Is it time to Free the healthy and shield the vulnerable

[Alex50]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52543692

The healthy and the vulnerable are not two distinct groups but a spectrum.
What do you do about a nurse with asthma, a bus driver with diabetes, an older person who is still working in a vital role? Free your so-called healthy too much you put all of these people either at more risk or greater lockdown themselves. It's not simple.

Define "the vulnerable "

No it’s not simple but it’s something that has to be thought about as we can’t stay in lockdown to protect a small minority, which is what is being said in the BBC article. There will be more deaths from lockdown soon than the coronvirus.

The "vulnerable" are people with rights too. What if they don't want to be inside?

Yes this is not straightforward at all.
Many, many people who appear ‘healthy’ on a day to day basis and work full time do have underlying conditions that makes them more vulnerable to CV. Added to that people who are BAME, older people, and those who are obese may also have added risk factors to CV, most of my family and friend group therefore fall under one or other of the increased risks and all work. It is certainly difficult going forward.

There have only been just over 300 deaths from coronvirus for under 45’s most of those had underlying health issues, the risks are tiny. I know some may have been ill at home but there are many things we can catch and be very ill and recover. Lockdown is going to cause far more health issues if it carries on to long, one being mass unemployment.

I agree, the number of healthy people dying from this is tiny and I think theres been a big overreaction somewhere down the line. Why are we making all the healthy people stay indoors miserable when actually their chances of dying are little greater than their chances of being run over?

In Finland they advised over 70s to stay at home but they can make decision themselves.

Yes I think so op. I think it's a good solution. Anyone who is vulnerable and needs to stay in should be supported so they're as safe as possible. We need everyone else to get going to minimise the economic damage (and thus the damage to other lives)

Apparently my dh is vulnerable- he has mild asthma but the doctor put him on the list of vulnerable that went to the supermarkets. He is entitled to supermarket deliveries. Should he stay in now? Maybe Paul Scholes who also has asthma despite being a football superhero should do.
The "othering" of people who have health conditions, even mild ones, continues..

I expect the shielded (extremely vulnerable) group will be told to stay at home for months-if they choose to go out and become ill, they will be a statistic (with underlying health conditions).

The not-shielded will be back to work.

It’s the vulnerable group that will be the collateral damage. Pregnant, diabetic, asthmatic, obese, etc. They aren’t ‘bad’ enough to get a shielding letter and there are too many of them to pay them full time for them not to be at work. Many will probably catch it and they will be listed as dying with underlying health conditions.

Very interesting article. I can understand the unfairness and difficulty of making only the vulnerable stay at home - but it seems absolutely mad to keep the entire nation under lockdown at great cost when only 300 under 45s (?) have died of it, some of whom probably had health conditions that were undiagnosed...

It's very difficult to shield the vulnerable if a large number of the healthy population are infected.

The vulnerable need healthy people to care for them.

It isn't straightforward, no - it is the vulnerable, not the shielded, who will be wondering what they are supposed to do about work and school.

I do wish those last two graphs could be more widely publicised though - they might counter some of the fear evidenced in the first graph!

I'm on that spectrum between shielded and healthy, and not likely to do well if I catch this, plus live with a shielded person I'm scared stiff of bringing this home to.

Moving back to normal too fast before this is under control is likely to mean I have no choice but to go back to work and just get on with being scared stiff about the risks I have to take. Because womaning up and embracing being 'very ill' and hoping to God if I survive that, and bearing in mind it took me four months to recover to my usual level of function from an ordinary bug this winter that I'm not left even more disabled and unable to work than I already am, after years of struggling to keep working, or just plain dying or seeing the person I live with die - somehow it just isn't something I feel very enthusiastic about.

However I'm expecting there will be a graded, steady release to lockdown so we don't have an immediate resumption of spreading the virus far and wide and infection rates shooting back up, with brakes applied if the numbers start to shoot higher. That's more something that will work for everyone, instead of implying that anyone with 'underlying health conditions' just needs to die for their country and stop whining about it.

It might be 300 but that is the dead not total hospitalised some of which will have been intubated.
Then x12 to get to 60% herd immunity
=3600 but only with lockdowns.
The risk isnt so small for the 17m vulnerable but not shielding.
And who except crazy people trust the gov to provide ppe and nhs capacity or lockdown again?
If they run out of ppe again the drs and nurses could easily refuse to treat anyone...

Also lets get all those mps and lords back in parliament if its not so dangerous after all. I expect all vulnerable ones up to 68 to attend daily.

What about the 45 and overs? Do we get to stay at home? What about the under 45s living in our homes?

I agree, the people at risk could continue to isolate until there is a vaccine available, everybody else that is happy to take their chances should be allowed to.

I imagine Johnson thought he was invulnerable because he doesn't fall into the "other" category.

Is it time to 'Free the Healthy' and 'Shield the vulnerable'

What crap sort of language framing is this?

That suggests the healthy have been imprisoned against their will (and that we should NOW shield the vulnerable (as if we haven't already - which is true, but begs the question why in the hell haven't they been to this point?)

The quote in the article:
"If we can shield the vulnerable really well, there is no reason why we cannot lift many of the restrictions in place for others.

"The lockdown has come at a huge economic, social and health cost."

But as it has been demonstrated very well, we haven't been shielding the vulnerable at all well. In fact, we've ended up exposing some of the most vulnerable - often because of economic reasons.

The emphasis SHOULD be focusing on where we have been failing to protect the vulnerable (low pay in the care sectors, particularly with regard to sick pay, lack of PPE, lack of timely testing in every area), not focusing on how the healthy have been locked up and how much economic damage this has done.

Ironically if we'd paid care workers better and given them better sick pay, then the death rates wouldn't be nearly so high as its likely that it wouldn't have spread so badly in care homes - and we may have been able to open up the economy quicker at less overall economic cost.

We could have done this as a country, but there were political decisions made to not do so.

The media keep asking all the wrong questions and the public are failing to see the questions that the media are failing to ask.

Something needs to change and no mistake

What would all the 'freed' people do if/when they develop symptoms....carry on regardless, go into supermarkets, hospitals, schools, whatever? Go into their workplaces if they only have it mildly because they are able to?

Excellent points made by RedToothBrush.

What Red said.