What on earth is going on?????

[Queeneee]

So far today, I’ve seen a headline stating that coronavirus could be wiped out of London in weeks. I’ve seen a headline saying the rate of infection is higher than they thought and has risen in the last week. I’ve seen a video of Matt Hancock saying the ‘R’ is unlikely to go above 1. I’ve also seen an article on Sky News saying that the government are now saying the ‘R’ isn’t actually that important (after previously stressing how vital it was for it to stay below 1).

My question is, does anyone actually know what’s going on at the moment? I can’t make any sense of the information we are being fed by the government and the media. I have tried to be positive about the government, even although I didn’t vote Tory and am not a big Boris fan. I tried to put all that aside and just support our government in trying to work a way through this. I actually initially convinced myself they were doing their best, but I’m just really getting down about all of the misinformation.

In all honesty, I’m having a bad day today so this could be why this has frustrated me so much. I just can’t understand how we are all going to navigate our way through this when there are so many mixed messages. That light at the end of the tunnel is just starting to feel further and further away

There's a lot of people looking for stories and change and novelty at a time when there isn't much new , just keep going doesn't make a headline

Yep I’m currently at a cross roads of the dfe saying the science says it’s safe to send kids back to school and bma saying it’s not. If they don’t know how can we

The media is the problem. Any other organisation deliberately causing fear and panic to make money would be subject to an inquiry.

The media have been atrocious during this time, such conflicting messages even from the same newspaper on the same day.

I can already see the DM headlines when we start getting back to "normal". Any spike will be COVIDS BACK

Its not really surprising the drs and teachers are concerned -for all of us and reasonably for themselves too. Who wants to go straight into another peak?
Even 15kids is still loads more than at the moment. Especially with siblings and parents and parents workplaces

The r number is low in society, high in care settings. Therefore the average is a bit meaningless.

The media is the problem... Don't make me laugh, who feeds the media their stories???

The government is the problem and them trying to influence mn by having posters constantly deflecting criticism of them is getting very boring.

@Keepdistance

Agreed. There are many siblings at our school including our two who will be in different “bubbles of 15”. They’ll all mix at home. The while school is mixing when I think through all the siblings in our small school. Then the parents are encouraged to mix more and do more so they’re exposed too.

It’s not the bubble they think it is.

Doing so much at once makes it hard to see what caused a rise if one occurs too.

@ssd Exactly. The Mail’s stance on teachers today came from government

I’ve noticed those posters too. I know they’re a genuine defence of them too and that’s fine but the fake ones are embarrassing

Do you think the Russians or Chinese have any posters on Mumsnet?

It seems to me that the government is panicking, they are worried about the economy so are taking risks in attempt to boost it. Every time information comes out that doesn’t suit the government they shut it down.

If the virus can travel from China to the UK, then it can certainly travel down the M1, or up the track from Brighton in less than 60 minutes. To say London will be free of it is a nonsense.

The rate of infection is higher because they are testing more people. The R is just a predictive model little more reliable than predicting the weather. And it depends if human behaviours and other variables are correctly factored in. It seems that the government jumped on RO as it seemed to offer a way to predict how the virus would or wouldn't spread according to how tightyly imposed lockdown is or isn't, to justify lifting lockdown. Now they realise that without lockdown it's all down to human behaviour. And we are fucked, because even with social distancing there will still be transmission. Of course the RO is diminished by careful social distancing. But that brings us to schools, how will social distancing work? An environment where the RO could potentially be higher than 1 very easily, all due to human behaviour not the total number of those infected, but because of the total number who can potentially infected by one individual.

They are saying R is unlikely to go above 1, but on what evidence? When the science doesn't tell them what they want to hear they discredit it. But RO whilst being used by epidemiologists it is not itself a science. In the same way economics is not a science. Different results can be found if we factor in more or less variables, and variables of different sorts, so its contested. The government would do better to study closely those variables when considering which model will give them the most accurate RO, rather than entirely discounting its value. To discount entirely how many people will likely be infected by an individual carrier under any proposed imposed changes to social behaviour is them trying to avoid responsibility for their decisions. Because it would follow that all decisions over lockdown and social distancing were pointless because the outcome would be the same......but we know that isn't true, and so do they which is why they begrudgingly had to act in March.

So, yes of course they want london clear of virus, .....its the economy int it stoopid!

As for the media, I agree with others.

@ssd @excitedmumtobe87

What?

The MSM gets their information from either PA or Reuters, or live from the briefings we all watch with our own eyes.

They then make a story from that information that suits their editorial agenda. They spin it.

The government is not writing the headlines. The inaccurate, twisted, inflammatory, terrifying headlines that get clicks and page views and make the bucks.

Think of a number, any number, then apply it to anything you like vaguely related to coronavirus - give it a few days and it'll be a headline.

@Sadie789

Gavin Williamson wrote in the Mail today. Last time I checked he was in government.

That’s the story I’m talking about m

I used to work in news I know how it works they don’t get all stories from press associations! Some yes. Some the others you say. Not all and definitely not the one one referring to

This is unprecedented
a novel situation
we are naive to it
we are in uncharted waters
Even the experts can only guess
Truly is the blind leading the blind 😳
Luckily humans are fairly good at making it up as they go along, a plan will emerge as as more data becomes available, we will find a pathway through; though it may not be a straightforward one!
Much will be learnt along the way

The r is reported with a time lag .i have been saying for weeks the media have been quite frankly disgusting .

We all know we will have to pay for all of this but they also decided to appoint themselves as the chancellor telling the public what will happen .

Too much politics going on in a worldwide problem .

Have people forgotten the scenes from Italy already? Hospitals completely overwhelmed and the army being used to move truck loads of bodies around. This country escaped that by a whisker. Watch Hospital on BBC1 - major London hospitals needing to overspill from itu into operating theatres. That is unprecedented.

I work outside of London and our hospital had to redeploy clinical staff from virtually every area of the hospital to look after covid patients on itu. Operations and routine NHS care had to be postponed because of the virus not the lockdown. We are still looking after around 5 times as many critically ill patients as we would do normally. Staff are exhausted. We cannot deal with a second wave at the moment. And it really isn't just the elderly or the young who weren't 'healthy' beforehand who are dying. Believe that if it makes you feel better, but it isn't just morbidly obese men with heart disease who are dying. And just because someone had a pre-existing health condition like asthma or diabetes doesn't make them disposable.

But the ship is sinking and we don't have the resources to get out of this situation and save everyone
Imagine The Terror in the days of the plague 😱

The media are not and never have been perfect. But I do not want to live in a country without a free press. Some freedoms are easily lost and painfully hard to win back.

I have noticed a huge increase in "it's The Media are the ones to blame!!!" whenever any criticism of the government comes up.
"The Media" or "the MSM" are not a homogeneous mass.

It's an embarrasingly Trumpian attitude.... That the government are there to hold the media to account. No. It is the other way round and we should never forget that.

And papers and journalists do not just get their info "live from the daily briefings and Reuters" Sadie789
It is well established that many journalists often get information from inside contacts before it is made public either without the blessing of the government/ministers (leaks) or with their full blessing (private briefings).
Sometimes to test the waters/fly a kite, sometimes to screw a political rival, sometimes to force the hand of the cabinet when there is disagreement by getting an idea "out there", sometimes to get the best spin on a story....
Basic political PR!

Cummings is particularly shifty in his use of this tactic.

As soon as more people have to start traveling to London for work.....the virus will go with them

Well if you used to work “in the news” you would know it’s news agencies, not press associations, and that he wrote an opinion piece yesterday, not today.

I can only surmise that you don’t believe the media is a pernicious player in this situation.

"the government don't write the headlines"
... Except when they do!
Like in March when Hancock helpfully directed the public to much needed information on Coronavirus... With a link to an article he had written in the Telegraph behind a paywall

No the Williamson piece was for the Mail not a news agency.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8321225/Time-class-Row-teachers-unions-explodes.html

A nd current Education Secretary Gavin Williamson demanded unions do their ‘duty’ and stop their opposition.

Writing for the Daily Mail, he said children need to start returning to classrooms ‘in the interests of their welfare and education’.