Is it time we learned to live with Covid? BBC article today

[PennyDreadfuI]

From the BBC

I'm beginning to think that it might be (and I'm higher risk). It's here to stay, after all, and lockdowns every few months cannot go on indefinitely. All the money spent on lockdown measures could perhaps be ploughed into the NHS to pay for staff/hospitals to provide care for those who need it when they become ill (and to ease the backlog the last lockdown created).

@JayDot500

If most people were willing to learn to live with it responsibly, maybe I'd agree with you. Letting this virus run through the country unchecked is not reasonable, no matter how one dresses it up. 'We didn't even try to protect them' would be the cries from angry loved ones. Vulnerable is not just old, even they would be at risk if staffing issues at hospitals meant they couldn't get the treatment for covid AND their other health issues.

I'm prepared to live life 'with it' when there's no likely vaccine for covid next year. We will know that late this year, or early next year. This is not 'forever', I wish people would stop thinking this. We need to at least try, don't we?

I think those holding out for a fix everything vaccine are in for a nasty reality check unfortunately. I sure as hell don’t want a rushed vaccine (assuming there even is one).

We haven’t even mastered a flu vaccine that is completely effective and doesn’t cause side effects yet!

I'd always suspected that "living with the virus" was a dog whistle for eugenicists

Lockdowns kill the poor and vulnerable, too.

Far more so than the rich and fit.

Not yet :) If there is no medical advance by Spring then we may all just have to live with wearing masks all the time, as they do already in other countries.

I think those holding out for a fix everything vaccine are in for a nasty reality check unfortunately.

To be fair, there are a number of medical advances short of that that would be welcome.

But we have mastered flu vaccines that save many lives every year. The side effects are mathematically not significant, but no medicine is 100% safe.
The reason you need to have it each year is because we don't retain perfect immunity from the previous year and because the flu virus strains mutate. Last year I was given one particular vaccine but older people where given a different one as they were less susceptible to some of the anticipated strains that year. The current flu vaccine is not a magic bullet either, but it is safe enough and reduces the risk of getting flu - it doesn't eradicate it completely.

@Requinblanc

I agree...

The reality is that the alternative simply does not work. Lockdowns do nothing to eradicate the virus but they destroy our economy, mental health and let people die of other conditions because they can't get treatment/operations...

I really don't understand why governments are not making that clear.

All we can do is masks/hygiene/ home working and get the testing and track and trace system right.

Everything else is just trying to believe in a fairy tale where lockdowns save everyone's lives and the virus disappears at the end or a vaccine magically appears in six months.

A vaccine might take years or might never happen.

I am really not quite sure why some people seem to have forgotten that we live in a world where life and death are part of the human conditions. There is no scenario where no one dies...

Please can you explain how having no lockdowns and therefore many more people in hospital with Covid will mean that people with other conditions will more easily be able to access treatment.

@notevenat20

I think those holding out for a fix everything vaccine are in for a nasty reality check unfortunately.

To be fair, there are a number of medical advances short of that that would be welcome.

Already there have been advances in how the most seriously ill are treated. You're less likely to need a ventilator if you're hospitalised now, and if you do need one you're less likely to die.

Lockdowns are this generation's equivalent of the policy of Appeasement.

Like Appeasement, it isn't working, it isn't going to work, this isn't going away, so we need to change tack and face the threat head on - that isn't achieved by hiding away until the economy collapses and food and supplies run out.

Yes. I agree. But I think it will take time to balance it out, and that's the difficult part. Some have already decided to 'live with it' without giving the time to find the best balance to do so, which is why we are in the position we're in. My DS was shielded in the first lockdown; thankfully his condition has now been deemed as not at heightened risk, but even then I felt this way (although I followed the guidelines). We're training ourselves and our children to be frightened of natural life, and that's going to be really, really hard to overcome. He even said to me on the way to school this morning that he really hopes they don't shut school again. He needs to learn - his words. He's 6.

Please can you explain how having no lockdowns and therefore many more people in hospital with Covid will mean that people with other conditions will more easily be able to access treatment

If less money was spent on lockdown measures (furlough schemes, hits to the economy) and more on NHS Covid care provision, there would be more capacity for those who need it. And other sections of the NHS would be able to open up and run as normal.

Perhaps it would be better to think long-term (investment in care) rather than short sharp shocks (expensive lockdowns which are just a pause button anyway).

I don't think it's possible to just live with it right now as the hospitals are already filling to capacity in some areas and it is going to be disastrous if that continues to happen.

I spoke to a nurse friend yesterday and she was telling me the inner city hospitals in our area are now at capacity and spilling out to the hospitals on the outer edges.

Surely, if this continues, the nhs will be unable to cope.

This is what learning to live with it looks like (emphasis on learning).

You just don’t like it.

There is no easy way out of this, even with your proposal there are massive problems which will require just as much resources and have similar, if not the same impacts.

Just so you are prepared for British people to be banned from travelling to countries that are choosing not to take the herd mentality approach and get their numbers under control. It’ll be like a health version of Brexit.

“Let’s learn to live with it” sounds like admitting Britain has failed, honestly.

Lol at everyone on here wfh pontificating about how living without restrictions will benefit 'the poor and vulnerable'. Many of 'the poor' have been out the house working every day throughout this and will be more at risk of getting it if you all get your way to go back into shops without masks because they give you sadface.

@PennyDreadfuI

Please can you explain how having no lockdowns and therefore many more people in hospital with Covid will mean that people with other conditions will more easily be able to access treatment

If less money was spent on lockdown measures (furlough schemes, hits to the economy) and more on NHS Covid care provision, there would be more capacity for those who need it. And other sections of the NHS would be able to open up and run as normal.

Perhaps it would be better to think long-term (investment in care) rather than short sharp shocks (expensive lockdowns which are just a pause button anyway).

It might take a while to train all the additional staff that would be required though. So yes a fairly long term plan I guess.

@Porcupineinwaiting

So basically the vulnerable would be screwed *@Desperado24*. Barred from education, health care and work and left to take their chances. Not so much "living with the "virus" but to hurry up and die of it.

I'd always suspected that "living with the virus" was a dog whistle for eugenicists but really hoped that it was about finding a better way forward.

What would you prefer to happen? Everyone to have their lives ruined to protect the vulnerable for something that they will probably catch anyway as even a vaccine is not going to eradicate it? That’s a bit selfish isn’t it? We need to go back to normal and let everyone get on with their lives, especially children who have had their lives completely disrupted for something that doesn’t affect the majority of them. Vulnerable can risk assess themselves and decide to take precautions if they wish.

If so many people weren't selfish ignorant twats, and would keep to the measures introduced, then we could surely have avoided much of the lockdown. Partly the government's fault for not making masks etc mandatory MUCH sooner, but partly the thickos who don't think rules apply to them.

@Cornettoninja

This is what learning to live with it looks like (emphasis on learning).

You just don’t like it.

There is no easy way out of this, even with your proposal there are massive problems which will require just as much resources and have similar, if not the same impacts.

Yup. We are learning to live with it right now.

I think there is no point to lockdown any more. The reality is that no one actually knows if the vaccines work, and they are still months away if they do. If flu arrived as a new disease, we would have panicked too. But we can’t afford to hide forever. I say this as someone who is fit and well but also pregnant, and v keen to avoid Covid. I’d rather I take precautions than the whole world lock itself away.

The second wave will bring a whole load more of Long Covid cases and I think people will think differently then.

We aren’t learning to live with it now though. An increasing proportion are choosing to ignore the rules, this will get bigger over winter. People are choosing to go back to normal, cases increasing. A lockdown won’t change that. When do we scrap the rules? When 30% aren’t complying, 50%, 70%? Because there will come a time when that many won’t comply.

We are living with Covid!

People are just demanding what selfishly suits them. Yes people with mental health issues as a result of the lockdown and the wellbeing of children is important but their needs don’t automatically trump the needs of others. Every life has equal value and their for we need a balanced approach.

@MummyPop00 in the Spanish flu outbreak many areas of the world introduced very similar measures to those we have now - masks, lockdowns and temporary laws restricting certain behaviours that's partially how the outbreak was brought under control but the other was time.
It was brutal and restrictive and the unfortunate thing about these outbreaks is one of the main things is they take time. Something our fast paced world is very bad at understanding. We have a 24 hour news cycle and that doesn't breed patience. We have numpties in charge who are more bothered about how they look rather than making sure they serve the people best.
Advice will change with time that's kinda how science works it evolves as will the virus bit that coupled with bad leadership doesn't help people understand what's going on. Bad decisions that prioritise profit over doing the right thing (a key priority in our current society) are what makes this unsustainable not necessarily the reasoning behind it.

Therefore, auto correct!

@RainbowParadise

I was just looking for a thread on this! There's a lot of sense in this article.

Quote from the article from Prof Sunetra Gupta of Oxford University:

''If we keep introducing restrictions and lockdowns while we wait for a vaccine it will be the young that suffer the most, particularly those from more deprived backgrounds. We can't keep doing this - it would be an injustice."

You were looking for a thread on this? You didn't look very far. There's at least 4 a day in the Coronavirus topic!