Soft play etc opening!

[Piixxiiee]

15th August softplay, ice rinks, more beauty salons,indoor events etc..... not sure what to think of that move.

@FaithinWashing perfectly said 👌

I think it’s an awful decision, especially 3 weeks before schools are due to reopen.

The government should financially support those few businesses which cannot/shouldn’t reopen! I wonder if Bojos new son is at the age where his mum wants to take him to softplay 🙄!!

I for one won’t be taking my kids to any sort of indoor softplay.. can’t imagine any of my friends will either !

The point is, the risks of slipping in the shower, of catching meningitis, of falling and banging your head, those risks are FIXED. With Covid, our actions AFFECT the amount of risk. If we continue our lives ignoring the risks of Covid, the risks continue to increase until we cannot ignore them any longer.

“ There are less than 1000 people in hospital with this illness across the country.”

Yes because of all the sacrifices we have made that helped to get those figures down. Opening things unnecessarily will very likely undo all that good work. Infections are rising especially this week. It would have made sense to wait and see what effect the rise has on hospitals in a few weeks to be safe. Especially if we want schools open. And again, Chris Whitty said we were at the limit of what we could open and that was before cases rose. Following the science my bottom.

@NameChangeBingo Excellent point.

@FaithinWashing

At the end of the day we have to get back to normal.

There are less than 1000 people in hospital with this illness across the country. Less than 100 on ventilators across the country.
This is never going away. NEVER so it is time to pull up our big girl pants realise that every single day we risk dying and have done every single day since we were born.

Hundreds of people die everyday in this country, for all sorts of reasons, some of them young and apparently healthy, some of them from accidents some of them from conditions they knew nothing about. Children die, its horrible to think about but children die everyday and not from Covid from congenital disease, from complications of any number of viruses that are mild for most of us, from accidents, from neglect. They could even fall awkwardly and have a catastrophic injury at soft play.

People die you can't stop that. Even if Covid cases went down to zero in this country it would come back. It is part of our lives now, anyone who thinks different is fooling themselves. Do you really want to lock everyone away for a vaccine that might never come? That might only work for a few months? Do you really think that you are going to wake up one morning and the newsreader is going to say 'it's all over' because I am telling you it will be with us forever and the sooner people regain their ability to accurately risk assess the quicker life will be back to normal.

I get that people are frightened, I get that people are vulnerable but life goes on. I know that some people will think I am heartless and selfish and maybe I am, but if you are vulnerable to Covid then without doubt you are just as vulnerable to any of the viruses you have lived with your whole life.

I am 37, perfectly healthy, healthy weight and fit. If I get meningitis there is a good chance I'll die. If I get sepsis there is a good chance I'll die. If I slip in the shower there is a good chance I'll die.

When I was 17 my best friends mum fell on the steps outside her flat banged her head and died - literally from stepping out of her front door.

If you are going to live in fear of dying there is no point living at all, death is the only certainty in life and I for one would rather live 40 fulfilling years than 80 scared and alone.

So yes open back up, life is too short to hide forever. Kids need to play people need to live. Yes you might catch Covid and die but you might also trip on your doorstep like my friends mum.

This. We need to live again and enjoy our lives.

@FaithinWashing I have to say I'm inclined to agree.

I wrote something similar but deleted it.

I'm not sure how long people expect to put life on hold.

Look at the destruction the lockdown caused to people lives, jobs, mental health, and we are nowhere near the worst of the aftershock of the lockdown.

I understand that we had to lockdown to get the virus somewhat under control. It's here now. Even a vaccine won't eradicate it.

It's here to stay. It is frightening, I'm not rushing off to many of these places but with every single thing that's opened people have been up in arms.

Even if we eradicated the virus here, it's all over the world.

The point is, the risks of slipping in the shower, of catching meningitis, of falling and banging your head, those risks are FIXED. With Covid, our actions AFFECT the amount of risk. If we continue our lives ignoring the risks of Covid, the risks continue to increase until we cannot ignore them any longer.

This simply isn't true and doesn't make sense.

If we all stopped driving there'd be zero risk of crashing or getting run over. But we don't want to stop driving so we mitigate risks by using seatbelts, having the Highway Code, speed limits.

If you didn't take a shower there'd be no risk of slipping.

The government are trying to mitigate risks while still allowing people to live their lives.

@NameChangeBingo

The point is, the risks of slipping in the shower, of catching meningitis, of falling and banging your head, those risks are FIXED. With Covid, our actions AFFECT the amount of risk. If we continue our lives ignoring the risks of Covid, the risks continue to increase until we cannot ignore them any longer.

We aren't ignoring the risks of covid though are we, nothing is the same as it was 6 months ago and some things unlikely to the same ever again. Everything has increased safety measures now, granted some things more than others, but all these things are done to help reduce the risk whist continuing to go about a normal life. There's nothing we can do to eradicate risk other than stay inside our homes and dettol the food shop forever. Some are happy to do that good for them, some are happy to continue to live being aware of the risks good for them too.

Exactly, every business that has reopened has had to put in extra measures.

Our local pool has reopened, but it's absolutely nothing like it was before. No showers/changing rooms. One way in and out. Reduced numbers. No family swim.

Nothing is the same. Places are trying to mitigate risk left right and centre.

At the end of the day we have to get back to normal.

Good luck with that! If we go back to normal - by which you mean people socialising as we did pre-covid (not sure what mind-altering drugs you'll have to give half the population to achieve that, but we'll assume people will play along) - how long do you estimate it'll take for virus levels to be higher than in March/April? And then what's the genius plan?

What the fuck do people think will be different this time round?

Normal is gone, finished, over, past, no more - until we get a vaccine or reliable treatment.

We need to deal with the realities of the virus, and the economy, as one problem. Not a choice between two problems. We can't fix one without the other.

I can live my life and have kids of enjoyment without taking my kids to a softplay!

From a virus perspective this is bonkers. Economically I guess it's their best shot for some income this holiday/year. So that'll be why they are opening.

Theatres are now allowed to open in a 'socially distanced' way which means much reduced audiences and a lot of measures in other areas, including workplaces, which include backstage and onstage. They've done loads of pilots to check how it works (and get feedback from attendees) so it is pretty likely to be safe. However, it's unlikely to make economic sense in most cases because of the reduced audience numbers. Gets the government off the hook, though - no need to extend the furlough scheme if you can open your building...

I can live my life and have kids of enjoyment without taking my kids to a softplay!

But what about people whose livelihoods depend on them?

Personally I'd rather go to bowling or soft play than the pub.

A vaccine isn't going to eradicate the virus. We have a flu vaccine but people still die from flu every year.

My grandmother died of a virus before Covid. She caught a nasty virus, developed pneumonia her body couldn't cope and she died.

On her ward at the time there were several others in the same boat. No one was bothered or worried where she picked it up from.

The government are trying to mitigate risks while still allowing people to live their lives.
This. If you decide softplay is too risky -stay at home. We have to live with the virus and accept that lots of people will catch it, most of whom will have no symptoms. few have symptoms that keep them in bed for a few days, and a tiny minority who are already terminally ill will die a few months earlier. Mitigate your own risk as much s you want to, but don't second guess other people's risk. Where I live there are loads of old and frail people doing 'daily exercise' at a time when they were supposed to be indoors- if they only have a short time left anyway they were not going to spend it hiding under a duvet.

"Everything has increased safety measures." Except schools. Especially secondary. It's still the same as March in schools - wash your hands and don't mix with other year groups. Opening too much and then schools really isn't a great idea. It should be clear to see that.

@OverTheRainbow88

I can live my life and have kids of enjoyment without taking my kids to a softplay!

Tbh I think soft play is the opposite of enjoyment! I went because it was something to do but categorically not for pleasure.

@lifeafter50

The government are trying to mitigate risks while still allowing people to live their lives. This. If you decide softplay is too risky -stay at home. We have to live with the virus and accept that lots of people will catch it, most of whom will have no symptoms. few have symptoms that keep them in bed for a few days, and a tiny minority who are already terminally ill will die a few months earlier. Mitigate your own risk as much s you want to, but don't second guess other people's risk. Where I live there are loads of old and frail people doing 'daily exercise' at a time when they were supposed to be indoors- if they only have a short time left anyway they were not going to spend it hiding under a duvet.

And I am fine with this if my kids don't have to sit so close they are touching your kids!

I can't say I think ice rinks are inherently any more risky than anywhere else. Yes, the temperature possibly adds to the risk, but that's offset by the fact that everybody is wearing gloves and not getting too close to each other anyway. It's easy enough to limit numbers. You could say the same thing about outdoor attractions/events once the winter months come, surely?

Plus, ice rinks being closed was preventing ice skaters and ice hockey players from training at all- it's not many people who have their own skating rink in their back garden. Mark Hanretty was campaigning recently on it- pointed out that the longer it went on the worse Britain's chances were in future Olympics. Now, you might not think that all that important in the grand scheme of things, but people have trained their whole lives for this, and the government had recognised already that other sports were important.

Soft play- meh. I get that the businesses will go under if it goes on for much longer, and that's sad, but the same can be said for night clubs, which haven't been allowed to open. I know the soft play industry reckons they can make it safe and I suppose toddlers don't tend to snog each other - mostly- but I'm a little dubious. Other countries had already opened them, so it does bring us inline with them. But we won't be going.

@latticechaos

At the end of the day we have to get back to normal.

Good luck with that! If we go back to normal - by which you mean people socialising as we did pre-covid (not sure what mind-altering drugs you'll have to give half the population to achieve that, but we'll assume people will play along) - how long do you estimate it'll take for virus levels to be higher than in March/April? And then what's the genius plan?

What the fuck do people think will be different this time round?

Normal is gone, finished, over, past, no more - until we get a vaccine or reliable treatment.

We need to deal with the realities of the virus, and the economy, as one problem. Not a choice between two problems. We can't fix one without the other.

But the point is everywhere has restrictions now so its not possible to socialise like we did pre covid. Its a new normal, some people new normal is to continue doing the things they did before under the new restrictions and safety measures and some people new normal is to never do those things again.

Covid is here to stay we need to learn to adapt our lives. We may get a vaccine or better treatment in the future but they are going to make it magically disappear overnight.
Whenever we go out to the cinema or soft play or theatre, or go for a manicure or hair done, we do those things because we enjoy them they make us feel good it boosts our mood helps our mental well-being. We need to live not exist and adhere to the necessary precautions to do that as safe as possible.

And I am fine with this if my kids don't have to sit so close they are touching your kids!*
*
But you can't control what any of those children or teachers have been doing.

Soft play isn't the thing that's going to blow the lid off the thing.

The teachers boyfriend could have caught it from his job in the sandwich factory. Your kid could have caught it from visiting their aunty Doris who's been to the pub.

• they aren't going to make it magically disappear