Coronavirus is awful but...

[Keepgoing88]

I do believe so would be continual lockdown and not just to the economy, the affect on people's mental (and in some cases physical) wellbeing is massive.
I believe Statistics have shown you are more likely to drown than die of corona if you are healthy and under 60 with no other conditions. If that is the case then would we stop all people going swimming Indefinetly...doubt it!
I think where I am getting at with this is that it's sad but I feel that if we truly do have to live with this terrible disease then unfortunately it should be those most vulnerable to the Illness that should isolate but not everyone else. I don't think this is a great solution but also I don't think it is fair on all healthy people to have to go on lockdown when the risk to them is so low. Anyway got most of my thoughts down / my two pennies worth! Does anyone else feel like this or have other views?!

I think we've sacrificed an entire generation of young people.

Not my young people. Not even close. Nor their friends.

I agree with @cornettoninja .

We don't know what the mid and long term effects might be. It took them long enough to add loss of smell and taste to the symptoms. I'd rather keep my head down and avoid it until the scientists have got a handle on it.

we are still WFH and no chance of going back any time soon. They said September but that goal post is moving - AGAIN. So frustrating.
you can't just get up and say oh, lets go to ...say for example a National Trust property for a bit of a trip out. You need a timed slot and round here anyway they are like gold dust. You have to stay up to Midnight Thursday slots open at midnight Friday and you have to join the bunfight to get a slot. Then of course it might tip it down on the day you got so you don't fancy it after all... back to square one!
our GP surgery is shuttered up. We think they are open to do phone appointments but no one is permitted across the threshold.
you can go out for a coffee/lunch/ meal as long as the rules are followed.
Shops, well, one way systems, don't touch.....and from tomorrow, masks. They are not going to encourage people back to the high street.
I would say we are a very, very long way from any kind of normality. Its not good to be honest.
I really don't care about the virus any more. I am sorry. I want my life back and I want to go to work!!! WFH has its advantages but so isolating, day in,,day out on a laptop at the dining table rather than proper office set up with 2 screens

I don’t think your analogy really works... it would be more like saying people who can swim don’t drown but when you do there is an increased likelihood that someone who isn’t swimming and can’t is the one who drowns... as most people have said the sacrifices now are few and far between and if it is a choice between children being allowed back in soft play or someone over 60 dying or being hospitalised then I think the answer should be clear that people should find other ways to entertaiN their kids

I'm really enjoying working from home BUT we have a spare room we've turned in to an office, work have allowed me to take my screens, desktop and office chair home with me and I have full functionality. So quite different to my laptop on the dining table.

I feel life is almost back to normal for us, but we've created a very different 'normal' - this is something lockdown made us realise we needed to do though. Things have certainly not gone back to how they were pre-covid, though I also don't want them to AND we could if we wanted it to (can go to the places we did etc). It is going to be a very very long time before things are how they were pre-covid with regards to no social distancing etc. I also think our (as in my families) expectations of what 'normal' would look like have been realistic and we never expected a return to precovid style lives. I think if people expected that then they were always going to be frustrated.

How do you know maxdash? My two are both still employed too but I can't see any options for them if that changes. Even McDonalds, the go to for young people when all else fails, is getting 100s of applications for every job.

I think the things for children will start to come back if when schools return in September, cases don't rise. I'm happy with the slow return to 'normal' life. I don't want to see what happened in March and April happening again. Anyone could become a vulnerable person at anytime.

We do though have a severely autistic teen so we haven't done spontaneous for 15 years. My main concern is people not able to get services they require, not that soft play is not open yet.

253 people under 60 with no underlying conditions have died from Covid - which is low... That may be less than the number of drownings, but only a fraction of the population have had a Covid infection.

And the lives lost of those with underlying conditions need to be counted separately because they are "lesser" yeah? Because a bit of wheeze in damp weather or when the pollen is high definitely means you're about ready for the grave.

Ponting out that very few people died from covid without underlying conditions is to help to put that risk into perspective. It doesn't devalue the lives of those who died with underlying conditions.

I don't agree, really. 'The vulnerable' are an enormous group. Where are you planning to put them? How will you make sure they stay there? Who will be their key workers?

Bonkers.

It does devalue those lives imo, as the implication is it isn't so bad.

Someone posted on another thread (or upthread?) that 1 in 10 school children live with someone vulnerable.

I’m not necessarily arguing for soft play to be open, though personally I’d be happy if it was. Clearly if all that was missing in my life was soft play I’d be quite content. My point in the post where I mentioned it, among many other closed or restricted activities, was more that I’m tired of the almost gaslighting going on saying that life is 90% normal, the new normal or anything similar and I should just be happy and content with that. For many of us no we don’t have anywhere close to 90% of freedoms back yet - that might be necessary (I’m not entirely convinced) but I don’t have to be happy about the current situation or accept it is normal or a desirable way to live.

@Triangularbubble

I hear what you're saying.

My thinking is - it isn't the restrictions limiting me per se, but the fact I still don't fancy doing things even though they are now possible.

So for me it is the virus not the 'rules'.

But no, things are not normal, whether through rules or reticence!

You can be the healthiest of people but your body can react badly to the virus and off you go.

I have spoken to several over-70s who feel that the stats relating to increased risk of complications and death in the over-70s does not apply to them because they are so healthy. Would that this were so.

cassgate - I think a reduction in opportunities for spontaneity is a small price to pay to protect ourselves and those around us.

I do wonder what people’s lives were like before lock-down when they say things are back to normal or lock-down didn’t change much. For us, so much has changed, especially for my 4yo. I’d love to take my children swimming, to have gone on our holiday, to have a potter round the garden centre without having to mask up, to have parties and play dates at home, for my youngest to be at her nursery, to see family properly... the list goes on. Things got much better once the playgrounds opened but we are no where near normality.

How does it devalue them? It is to help people calculate their own risk. Knowing you have no underlying conditions and so are unlikely to die of covid helps you to shape your own psychological response to the pandemic. It doesn't mean you are happy for vulnerable groups to die.
I hate the way this type of guilting is used to stop us discussing facts.

It isn't guilting, it is a different opinion.

We really aren't in lockdown any more. When people complain about the things they still aren't able to do, I wonder if they consider the fact that most of those are things that many people in the world either don't feel the need to do, aren't able to do or can't afford to do normally anyway. Not being able to go swimming or go to soft play really doesn't count as a great hardship imo.

I have every sympathy for people suffering from poor mental health (due to lockdown or generally), and I also believe it's important for everyone to look after their mental health in order to avoid it getting bad. But I think there are probably also perfectly mentally healthy people wanting restrictions ended just because they want to do stuff they like, but claiming it's because they are worried about the nation's mental health.

A few things annoy me about your post. Firstly, pretty sure nearly 50000 people a year in the UK dont die of drowning so that's a pretty mad correlation. Secondly it's not just people who die from it who suffer, there will be thousands upon thousands of people who get covid, dont die, but then have severe ongoing problems for years. Lastly, do you presume there arent many people on here older than 60 or with health conditions? There are incredibly large numbers of people with conditions or over 60 who are incredibly worried about catching this virus. Oh and incase you havent heard, we arent really in lockdown anymore.

@lazylinguist personally I won't be happy until my DS is back at school full time. Whatever else I'm allowed to do is great but I want him getting his education.

I can understand that, Waxon, but (depending on where you live obvs), presumably you're in the summer holidays now as you normally would be, and your ds will be back full time in September? So coronavirus is no longer stopping him from doing that.

@lazylinguist yes it is the summer holidays now, I'm just concerned that people will kick up a fuss come September and say they shouldn't go back.

Knowing you have no underlying conditions and so are unlikely to die of covid helps you to shape your own psychological response to the pandemic. It doesn't mean you are happy for vulnerable groups to die.

So are you basing your individual response based on your psychological response which is in turn based on your personal level of risk? Because if everyone does that, people will die-not saying you're happy about it but that's the outcome if the healthy majority say "I'm alright Jack". Also, a greater number of the "I'm alright Jack" will probably find themselves touched by disability and tragedy than expected. Because everyone thinks it's not going to be them on the basis that it's unlikely to be them. But it's certain to be someone. Children, young mothers, nurses-some won't be alright.