People STILL not wearing masks on London buses

[custard6543]

I had to take a journey by bus earlier. There were about 10 people on the bus, three of whom were not wearing masks. Drivers need to stop letting people on without masks - these selfish passengers are putting everyone else’s lives at risk!

Care in the community for the disabled has gone back fifty years because of this virus. Hard to believe how fast it has unravelled.

I hope they don't Helena but if your vulnerable loved ones get Covid off someone in an enclosed space who is travelling without a mask maybe you'll get it. *

Oh give over that you travel without a mask you will get covid likely hood is you won't. This sort of crap gets peddled that the unmasked are infected when they aren't and if your mask are working they shouldn't be.

@justasking111

Care in the community for the disabled has gone back fifty years because of this virus. Hard to believe how fast it has unravelled.

Sadly there's been very little 'care' in the community for years. Long before Covid came along.

Further withdrawal of the barely there care is not down to Covid. If the government wanted to, they could ensure vulnerable disabled people had access to the support and help they need and deserve.

@SheepandCow I actually meant the publics attitude to it had gone to the dogs with covid reading this thread and others elsewhere.

@justasking111
It's certainly shocking seeing so many people dismissing the disabled aka The Vulnerable as expendable.

However I don't think it's a recent attitude. It's been gradually getting worse over the past twenty years.The UN condemnation of our treatment of the disabled, i.e. the thousands who've died as a result of benefit sanctions and things like being found 'fit for work' just months before dying all happened pre pandemic.
The Blair government's disability benefit cuts 'reforms' kick started it all by pushing the false narrative of disabled people being 'scroungers'.

I think some of you are doing yourselves a grave disservice by convincing yourselves this is about attitudes to the disabled. You're missing what's really going on here and painting everyone that's not comfortable with people in enclosed spaces not wearing masks as evil oppressors.

Without giving a single thought to how it must feel to be in an enclosed space with someone who isn't wearing something that could save your life. How is anyone saying the disabled are expendable? How is it even possible to extrapolate that out of these comments all of which say if people have a genuine reason fair enough.

If anything it's the other way around. Like this gem Oh give over that you travel without a mask you will get covid likely hood is you won't. This sort of crap gets peddled that the unmasked are infected when they aren't and if your mask are working they shouldn't be.

Which is, in a nutshell saying I don't give a fuck about you or your health and I don't believe you will catch it. Nice.

We hear over and over that masks don't protect you they protect others. A lot of people are scared to death of this. I know older parents who haven't seen their children or grandchildren for months and who won't be having Christmas with their families.

Not a single person has said it's acceptable to harass people not wearing masks or that violence is acceptable or any of the other mad stuff trotted out on these threads. But literally no one wants to risk their lives because some people are selfish. Wear a mask if you can. Don't complain if it's made law and you are asked to justify non mask wearing by the police. If you don't like that don't go places you are expected to wear one. The end.

Why is that just so difficult to grasp and why are you making it about disabled rights and turning it into some kind of crusade. The right to risk other people's lives? Not cool.

The thing about the exemptions from mask-wearing is that it pits people with disabilities against each other. Having a medical exemption from wearing a mask does not make you less infections than people who have no exemption. Other people, who have underlying conditions, and who are thus at a greater risk if they get infected, may then have to stay home if they cannot risk getting on public transport and being infected by someone not wearing a mask (whatever the reason for not wearing a mask).

So either way people with disabilities and long-term health conditions are excluded from public life. So if you are arguing that everyone should wear a mask, you are excluding some people from public life, and if you are arguing that mask exemptions are fine, you are also excluding some people from public life.

I’m in central London and take my 10 year old to school every morning and it is just outrageous how many people are allowed on the bus without a mask .
I just don’t get it ?
Shouldn’t people who are medically exempt be wearing a badge to say this ?
You know like when your on the underground and a woman comes on who doesn’t look pregnant but is wearing a badge that says “Baby On Board”?
Letting us know to give up a seat .
So surely people who are exempt for medical reasons should wear a badge saying this .
I’ll be honest in my opinion it will save a lot of confrontations .

I’m not anti mask (though I know no options are permitted other than ANTI MASK COVID DENIER or FEARFUL AND COWERING) but really that is placing a lot of faith in masks as protection

I could understand originally making an exemption for those who couldn’t wear face masks, now there are plenty of visors available, it should be a simple, no face covering or visor, no service.
You’ll get barred at the gateline to trains, by security at the supermarket etc.

@MarriedtoDaveGrohl
I agree with you 100%. I was referring to the many posts across threads over the past months that have dismissed The Others - aka The Vulnerable (i.e. the elderly and disabled) as expendable. All the 'we need to just get on with it' posts and the like.

People genuinely exempt from masks are a tiny minority, yet there are millions of vulnerable to Covid disabled people. Both groups deserve understanding and empathy but it seems many people only have concerns for the first much smaller group.

This is interesting, I think, talking about the worldwide death toll being actually higher than current records show, and the effects of masks on death rates:

"There are however, ways to slow that mortality toll, but they require rigorous implementation of established public health measures, particularly wearing masks and social distancing," Professor Lopez said.

"If 95 per cent of the world could be convinced to wear masks when they go outside then we could probably save 700,000 or 800,000 of those 2.5 million deaths."

www.abc.net.au/news/2020-10-01/johns-hopkins-coronavirus-covid-death-toll-probably-much-higher/12716740

@FTMF30

The media/government have really done a number OP. Do you teally think your life has been put at risk because three people on your bus weren't wearing masks?

This. The whole mask policing thing is ridiculous. I do wear a mask as I am not exempt and I am a rule follower but I remain cynical about the good they do. I certainly don’t feel my life is endangered by coming across people not wearing them, I couldn’t care less.

@MaxinesTaxi

I’m not anti mask (though I know no options are permitted other than ANTI MASK COVID DENIER or FEARFUL AND COWERING) but really that is placing a lot of faith in masks as protection

Masks by themselves aren't magic or impenetrable. Masks are one part of a whole series of small actions that together lessen the risk. A mask isn't magical but it does help - and in the current circumstances, we need all the help we can get.

“ wear masks when they go outside ”

Really? Everywhere out of doors?

I am aware ArcheryAnnie, I have read the research

Really? Everywhere out of doors?

Pick pick pick. Use your noggin.

Likewise.

Ooh, burn!

Oookaaay, we’ve reached a weird stage of discussion. Not sure how much useful conversation there is to be had, but I think it’s reasonable to expect people giving advice about risk reduction to be specific and clear about what people should be doing. Implying that stepping out of the house should require a facemask if people want to reduce their risk of transmission of a virus is not helpful when many people are trying to do their best and are worried.

I just think it’s a load of crap if most of us are wearing a mask on the bus and train and shops and there is no way of checking on people on the spot if they are not wearing one .
Why should I be sweating on a 45 minute underground journey wearing a mask when others aren’t ??
It doesn’t make sense .
It’s outrageous

Implying that stepping out of the house should require a facemask if people want to reduce their risk of transmission of a virus is not helpful when many people are trying to do their best and are worried.

He didn't imply anything. He said, as quoted, "There are however, ways to slow that mortality toll, but they require rigorous implementation of established public health measures, particularly wearing masks and social distancing."

I am struggling to see what your problem is with this. If people are trying to do their best and are worried, surely they are also trying to follow the latest guidelines for safer behaviour for themselves and for those around them and for others they may encounter.

I have no problem with that part of the quote, and you can see that I didn’t. It’s quite obviously this part

“ If 95 per cent of the world could be convinced to wear masks when they go outside then we could probably save 700,000 or 800,000 of those 2.5 million deaths."

Which really is not a useful thing to say. I know you think I’m pick pick picking but if he didn’t mean it literally then he should have said what he did mean literally. We are being bombarded with different instructions about how to behave to protect others and ourselves and if you’re going to pick out quotes then it’s helpful to use ones that are clear and meaningful.

I am sorry, I fail to see how it is not a useful thing for him to say. What part of that comment are you finding so difficult to interpret?

Should he have said, wear a mask when you go outside, unless you are going into a field directly outside your front door, are on the Antartic base, or are planning to row the Atlantic solo?

Was on underground earlier this week very few people in zone 1 carriage (3-6 people) all women wore masks. Half the men didn't. At the London train stations most people wearing masks. Noticeable people not wearing a face masks were all male and about 50% of those were young black guys not wearing masks (not massively scientific study though but surprised given increased BAME risks from C19).

Having said that, in the allegedly covid secure hotel where I was staying at most of the elderly (all white) guests seem to be rather lax in mask wearing in the public areas. I got stared at quite a lot wearing mine in the hotel by guests. Interestingly the 3 coach tours staying at the hotel were from South Wales, Yorkshire and the north-west.