Do people realise Coronavirus won't be eliminated

[Shockhorrorno]

And they'll always be lots of Coronavirus deaths every year? I get the feeling people think it's going to magically disappear when a vaccine appears, but at best we'll still have Coronavirus deaths similar to flu and pneumonia. And people will still catch it and be left with long covid. Is it time for a reality check on what we're actually going to be able to achieve?

If we have Covid for ever, what happens to places like the Isle of Wight or New Zealand that are not going to open up borders until it has been eliminated.

@Oliversmumsarmy they’ll have to open 🤷🏻‍♀️

So what was the point if they aren’t going to avoid it

@Oliversmumsarmy there’s none

@Oliversmumsarmy

If we have Covid for ever, what happens to places like the Isle of Wight or New Zealand that are not going to open up borders until it has been eliminated.

The Isle of Wight isn't a separate country and has no borders to close. I assume you mean the Isle of Man?

Sorry always get the 2 mixed up

In time there will be treatments for this and vaccines. Ne Zealand can wait until they are available to open up again.

Meanwhile maternity care here is being threatened because staff are going sick and they are planning to ship patients from the north to the south west when their hospitals run out of beds.

Anyone getting ill with anything at all can not rely on getting medical care for much longer.

When covid is under control social distancing and lockdowns will end
when measures used to mitigate virus transmission cease virus transmission will go back up

@Yohoheaveho

When covid is under control social distancing and lockdowns will end when measures used to mitigate virus transmission cease virus transmission will go back up

This

New Zealand may have cut the virus out for now, but in order to keep it out what will they do? Keep their borders closed permanently to visitors, emigration and immigration, so becoming an island race who try to exist long term in splendid isolation? That would mean a continually decimated foreign tourist industry, and many people never being able to see family who don't live there.

Of course they won't keep the borders closed permanently. Like the rest of the world they are waiting for either an effective vaccine (best option) or cure, and then it will become another virus which we live with, like flu, but people will be able to take action to help prevent catching it and spreading it. Incidentally, the borders are not completely closed, some people other than citizens/residents are already allowed in (mostly for work purposes), but they go into quarantine and are not let out until testing shows they are covid free.

It's not like whooping cough or measles, though. Much as people insist that it's not like flu, mostly because people confuse flu and colds, it is more like flu and we will have to live with it like flu which kills tens of thousands of people despite the vaccination availability.

But how many people actually have the flu vaccination? I worked for a business which had over 70 staff and they offered free flu shots each year. Less than a third of the staff took advantage of the offer, and even less people would be getting vaccinated if they have to pay for it. If everyone was vaccinated there would be less deaths.

It’s fine for nz, IOM to allow people in IF people strictly do the 14 day quarantine. If this is enforced strictly, it is likely (though not 100%), to identify cases and reduce spread.

@Shockhorrorno

And they'll always be lots of Coronavirus deaths every year? I get the feeling people think it's going to magically disappear when a vaccine appears, but at best we'll still have Coronavirus deaths similar to flu and pneumonia. And people will still catch it and be left with long covid. Is it time for a reality check on what we're actually going to be able to achieve?

Yeah? Tell your lazy, defeatist, negative, whingie to Taiwan.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2020-10-29/this-place-hasn-t-had-a-local-coronavirus-case-in-200-days

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.bloombergquint.com/amp/markets/taiwan-gdp-poised-for-rebound-buoyed-by-covid-response-huawei

@Yohoheaveho

When covid is under control social distancing and lockdowns will end when measures used to mitigate virus transmission cease virus transmission will go back up

Hopefully scientific progress is soon going to enable us to mitigate it better than we can now.

I think a lot of the resignation about how Covid deaths are 'inevitable' is emotional cover for the fact the UK government has massively fucked this up for us. Many countries are in far far better shape than us both in terms of health and the economy. I'm no longer going to cafes, shops, attractions not because of the restrictions but because I can read and the virus is rising fast in my area.

Talk today of another national lockdown - and longer because our ever-hopeful, ever-indecisive, ever-absent PM wouldn't do the two weeks when suggested. He's made this worse every chance he's had.

There is a much higher chance of this being eradicated than flu owning to the fact that it doesn’t appear to mutate so quickly. Even if not and we have to vaccinate yearly, then we can still get back some normality.

It’s a similar virus to SARS and those people still have immunity 17 years later.

I think assuming it will be endemic is a bit of a leap. No one knows, it isn’t the same virus as flu and has similar spike proteins to the the original sars virus.

There’s still every change a vaccine will work to eradicate it or at least mean it’s not as bad symptom wise.

*chsnce, not change

Nope ! I can name 2 people already that have actually said " if only people would do as they were told / wear masks/ stop mixing then this will go away"
One of them is an ex work colleague- me getting made redundant put paid to hearing any more of that.
The other is a school mum that doesntvtalk to me anymore because I wouldn't quarantine my ds for 2 weeks before her kids birthday party . Hes uninvited.

( the same woman has never had a smear test in her like , such is her grasp of being health aware )

• in her life . Sorry for typos

Many countries are in far far better shape than us both in terms of health and the economy.

If we compare ourselves to our closest geographic and cultural neighbours, I don’t think that’s true. The vast majority of Western Europe is struggling.

Talk today of another national lockdown - and longer because our ever-hopeful, ever-indecisive, ever-absent PM wouldn't do the two weeks when suggested. He's made this worse every chance he's had

I think the government have a balancing act in that those with the loud voices are in work, still being paid and want full lockdown, because that is what everyone else is doing and they are shouting about saving lives (although countries that had a harsh lock downs are now in a worse position than somewhere like Sweden who’s figures are falling).
Against those who don’t have an employer to keep paying them come what may. Who need to go out to work and earn money and who are part of the gig economy as well as the businesses who employ those who are drawing a salary and are screaming about going into lockdown

Personally I think we need to keep going with the tier system till January but everyone
if they can wfh they do. Strict Social Distancing and mask wearing (no exceptions) when outside the house (and in it if you have visitors)

There is supposedly a vaccine that might become available in December/January. If it does then vaccinate everyone, if it doesn’t then start opening up everything anyway. Including theatres, pubs, clubs etc. Still have the mask wearing and other guidelines but at some point like Spanish flu enough people have some sort of immunity to it that it cant spread

The figures will rise but then they will start falling and in the long run it will save more lives than a National lockdown. Followed by everyone running out and meeting people with no masks and in close proximity.

If people know that they have a timeline then businesses and individuals can work around that. Atm there is no timeline for places to start trading again so businesses are closing because there is no end in sight.

My DH is out of work due to covid but this ongoing middle way is just prolonging it. The government are not 'balancing' they are simply doing nothing to benefit either the economy or health.

I'm sick of the charge being thrown around that anyone who wants the government to fucking do something is a) wealthy b) WFH - we have been badly hit, but I can understand public health science and what we have/continue to do in the UK is not helping. The government have made it worse repeatedly - one fifth of clusters are linked to EOTHO! Geniuses.

@TheKeatingFive

Many countries are in far far better shape than us both in terms of health and the economy.

If we compare ourselves to our closest geographic and cultural neighbours, I don’t think that’s true. The vast majority of Western Europe is struggling.

Only Spain, Italy and France are as bad and UK cases are rising faster than Spain and Italy? Plus perhaps if we can see Europe is failing we could look at countries doing better and fucking well learn something quickly

Plus perhaps if we can see Europe is failing we could look at countries doing better and fucking well learn something quickly

Sure, but we have to take into account the cultural and geographical differences between us. Most Asian countries who’ve contained it have radically different approaches to citizens rights and data privacy. Somewhere like NZ is an island nation that was able to shut itself off (but now is dependent on other countries producing vaccines).

In retrospect, Western Europe was always going to struggle, for reasons that are primarily cultural.

Plus perhaps if we can see Europe is failing we could look at countries doing better

Which comparable countries - by which I mean, not China, SK or NZ - are doing vastly better than the UK?

Plus, surely we can see by now what many have been saying all along: that there's not much point in comparing contries at one given moment in time? People were falling over themselves to praise the Czech Republic 4 or 5 months ago, but now it's got one of the worst rates in the world. Even Germany, which had been doing really well, isn't so much anymore. And Spain and France's super strict lockdowns don't seem to availed them much either.