Two week circuit breaker - who's in favour?

[zafferana]

Keir Starmer is in favour - so are you?

If they did it over the next two weeks I actually wouldn't mind that much, as it's half term.

@PostItJoyWeek

I bet there are lots of tasks that could be done by lower skilled people freeing up the nurses to do more of the high skill parts of the job.

We'll not really given the pressure is going to be in ICU?

@PostItJoyWeek

I bet there are lots of tasks that could be done by lower skilled people freeing up the nurses to do more of the high skill parts of the job.

I trust then that you and the others suggesting such ridiculous ideas, will be volunteering to do these "lots of tasks"

Or are you an ArmChair General, content to order around the plebs that you believe are beneath you?

I fail to see why we raced to build hospitals and morgues and then didn’t use them - it seems like peacocking to the rest of the world

The morgues were used I assume.

The nightingale hospitals I don't really understand. They were never going to be useable. Maybe they were always meant for this winter.

@Onamugsearch

Rather than using beds and wards in hospitals for covid cases, why not use the purpose built Nightingale’s? They’re empty, they’ve got plenty of staff from airlines who were prepped to go and work there alongside fully trained professionals. Instead you go into hospital for a knee op/hip op/ gastro problem and are put on a pre-test covid ward......

Three of the above I KNOW contracted covid whilst in hospital.

But nightingales, EVEN in the highest affected areas sit empty and have done for months.

Not in favour of a circuit breaker, dh has already lost his business due to covid and we’ve lost 40% of our income plus my company is in talks about redundancy so......

The 'fully trained professionals' are not available to work alongside airline staff. They already have their hands full working in normal hospitals.

This is why the nightingales are empty - it's all infrastructure and no staff. We truly are governed by a cargo cult.

The economy couldn't take another hit like that.

@greenlynx

Yes, I would. I’m really worried that people will travel over half term and spread the virus further. The cases are rising and we need to cut contacts as much as possible to get transmission down. The idea is to keep schools open which will make WFH easier for parents and another week will be half term anyway. My only worry is about secondary schools students as they tend to mix over lunch time and after school so maybe mixture of on site and online for them.

PMSL at the idea of travelling anywhere (no money, thanks to Lockdown 1).

Cases are rising because that's what viruses do. Why do you think Covid is so special?

WFH is all very well, for those who can WFH. But if you look a little bit further, you will see all those people who can't WFH, and who have children to house and bills to pay. What are we supposed to do?

@jasjas1973. As someone in hospitality, I would have relished the opportunity to volunteer for something like this.

There were plenty of medically trained staff in the first wave who were passed over in favour of airline staff - dentists/dental nurses etc who were already half way there and wanting to work.

It’s depressing that some opportunities weren’t taken earlier on “we’re all in it together”, “save the nhs” there are so many opportunities missed to help save the nhs, people might not have been super highly skilled but surely much of the pressure could be relieved by lesser trained staff helping out - sitting with patients, calling families etc surely it’s not all about intubation?

Anyway it’s a moot point now, it’s just a shame they didn’t run with and expand their initial idea for nightingales.

Absolutely not. Will trash the economy and achieve absolutely nothing. This thing is here to stay, no amount of locking down is going to do anything except destroy what little of the economy we have left. Good luck finding the NHS then. Covid will look like a walk in the park.

*funding

No. Pointless.

Would a 2 week circuit breaker be like last lockdown with all non essential shops shut etc etc
If so would the plan be to pay them all as well ?

Does starmer realise we have different half term weeks around the country , if we have lockdown bit still keep schools colleges open then still loads going out incl pick up , drip off etc as well as many use public transport
If your going to do a circuit breaker you do as tight as possible even encourage min visit to shop as most of us should have most things in to last
If you gave a start and end date maybe compliance would be high if only 2 weeks , but would have to subsidise wages somehow as not many can loose 2 weeks money

@Onamugsearch The Nightingales were never intended to be used, they were a PR exercise, take an existing building, put in plans for 4000 beds, equip for 400 and get the media to tell everyone they have built from scratch, a brand new 4000 bed hospital.... Stand back and take a bow!

Unskilled staff need supervision, equipment, PPE, testing, more supervision..... they tried it with yr 2 and 3 HC students (my DD volunteered) it didn't work, most never heard back from the trusts they volunteered for, never got paid or worked for a week.

As i said to a PP poster, go do a online social care training course (takes about 4 hours) and go work for a care agency? that could free up a more skilled HCP to work in a hospital.

I don't see what the last six weeks has to do with what could be done with the next six weeks, sorry. If the government wanted to use the time, they could

No doubt they could use the time productively, but given they've wasted not six weeks but over six months, I'm not sure why anyone would expect the next few to be any different?

@Puzzledandpissedoff

I don't see what the last six weeks has to do with what could be done with the next six weeks, sorry. If the government wanted to use the time, they could

No doubt they could use the time productively, but given they've wasted not six weeks but over six months, I'm not sure why anyone would expect the next few to be any different?

Yes that I do fear is likely to be true but if they did get a plan, I'd be willing to go along with it I think.

@jasjas1973 again fair enough - peacocking it was then

Still believe it’s a missed opportunity

Re courses - as I’m not allowed to work for anyone else yet I haven’t progressed with it, it may well happen in the near future but I’ve been doing my job for 20+ years - if I’ve got to leave I’m not leaving without being made redundant ( which I would have to do to work as an HCP). It may seem selfish but I’m all set to go down that route once I know where I stand.

Still no fan on another lockdown

I'm not sure, but I'm cynical about why Starmer is suggesting it now. It's obvious that as hospital admissions are rising steeply, the death rates will rise very steeply in 2 to 3 weeks' time, at which point Starmer will no doubt be blaming the govt in a "told you so" way if the circuit breaker/sharp lockdown is not imposed soon. Even if it is imposed immediately, death numbers will rise as some existing patients succumb, then he'll say it wasn't done soon enough. He will maximise political points either way.

Meanwhile, people in Liverpool are saying they feel victimised and that the govt is ruining their economy with the restrictions. The govt can't win, no matter what it does. No easy answers, just a tricky balancing act, but so easy to blame the tories for everything, while ignoring the fact that this pandemic has created impossible problems for governments all over the world, regardless of which political persuasion they are. Death rates will dominate the news in 3 weeks, it's going to be horrific. We can only do our best to follow the guidance and minimise social contact, there is no quick fix to this problem.

Yes, if it would actually work. But it won’t. Madrid had one of the strictest lockdowns in Europe previously. Once they went back to even semi normality the infection rate is rocketing. So what’s the point?

I'm in favour. It's far from ideal but covid is a shit show that we need to manage the best we can. Hospitals are already starting to have to cancel elective surgeries and we cant carry on at this trajectory for the next few months. I think it would need to be a pretty strict lockdown for 3 weeks. At the moment I think we are at 1/5-1/4 of the daily infections we had before we locked down in march so I do think 3 weeks could reduce the infections to a more manageable level, we may then need to do similar in January. The government need to fund it properly though so businesses are still able to pay staff and keep going.

The economy can take it if for a couple of weeks or so. The UK is in series debt spread but still lower than the US/Japan by a mile.

Debt only becomes a problem if you can’t pay it and with central banks setting rates at close to zero, it’s not a huge problem currently.

@RonaLisa no, it wasn’t a joke to lock down to save just Christmas/new year, more the family festive time that goes with the season.

The country is going to keep spiralling around with the virus because the minority are spoiling it for the majority. There is no leadership at the top and this is why we are all hurting. I am all in favour of reclaiming our normality, but something has to be done now before you have two consecutive social events that would spread the virus more. It’s not worth it. Family, friends at Christmas and religious faith gatherings - yes.

@EnolanotAlone (like the name!)

Please, please don't talk to me about religious gatherings. I haven't been to a service since March. "Religious gatherings" were a central part of my life pre-Lockdown Number 1. So was singing in a choir. I have done neither of these things that gave my life meaning (and this is separate from earning a living, which I haven't done, either), because the opportunity hasn't been there.

My own faith is nothing to do with Christmas in particular (though that, and Easter, are obviously central to this).

Please don't conflate 'family get-togethers' and 'religious faith'.

Though I would say that both are equally important, even though one matters to me personally more than the other.

I honestly don't get what it would achieve. Besides "flattening the curve" a bit before it shoots back up again after the 2 weeks is up. What's the actual point?

[quote Waxonwaxoff0]@MJMG2015 how am I supposed to work if school is closed? We can't all work from home.[/quote]
It would be like March lockdown. Provision for key worker children (as few as humanly possible - school staff see if enough will volunteer with a bonus incentive) . Non key workers on furlough.

Secondary schools should switch to rota on line someday and in some days so they are thinned out.

All parents should support school with getting windows open and dc in warm clothes.
They should all be encouraged to wear clean clothes whether it's school uniform or not.