I can’t believe this is how people think

[Tigerlily31]

My MIL told me she’d rather die of “anything else over Covid”

My own mother is convinced she’ll end up in ICU on a ventilator if she gets it, despite having no health concerns.

I fully blame the media. It’s becoming frightening how big it is in people’s minds.

Tigerlily31 - My MIL told me she’d rather die of “anything else over Covid”...It’s becoming frightening how big it is in people’s minds.

It's not a particularly nice way to die but then a lot of deaths are far from gentle. I think the thought of dying alone and not having loved ones close to support you is probably the most troubling aspect which sets it apart from other deaths. It is still relatively early days in our knowledge and treatment of it - we will all learn to live with it.

Great, yet another thread about how ignorant and hysterical everyone is. We hear you and we don't care. You're entitled to your opinion.

A quote from MN...

people are so scared of dying that we've forgotten how to live

Genius

Its the mental health issues many of the teens&next gen workers are left with as covid legacy that is the most frightening thing-broken spirits and crushed hearts. Id almost believe in a conspiracy of"if we cant break their health, break their minds".
I allow myself a 5min weekly covid catch up..anything else is just unnecessary.

@Uhoh2020 I follow a Chief Medical Officer on LinkedIn of a hospital here in Melbourne and he shares peer reviewed studies.

This has come up and is a concern.

No Chinese whispers.

The RTA thing - I think I saw that on C4 News a few weeks ago, possibly said by Prof Carl Heneghan from Oxford's Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine. He published something about how no-one can 'recover' from Covid-19 (because PHE attributes any subsequent deaths to it). It does seem like it needs to be corrected; people need to have trust in the data.

Any concern I have is mostly due to lack of trust in our government to do the right thing.

They could have locked down sooner and infection rates would be lower now. They could have eased more slowly and infection rates would be lower now. They could have a reliable track and trace system instead of a rubbish failing one. They could have clearer comms and messaging (I say this as someone who works in comms and thinks their messaging is Appalling for a government who gets their election campaigns so spot on).

Instead we have incompetence confusion and u turns and a lack of trust.

So as someone with health issues I choose to live as full a life as possible away from consumerism and hospitality. We get out on country walks every day. See people at a distance. We work from home. The kids are doing really well. I buy from local firms online. We get takeaways from local restaurants.

What an evil bad bad coronaphobe I am.

I’d love to get back to the high street etc but right now we’re doing ok and as I said I just don’t trust the government.

It’s not about me being controlled by them like many think. Quite the opposite!

Does covid appear on the death certificates that ONS processes, even if someone had covid & recovered months ago? I want the ONS tally to be right.

30 day or 60 day survival rates after covid diagnosis would be useful. Only a very tiny percentage are on ventilators / hospitalised for longer.

But the OP is talking about someone saying they would rather die of anything than coronavirus - as though it’s the worst way to die. That’s different to “Taking the virus seriously” etc. It suggests that someone might take greater risks with their health and well-being in order to avoid coronavirus, which isn’t a sensible or helpful route

"It’s been made into “the worst thing to exist” when in reality it is one of many, and even then not as bad as some."

I've seen comments like this a lot as well as risk is part of life, you could die of flu etc. But there is a reason governments around the world, with the advice of experts in their field have shut down large parts of society because of it.

I don't know how old your mil or mother is but as a 40 year old, I looked up the average mortality risk of my age from all causes. E.g rabies, flu, stroke, cancer, murder, accidents, heart attacks, lightning strike etc.

With no underlying health conditions, the mortality from covid is 3x this risk. If you are obese it is 6 times. If you have heart disease ( frequently undiagnosed it could be up to 12 times and if you are diabetic ( also often not realised until very serious) another 12 times again.

So as a 40 to 49 years old conservatively the risk of death from covid ( if caught in the next 12 months) increases risk by so where between a factor of 3 and 33. It is probably somewhere
at the lower end.

Now the risk of death in you 40s in one year is not huge to start with so as a probability this is still pretty low but remember most people are risk averse, particularly about death or serious illness. It is widely quoted the covid risk increases significantly with age. I think it is X 10 with every 10 years? Then there are possible long term side effects which may not be common but sound serious and there doesn't seem to be enough information to dismiss them as rare.

I am still going out within the guidelines wearing masks etc but look at the government's track record.

Dithered about lockdown doubling deaths.
Had ignored pandemic planning so ran out of ppe causing deaths in us.
Discharged patients into care homes without testing them causing lots of unnecessary deaths.
Set up private companies with a price tag of 10bn for test and trace which still isn't effective enough.
Built their own app then scrapped it.
Have banned 2 families meeting indoors because it is driving infections but at the same time said schools are safe with no ppe or SD.

Have boasted about our stunning success in driving down deaths when we have the highest excess deaths in Europe, then just say they regret every death

I can understand being blase about covid as under 30s it is a far lower risk than other causes ( unless you have pre existing conditions). I think it may be right to be more cautious going into winter and wait for yet more treatments and vaccines if your older. Restrictions in the north west have been driven by younger people "getting on with life because other things can kill you."

@TheMurk
ReefTeeth but this is just what the media is telling you.

The fuck it is.

I take it nobody you know is still suffering the after effects of having it in March?

And presumably nobody you knew has died of it?

If we all lived by what we actually see and experience going on around us rather than what the media tells us is the truth the world would be a better place.

You too, @Uhoh2020

Congratulations on your blissful little bubble.

The media are not the enemy here.

Is it not possible to say “I take notice of coronavirus as a risk amongst many other risks” without people interpreting that as “I don’t think coronavirus is a risk at all”?

Unless you are very elderly, ie over the age of 85, you are extremely unlikely to die of covid, even if you are considered "at risk". So for people in that age group I do have complete sympathy as they must be scared of catching it. But for everyone else in the world... it's not that big of a risk. At all. There are so many more things out there that are more likely to kill you, and we don't sit around panicking about those on a daily basis. Under 20s are more likely to die from being struck by lightening than from covid, for example. I have honestly never heard of anyone worrying on a daily basis about being struck by lightening.

I think the media has a lot to answer for here and people need to get things into perspective.

@Iloveyoutothefridgeandback

Unless you are very elderly, ie over the age of 85, you are extremely unlikely to die of covid, even if you are considered "at risk". So for people in that age group I do have complete sympathy as they must be scared of catching it. But for everyone else in the world... it's not that big of a risk. At all. There are so many more things out there that are more likely to kill you, and we don't sit around panicking about those on a daily basis. Under 20s are more likely to die from being struck by lightening than from covid, for example. I have honestly never heard of anyone worrying on a daily basis about being struck by lightening.

I think the media has a lot to answer for here and people need to get things into perspective.

As I said, it's not just a case of not dying of Covid so everything is ok.

It's the long term effects on the body they are starting to learn about.

We are 6 months in, how can you actually say under 20s more likely to die by being struck by lightning. That's with very limited data. It's pretty misleading.

The fact is that both sets of experiences - 'I know several young fit healthy people who are now long-term ill with it' and 'my mother in a care home was asymptomatic' (just putting the two positions as briefly as possible) are ancedata. I do think Covid can have some very nasty complications - as can other viruses, including the much-derided flu (but these a) are not media-worthy so not reported b) possibly occur at a lower rate, in part simply because Covid is a novel disease c) may not be diagnosed as such, while Covid is an obvious cause of suspicion for complications atm) - and that it is more than worth being cautious. I'm certainly risk-assessing my activities more carefully and not doing some things I might have done before this started. At the same time, particularly in the UK (mainly due to the drastic U-turn in public messaging that needed to happen once it became apparent this was serious and not to be dismissed, as Boris and co had done originally), fear has been stoked to a degree where, when it interacts with people disposed to be anxious and/or impressionable to drastic messaging, is having unpleasant MH consequences. I've read 'I've been told I'd likely not survive Covid' quite a lot on here, and I don't think these posters are lying or exaggerating - I can believe that people's doctors (who to a degree are also still in the dark about all this) have used words to this effect - but at the same time the figures simply don't bear out that this can be true in all these cases.

As in many things, a middle way is what's needed. We can't have life as it was before this started, not atm. We do (and let's not forget that some people always have responded to this imperative) need to keep society functioning.

@DeepTreacle

Is it not possible to say “I take notice of coronavirus as a risk amongst many other risks” without people interpreting that as “I don’t think coronavirus is a risk at all”?

So much this. The discussion has been extremely polarised right from the beginning. It's as if there are only two camps you can possibly fall into - completely terrified or completely insouciant.

walksen, I agree entirely with you about the government's handling of this, but I just wanted to ask do you have sources for those excess death risk figures?

And I really can't agree with this: 'but remember most people are risk averse, particularly about death or serious illness', when I look around at how many people are significantly obese, how inexplicably common/popular smoking still is, how a walk of a mile is considered a long distance and how normalised drinking to get drunk is. I think it would be more accurate to say 'people are risk averse where the threat to their health/life appears immiment'.

Are you all fucking stupid.

Let's ask the 46000+ people who died of it if they think its just over hyped nonsense. Oh wait..

Fuck sake!

@BananaChocolateLump

Are you all fucking stupid.

Let's ask the 46000+ people who died of it if they think its just over hyped nonsense. Oh wait..

Fuck sake!

And this shrill, aggressive tone is also part of the polarised discussion - in both 'camps', though tbh I've seen more of it from the 'anxious' side. The 'insouciant' side tends to be more sneering. Neither are helpful.

@Tigerlily31

My MIL told me she’d rather die of “anything else over Covid”

My own mother is convinced she’ll end up in ICU on a ventilator if she gets it, despite having no health concerns.

I fully blame the media. It’s becoming frightening how big it is in people’s minds.

Hello Sarah Vine, welcome to Mumsnet

Covid is currently by far the biggest threat to my life and to my enjoyment of life. I eat healthily, drive carefully and had long lived parents so genetics are good and most of my risk comes from other people. My husband's risk is higher.

I dont need to rely on the media for information, I know people working in healthcare and I can read and understand statistics and research both from our country and elsewhere. Health workers are not complacent about the risk. The media are carefully avoiding talking about the long term effects of this illness but I know better. I'm more concerned about the impact that could have on my life than I am about dying.

I understand that for young people the bigger risk is actually having no job. I'm willing to spend to support the economy - BUT only if I see young people taking this seriously too. If they are not wearing masks, not keeping their distance, not getting tested and isolating when they should then I regret to say they bring the job losses on themselves.

The governments track record on this is appalling. Control the virus and you have a return to something like normality but their mixed messaging just means that the young and foolish prolong this epidemic.

Fortunately treatments are improving all the time, testing is improving, eventually we will get through this regardless of government incompetence. We would be through it a lot faster and with less economic damage if people took it seriously enough.

Apparently 1 in 5 people believe the conspiracy theories that abound and believe the virus is a hoax hence 20 per cent minimum are NOT taking any precautions.

The thing about all deaths of people who have ever had Covid being recorded as Covid deaths is true, or at least Matt Hancock thinks it is www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/matt-hancock-review-coronavirus-deaths-miscounted-a4501466.html

I know 3 people personally who've had the test and been confirmed for COVID. All have worked in a close personal care setting. All are under 45, no additional health conditions. All have recovered but stated they felt very unwell whilst having it. Its a very small sample (very small!). But I can only state what I actually know. My parent whose isolated from the start also developed shingles via stress as the virus will have laid low for years but they've massively struggled with isolating. Would they have been better to take their chances? Who knows? It's a hard call and currently no one seems to have all the answers.