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Original poster

Should we treat covid like flu now and just get on with life?

562 replies

947EliseChalotte · 30/07/2020 19:48

Is it time to accept covid as another flu and just get on with life and back to normality. The whole point of lockdown was to flatten the curve.

OP posts:
dudsville · 30/07/2020 19:49

With other flu's the vulnerable can have the flu shot.

Racoonworld · 30/07/2020 19:49

Surely we’re going to have to at some point as it’s not going away. We can’t live like this forever!

VirginiaWolverine · 30/07/2020 19:49

No.

Racoonworld · 30/07/2020 19:50

@dudsville not all flu, the flu vaccine only targets the predicted strains each year, sometimes they get it wrong.

cardibach · 30/07/2020 19:50

It’s not a flu, so we can’t treat as ‘another’ one. We will have to coexist with it for a while, but it will require measures flu doesn’t.

duvetaddict · 30/07/2020 19:50

No

PinkiOcelot · 30/07/2020 19:51

I don’t think we’re going back to “normal” for a long time to come. This is our new normal, I think.

LST · 30/07/2020 19:51

@dudslife not all flus are prevented with a vaccine.

megletthesecond · 30/07/2020 19:51

No. We don't yet understand all the long term side effects.

BelleSausage · 30/07/2020 19:51

Not this AGAIN.

There are 400 reasons why you are wrong OP. But I cannot be bothered to list them all the you because you know very well that treating this like flu would cause the collapse of our health system.

Which would be a terrible idea!

WouldBeGood · 30/07/2020 19:52

Yes, I think we have to now. Life is too short to live like this any longer. Protect the truly vulnerable financially and everyone else gets on with it.

MakeItRain · 30/07/2020 19:52

No I don't think so, or hospital admissions will become unmanageable. I'm quite optimistic that by early next year there will be a vaccine and that enough people will take it to get transmission rates right down. I think until then we should socially distance, wear masks and take precautions. (But not shut ourselves away completely).

lunar1 · 30/07/2020 19:53

We don't have a vaccine, proper treatment, immunity or hospital capacity to treat this like flu.

We also have no clue how this virus will behave long term.

So no, we need to continue to treat it like the global pandemic it is.

Fatted · 30/07/2020 19:57

I think we have to learn to live with it in that the people who have been too scared to set foot out of their houses for six months will need to get their arses in gear and get out. Masks, social distancing, some places not opening and queuing in the shops I think can carry on for a while yet. But it is going to get old by Christmas I reckon.

supercalifragilistic123 · 30/07/2020 19:59

But it's not flu, that's the whole point.

I know somebody who is early twenties, fit and healthy, white and female (so no risk factors at all) and ended up in itu with covid. She quite easily could have died.

It could happen to anyone. We have to be careful until we know more.

KitKatastrophe · 30/07/2020 19:59

I would say not yet, as such a small percentage of the population have had it and we still dont understand much about prevention and treatment. But at some point, yes, I think this is what we will have to do.

While covid is not flu, we now know that the mortality rate is not that different. So eventually it will become endemic and we will just have to live with it.... but not quite yet.

Crackerofdoom · 30/07/2020 20:00

I will follow the advice of the WHO.

When they tell us we should treat it like normal flu I will do that. Until then, I trust that the years of scientific, medical and clinical knowledge they have (none of which I have) is giving us the best available advice.

SusieOwl4 · 30/07/2020 20:01

No . Flu kills on average 17000 a year . If covid carried on as it was 1000 deaths per day you could be looking at 365000 deaths . People are up in arms that the government did not do enough now you want to do the opposite?

KitKatastrophe · 30/07/2020 20:01

@supercalifragilistic123

But it's not flu, that's the whole point.

I know somebody who is early twenties, fit and healthy, white and female (so no risk factors at all) and ended up in itu with covid. She quite easily could have died.

It could happen to anyone. We have to be careful until we know more.

To be fair this could also happen with flu.

It doesnt make the news when a young healthy person dies of flu. But it happens.

MarshaBradyo · 30/07/2020 20:02

I’d go with where we are now with ft school

Goodoldfashionedploverboy · 30/07/2020 20:03

"it is going to get old by Christmas"

This is the kind of childish, impatient, petulant guff that has become an epidemic in itself.

It's a fucking pandemic. It gives no shits how bored you are of it! FFS.

stayathomer · 30/07/2020 20:05

The problem is that covid is a Russian roulette thing, you may or may not get it by just being around people, and you might or might not have an extreme reaction that can cause you to die. I was thinking it before, about the similarities to flu, but when you look at the US and the catastrophic consequences of not following the only way we know how to anyway handle this, I definitely change my mind

BananaPop2020 · 30/07/2020 20:11

Yes

Isthisfinallyit · 30/07/2020 20:16

Op, I'm guessing that you're not vulnerable and don't give a fuck if the vulnerable die or not. Can't you see how cold you are?

Lazypuppy · 30/07/2020 20:17

I agree OP