. The well off can of course choose to remain isolated until there is a vaccine or effective treatment, however long that may take.

The point was to slow down too many people needing hospital admission at once. It wasn’t meant to be a place of eternal safety. I’m conflicted because personally I have had 5 colleagues needing ITU care (I work in a hospital) and we have had staff die because of it. But because we’ve had to carry on working and commuting we’re in a way less fearful than those who have holed up. Kids are still attending school. I’ve noticed the same relaxed attitudes from supermarket staff and the postman and delivery drivers. If people can afford to stay locked away that’s their choice, but the rest of us will have to get back to earning a living. And sooner than some would prefer.

These people had to work through the peak, to allow you to live. Some of them have died, working, to protect you. These people, literally with no choice, laid their lives on the line to allow you to be cared for if you fell ill. To allow you to buy essential groceries so you didn't starve. To enable you to pick up vital medication.

It's now your turn to help out the rest of society. Just be thankful that when you do return to work, at least your workplace will have had ample time to research protective measures and put them in place. NHS workers, care workers, retail workers, et all? They didn't get that luxury.

Lockdown didn't protect us all in equal measure, but it did protect us ALL in some ways by preventing the disease being much more widespread. Which will have saved the lives of some key workers as well as those who were locked down 'in safety'.

It meant that those who did get sick got healthcare which they might not have if we had been in a triage scenario.

Thats not to take away from the fact that key workers have been looking after the rest of society.

But they DID benefit from lockdown even if they didn't actively participate in it by staying home. Just to a lesser degree.

I'm grateful I am on mat leave and I have the luxury of "staying home" until March 2021 should I so wish because I tend to lean towards irrational and neurotic in my views of corona (blame the newborn, I'm usually fairly lax)

But it's worrying how many people seem to be completely oblivious to the economic shitstorm heading our way - surely most posters saw 2008 crunch and can gain some perspective through this? The government cannot bankroll the country's economic even in the medium term, we need to get this show back on the road for everyone's benefit.

‘I can absolutely understand the anxiety and fear that those who have been told that they are vulnerable and/or to shield are feeling. I'd imagine that provisions will be made to enable them to remain at home as much as possible.‘

You can imagine it all you want but it doesn’t make it true. The government hasn’t said anything to indicate that the vulnerable group, as opposed to the shielding group won’t be sent back to work very soon.

@RedToothBrush, thank you for another great post. So many people do not seem to be reading and engaging with the explanations why lockdown needs to carry on a little bit longer.

One of the problems with lockdown will be persuading people to leave lockdown

I don’t think it will. I think many people don’t want it to stop as it benefits them, so they are putting up a fight now.

When they lose that fight and they need to go back, they will stop the bs and do so.

Still whinge, sure, remembering the halcyon days of no commute, no school run, or even being paid to stay home, but let’s face it, this is just a protest to keep it going for many.

Not all, some folks at genuine, but for many, it’s obvious they are just kicking off to see if they can keep it going because it benefits them,,,when the fight is lost, they will be straight back work with the kids immediately in school.

But right now, it’s worth making a bit of noise over for them,

21:07frillyfucks
But it's worrying how many people seem to be completely oblivious to the economic shitstorm heading our way - surely most posters saw 2008 crunch and can gain some perspective through this? The government cannot bankroll the country's economic even in the medium term, we need to get this show back on the road for everyone's benefit.

What people? I don't know anyone who isn't aware of this? If only the virus would understand then it would be so simple.

I'm torn on this tbh! I am low risk, but msm has made my controlled anxiety spiral out of control to the point I haven't left the house in weeks! I have lost my business as I was tourist dependant, the small town I live in is completely tourist reliant so we will have no income for the foreseeable future, that includes one of my kids, I am also self employed so have had no income since March, all bills that I can have been put on a break but it's highly unlikely I will be able to pay them unless I get government help for a year as I work loads in the summer to allow for the quiet winter, I spend my days talking down my daughter with a new baby whose mh is through the floor, dealing with a teenage girl who now has terrible anxiety and won't eat to the point she is fainting! We cannot access any mh services as they are overwhelmed. I worry about the old folks I clean for as I can't get to them and some are struggling to keep living quality up and some can't see to clean or cook, (I can't go to them as I'm not qualified in care) I would love to go back to some sort of normality, just seeing family and friends and be able to help the ones that need it and I would love to be able to work in some capacity and allow the vulnerable to be able to get the financial support to be able to get through this without me having to claim!

I doubt they’ll throw everyone back on public transport at same time. As long as they don’t think the same way as some on here are and keep to R0 statements. It won’t be back to normal but measured. Fine.

Smilethoyourheartisbreaking "There are gradients and nuances" You are quite right but OP and lots of others seem to think our plan is to stay in lockdown until everyone is vaccinated and that we are too stupid to have realised the downside.

Of course we'll be lifting restrictions and getting people back to work. We have to.

Hands up who thinks that our government would not release lockdown in a heartbeat if it thought that was the less damaging option for the economy.

They haven't, because they don't.

Thank you OP. We need more voices like this. It was a poorly chosen title: as I opened the thread I wondered "will this one be for or against?" It's also Mumsnet, as others have said, where the general view that we must all remain holed up indoors for ever, and that anyone who says otherwise is a homicidal selfish arsehole (although the tide is turning from that, thank God).

In fact, this week I intend to write to my MP to add one more voice to those against lockdown, and to make it clear that it's high time for the government to TALK TO US ABOUT EASING LOCKDOWN, so that people have something to hope for, and so that businesses can plan. How can they adequately plan if they are told "everyone must return to work tomorrow", which is what Boris would do if he had his way? I think the government is believing complacently "the public are handling it well" because there was more public compliance than they expected, so they think that we're OK with the lockdown. We are not. People are dying, from the lockdown. If it continues much longer, especially in its present form, the effects will be much more long-lasting than the pandemic itself.

There is also a very real concern that we are being led by stealth into a surveillance society, aided and abetted by the public. The lockdown has revealed a very nasty side to some members of the public, who are happy to bully key workers, and to name and shame others for buying Easter eggs, or for "letting the side down by not clapping". The new laws were rushed through very quickly indeed, with no timetable for reversing them.

And I'm still puzzled about why there hasn't been civil unrest, as people become more desperate. Perhaps this will happen if the government fails to talk about exit strategy for another week, or in a few weeks' time when people realise just how badly they've been screwed over financially and mentally by Boris and his cronies.

There actually doesn’t seem a lot to be gained by hospitalisation though. There’s no cure and its mainly pumping through oxygen as treatment.
The amount of people staying in care homes or their own homes and either dying or recovering would suggest the same.

You obviously dont have any friends seriously ill, in IU for nearly a month, with serious health issues cropping up from the virus,not elderly and with no underlying health issues, and work colleagues in the NHS, not in an ethnic minority, both on ventiilators,lucky you,