If shielding means you get full pay without having to work in some jobs surely some people will push their doctor to say they need to shield

[Treesofwood]

And their GP is going to feel they have to agree due to the repercussions should that person be unlucky?
It is a huge and unhelpful job to push onto GPs
But also it can be manipulated.
Of course the blanket shielding from March wasn't great either. Not sure what the answer is.

@murfle Interesting thought. I was not thinking of "fat" people as you put it. But you might be right that the leak is a divide and conquer thing. Take the focus off all the other things going wrong

I actually can't stand their leak approach to policy change. It's obviously done by design, presumably from advisors who instruct the government how best to push through change.

And PPs are right that people have always taken the piss and always will. And other people are screwed over. And so it goes on. I guess this is just another way it will happen.

OP I was on the shielded list and continued to do my part time job from home without hitches and still continue to do so. I have teens so they didn’t impact on my work in any way. I have two colleagues who both have one slightly younger child. One in particular completely took the pee during lock down and was never available to SKYPE as she had to settle X with her maths or English and she continues to do so. They are both going into work for half a day a week but starting late using travel time to and from work and are both taking time out during the day to travel home then have a lunch break one drops off and picks up an 11 year old and the other to drop off and pick a 10 year old and a 17 year old!!! So some shielders are working and can be productive.

But surely these people could work from home in many cases? Obviously a security guard, receptionist, canteen worker cannot, but as we have agreed on the shielding threads, having a “bad-outcome Covid condition” does not suddenly render you incapable of doing anything, including working at a computer at home.

I was reading in the Times the other day this miserable pair of shielders who were complaining they weren’t online and couldn’t get food/pay for things etc etc. They were 70!!!! Fgs use the time to update yourself and not behave like a 90-year-old. Mental health/dementia aside, no one under the age of 90 should say they can’t use a computer. I’m not suggesting they trade bitcoin on the dark web, just develop the skills to order from Tesco.

[quote Treesofwood]Roseandrose There are a huge number of conditions of varying severity that people could be asked to shield under. Asthma, type 2 diabetes, obesity. I don't think people will be pretending they've got cancer.

Saskia, the suggestion is that GPs will be involved. Not guidance yet but often these things that are leaked come to pass.

inews.co.uk/news/obesity-coronavirus-shielding-local-lockdown-711311[/quote]
These conditions aren't in the shielding category? T2 diabetes was never in the shielding category nor was obesity. You have got your categories mixed up.

@YardleyX are those colleagues really no leaving the house for any reason and not seeing anybody, outside of their household, at all? I would fear for their mental health, I did it for nearly four months and that was bad enough...

How on earth can people pretend to be that ill they need to shield.
I have type 2 diabetes I'll get nothing btw, and have lost my business.
Many of us fall through the cracks for financial support and are having to sell our houses.
Please get your facts right before you start such a goady thread.

Shielding should absolutely be brought back for those who need it and it should be generous- full pay up to £2500 per month for shielders and their family members who cannot work from home.

I’d be relaxed about including people who were perhaps borderline cases. Shielding will still be far less costly than shutting down the whole economy and keeping everyone at home.

I said I should be shielding and yes, rang my GP demanding a letter. My consultant was going crazy that I hadn't had a letter as my condition was listed and because my GP doesn't know much about it (I'm under haematology) it didn't flag up
I needed the letter for work but I guess that's different as my condition WAS on there, I had just been missed

@QueenOllie my gp said that the original list was a disaster, people with no reason were there and people who really needed weren’t , she had to go through her register in the end... it is not just the condition, it is also your circumstances,

@Franklydear it was ridiculous. I rang reception and explained and she checked my notes and went "not at any risk, you don't need to be shielding, go back to work"
My consultant then had to ring up to go batshit have a chat and it took him ringing three times in the end and me ending up in tears to actually get one. Because I wasn't "on the list" despite registering on the gov website, I wasn't getting any online slots or food boxes so I went 5 weeks I think without being able to get any food delivered

@QueenOllie I managed to get deliveries every week, but to be fair I’ve been doing that for 10 years before, but nothing else, my gp was in my case since mid March as I had a flare up anyway, so she was expecting a letter for me, never came, so she put me on it herself.

The guidance says that those who do not require regular consultant input are very unlikely to be categorised as ECV

And the definitions of 'serious' eg for asthma were thrashed out first time around

Unless an employer was able to make up furlough pay to full pay, shielded people simply did not get that level of support first time. Any scheme now is going to be less generous (as all of them are)

Roseandrose We knew so little first time around I am not surprised about omissions.
But type 2 diabetes is a high risk factor.
Obviously SSP is not really enough to live off and what happens is going to vary a lot depending on what sector you work in.

On the plus side there will be a tiny number of children sheilding now, according to the government page. Again not a risk anyone could have taken in the early days. But more information is showing this to be the case for children even with underlying health conditions.

I do know people that pushed for a shielding letter when they were not entitled to one. Not because they were desperate not to work tbh, but because they were absolutely petrified.

I don't believe in 'furlough'. If someone wants unemployment pay, they can apply like anyone else. If someone wants a job where they work from home, they can apply like anyone else.

If there is no immediate job available, they can and should do voluntary work, for their own self respect, mental well being and interest, and for their personal c.v. People who are fit to go out and pick up litter can do that. Those who can go and 'shadow' a care worker can do that. Those who can W.F.H. and do socially worthwhile tasks can do that. Befriending a lonely person, coaching someone needing home exercise and learning, watching hours of randomly anonymised c.c.t.v. footage to catch villains, to supplement the efforts of police or animal cruelty organisations.

The latter would prevent, as well as identify, because those attracted to raping teenagers in care homes or kicking animals in factory farms know very well that even if the c.c.t.v. is on day and night, nobody will ever look at it.

Yes, lets have more people working in care, abusing old people because they have been forced into doing that work. Great plan.
Furlough, or more being awarded benefits, comes from the same pot.

@20mum

I don't believe in 'furlough'. If someone wants unemployment pay, they can apply like anyone else. If someone wants a job where they work from home, they can apply like anyone else.

If there is no immediate job available, they can and should do voluntary work, for their own self respect, mental well being and interest, and for their personal c.v. People who are fit to go out and pick up litter can do that. Those who can go and 'shadow' a care worker can do that. Those who can W.F.H. and do socially worthwhile tasks can do that. Befriending a lonely person, coaching someone needing home exercise and learning, watching hours of randomly anonymised c.c.t.v. footage to catch villains, to supplement the efforts of police or animal cruelty organisations.

The latter would prevent, as well as identify, because those attracted to raping teenagers in care homes or kicking animals in factory farms know very well that even if the c.c.t.v. is on day and night, nobody will ever look at it.

And where does the money come from to pay the people watching potentially harrowing CCTV?

Do you have any idea how much training and mental support is required to the teams that do watch this stuff?

I am presuming your whole post is a wind-up because it's so cold hearted and totally uninformed.

My MIL (in Scottish care home) was put on shielding measures within the home without even being told why. This was done by the local health authority with no reference to her GP. She was furious and her GP had it reversed, having discovered it was due to a spleen removal in the 1980s.

@20mum, you think that we should be encouraging more random people into care homes?

This is a thread about people who need to shield, the point is that they need to limit social contact, so volunteering is out of the question. No charity will break safeguarding so that they can be taken on.

The government is forcing us out of work, people need to live, so funding has to come from somewhere.

If the money wasn't directed at those people, do you honestly think that there'd be no protests? That's beside the governments duty to provide for their citizens.

Your missing the fact that schools were closed and people have to go through waves of isolating.

IrmaFayLear Have a bit of empathy. If you don't have a computer, maybe have a smartphone which you use for phone calls and photos only, perhaps don't have email, then "developing the skills to order from Tesco" isn't that easy at the best of times, and is even more difficult when you can't meet anyone face to face, and your daughter or whoever you are asking for help is trying to coach you over the phone without being able to see what it is you're having difficulty with.

Then add in things like failing eyesight, arthritic fingers (all sorts of physical disadvantages kick in in your 70s) and it really is asking a lot to ask someone to go from nowhere to running their whole life online at a time when their chances of getting help are slim.

Mental health/dementia aside, no one under the age of 90 should say they can’t use a computer. I’m not suggesting they trade bitcoin on the dark web, just develop the skills to order from Tesco
Yes to this. I do meet a surprising number of 70 year olds who claim not to do tech. Home computers have been around for 30 years, workplace ones even longer. Where have they been?

I am hoping that shielding will be more nuanced this time round.

It's really only 20 years since home computers started to go mainstream, about 6 years aftervinvention of the web and around the time that we moved away from dial up internet access

Someone aged 50 at the time in a none technical job could very easily have not got to grips with the technology

Yes to this. I do meet a surprising number of 70 year olds who claim not to do tech. Home computers have been around for 30 years, workplace ones even longer. Where have they been?

My father at 82 never had a computer on his desk at work when he retired at 58, very few did in the Local Authority he worked at. Ones that did, had a dumb terminal and not a PC.

@20mum

Thus is a thread about those who are being asked tomshield. Who are being told by the government not to,attend their workplaces. If they can WFH then that's fine. If they cannot, then what sort of supportnshouid they get for what (one hopes) is only a hiatus. Your suggestions are not, on the face of it, remotely suitable for the shielded

@20mum your post is utterly irrelevant even if it's your opinion.
The shielded should be furloughed or wfh if possible how the hell can they go and work in a care home if they are supposed to be shielded?
If they can work in a care home they can do their job but the point is they can't .
Seriously I don't mean to be rude but you really need to think before you post.

I rang my GP to ask why I'd been told to shield - he said they'd been sent a letter under the rare diseases cateogory and had come from hospital consultant