Italy v England. Why the different levels of sympathy?

[Whatsthis1515]

I am noticing that people feel sorry for Italy regarding their death toll but for the UK, people are scathing and pointing fingers. Why is this? I know Italy was supposed to be a lesson to us, but surely in that case, they didn't do the right thing either?

Interested to know what you all think.

Thanks

Reginabambina
what do bushfires have to do with anything? They’re pretty standard here and not exactly preventable.

That may be so, but pp said;

"If you look at Australia’s timeline they were on it straight away in Jan" -

I pointed out the UK media's view of Australia/Scott Morrison during the same month - Jan. It relates to other comments made about how the UK is viewed from other countries.

it’s not like the government could just stop bushfires altogether

If the spread of coronavirus was so easily preventable there wouldn't be 7,500 deaths in Germany.

We were all told by 111 and the media to not bother the NHS until you were dying.. 🤷‍♀️ stay at home.. hospitals empty everyone too frightened to bother them! Now look...

I have a feeling (backed up by dna evidence from France) that this virus was here a lot earlier than we think and whatever we had done was too late. Haven’t french generic analysts traced Covid back to Dec 2019 in some french patients that died of pneumonia. In Italy similar - they have a health system which is less joined up than ours but now they are joining the dots they are finding a lot of strange pneumonia cases from late 2019. Geneticists there have traces the virus back to Oct 2019 in China (and maybe even earlier). If that is the case then the virus would have been in Europe by Dec 2019. Given the WHO was saying on Jan 23 that there was no human to human transmission and slamming trump for closing borders - wasn’t it already too late?

Sorry not closing borders but stopping flights from China

This is going to be like BSE - loads of other countries will have far higher caseloads but will release their real figures after the media frothing has moved on to something else.

@moltoagitato. Fully agree!!!!

As others have said. The virus hit Italy with no real warning. We do not have the same excuse.

The failure of our government to learn from what happened in Italy was shameful. History will not look kindly on how we have handled this crisis.

Isn't it about time people look at how many live in the country and how many died?
We are smaller and have more people, you can't just count how many die.

I live in NI so I have been following and comparing the developments in ROI and in the UK. Yes, ROI on the whole is not as densely populated as England, however, by comparison of largest cities, Dublin contains 28% of the population of ROI while London has 16% of England's population. Similarly Belfast contains 16% of NI's population.

By percentage of population, England has had more deaths than any of NI/ROI/Scotland and Wales. I followed the development of both countries very closely at the time and especially how NI reacted. The main differences I noticed:

-ROI m locked down eleven days earlier than England
-Many NI schools chose to take staff days and close early so were closed from 13th (already off 16th/17th)

• A lot of NI bars, restaurants self closed before the official lockdown (around a week).
• Large gatherings were cancelled on the 9th March with St Patrick's parades being called off.

-The GAA ceased all sporting activity and closure of pitches in Ireland on 12th of March.

Meanwhile, England still had full subways of non essential workers for at least 2 weeks after their official lockdown on 23rd March. Cheltenham was still going ahead on the 13th March as were Champions league football matches with Madrid travelling to Liverpool on March the 12th.

So, for me (other NI posters in different areas may have different experiences) our situation was greatly helped by many people choosing to follow ROI guidelines rather than wait on our government to follow Boris.

The Republic of Ireland currently has the 8th highest number of deaths per 1 million population in the world (excluding San Marino and Andorra) - they have obviously not got everything right.

mummy2007- that's why all the relevant and serious studies and statistics look at rates and percentages and not total numbers.

That's a bit of a skewed response Clavinova when you look at that table. I don't think deaths per million of the population is a very reliable way to judge success. Look at how small the population of Ireland is in comparison to the others on that list, that completely distorts the figures.

My God, it's tiresome that some people want to shut down any criticism of the UK Govt and coronavirus by writing it off as "loony leftyism". Tiresome and stupid. And weirdly defensive. And ostrich-like.

Population of Germany 83.02 million, coronavirus deaths 7,549.

Population of UK 66.5 million, coronavirus deaths 31,587.

How can anyone even suggest the UK Govt have done a good job here? It's bollocks.

Chiccchicc

Furthermore you can break it down as many lockdown measure have been devolved decisions,

England Population 55m
Deaths 28,000

That's a bit of a skewed response Clavinova when you look at that table. I don't think deaths per million of the population is a very reliable way to judge success. Look at how small the population of Ireland is in comparison to the others on that list, that completely distorts the figures.

I suppose you think GDP per capita is skewed as well - ROI does very well by that measure.

You're a great one for ignoring the majority of posts just to pick and stick on one area. I do not agree that deaths per million give a reflective picture of success as smaller counties results get completely skewed.

That table has USA up as a relative success in comparison.

That table has USA up as a relative success in comparison.

Indeed.

BBC -
"Everyone wants to know how well their country is tackling coronavirus, compared with others. But you have to make sure you're comparing the same things."

"The United States, for example, has far more Covid-19 deaths than any other country - as of 4 May, a total of more than 69,000 deaths."

"But the US has a population of 330 million people."

"If you take the five largest countries in Western Europe - the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain - their combined population is roughly 320 million."

"And the total number of registered coronavirus deaths from those five countries, as of 4 May, was over 115,000 - far more than that of the US."

www.bbc.co.uk/news/52311014

Each one of those countries is operating with a different government and different regulation, again, you give another incomparable example.

Like I said before, the UK should not be judged as a whole as there are 4 devolved governments making decisions.

Each one of those countries is operating with a different government and different regulation, again, you give another incomparable example.

Well, OK, but you are dismissing the comparison of deaths per 1 million population as a skewed measure of success, when that is exactly what many statisticians/analysts/scientists do regard as a more reliable measure. Perhaps the USA will climb higher up the table, but at the moment it has fewer deaths per 1 million population than Belgium, Spain, Italy, UK, France, the Netherlands and Ireland per individual country. Germany is seemingly doing better.

The Republic of Ireland has a population of nearly 5 million - comparable to New Zealand, Norway, Finland and Denmark - those are the countries it should be compared with if you prefer.

One quarter of the population of Ireland live in one city - Dublin.

Also New Zealand has far and away excelled as probably the best in the world in their handling of this pandemic.

By the way, I have never said Ireland has got everything spot on, just that they have handed it better than England. In my experience I am glad the people in my area unofficially followed the guidance set by the Irish government rather than that of the UK government. This is what I stipulated in my first post.

I am getting a little bit fed up of hearing from very rural countries about how wonderfully they have coped. London is a major international financial centre and it is no accident that the borders have been left open.
I have to visit NI about every two months to visit an elderly widowed relative who married a long way from Surrey. Outside of Belfast it is like time travelling back to the 1970s. It has nothing in common with the SE of England at all.

Cake, plenty of countries with far higher population density than the UK have coped far better.

Also New Zealand has far and away excelled as probably the best in the world in their handling of this pandemic.

That hasn't stopped the press comparing the UK with New Zealand.

By the way, I have never said Ireland has got everything spot on, just that they have handed it better than England.

Considering that some posters on this thread have claimed that other countries are laughing at England because of the appalling way they have handled coronavirus, and you yourself described the government's efforts as 'an embarrassment' - saying that Ireland have handled it better than England is not much of a boast.

I think it’s fair to say we can it compare ourselves with NZ and Australia.

Think we can compare ourselves to Germany though? In terms of population size and density. They have fared far better.