Covid measures 'a monument of collective hysteria and folly'

[RonaLisa]

The Guardian is not my natural habitat, but this is spot on.

It needs to be shouted from the rooftops.

It's October and the hospitals are full and it's nothing to do with Covid?

How do we have an NHS that given they know winter happens every year has no wiggle room so the hospitals are full just a few weeks into autumn? It’s appalling.

@Northernsoulgirl45

Well I guess Guernsey is a small Island so easy to close borders as not a travel hub and never had many cases. Si is still a requirrment or visitors

Not relevant.

Its a community that has the virus in the wild (although they didn't know, because most people never show symptoms) who haven't had any social distancing or masks for months.

Surely if its so deadly and contagious it would have run right through the place?

@gjejgej

It's pointless having this argument on MN.

The cookie-cutter response is always: "if we'd done nothing, the NHS would be overwhelmed and the country would crash and burn 10's of thousands would die etc"... (there's no evidence for this btw...pure conjecture).

When someone holds that position, you simply cannot reason with them.

It’s not a cookie cutter view. Allowing thousands to get ill or die DOES have an effect on the NHS and the economy. Economies struggle to function when staff are off, ill or dead. You only have to look at the economic effects of Spanish flu to understand this.

@MadameBlobby

It's October and the hospitals are full and it's nothing to do with Covid?

How do we have an NHS that given they know winter happens every year has no wiggle room so the hospitals are full just a few weeks into autumn? It’s appalling.

Because we are making them work to COVID restrictions, and making staff stay at ho e everything they cough? Its always busy in autumn and winter, the current restrictions are making it worse

BelleSausage I am complying with restrictions and support them but please don't call us seeing family a luxury. And yes I know we can see them outside but it's now forecast to rain from now until as far ahead as the forecast goes, so that will be a hurried, unpleasant affair.

[quote BelleSausage]@MadameBlobby

A totalitarian regime! Are you joking?

Our rules are some of the most lax in the world- even more than in the US.

What we are living in is a fantasy land full of people who are trying to justify their holidays and socialising by pretending that no one important is dying (it’s only old people) and that they are being asked to make massive sacrifices (but I couldn’t take my kids to soft play).

See the following utterly wrong and misleading comments to steer clear of-

‘It’s not worse than the flu’
‘The numbers are over estimated. I heard of my mother’s cousins brother who was put down as COVID but died in a freak circus accident.

I wouldn’t mind people being honest about it being hard to give up luxuries (and they are luxuries) but all this pretending nothing is happening is some weird psychological thing.[/quote]
I didn’t say we were living under one just now. But I don’t want to live under one. The issue is less the measures but them not being subject to proper scrutiny and debate. The Tories don’t have much regard for trivialities like the rule of law.

My husband hasn’t earned a full wage since March. He earns barely minimum wage anyway. I was made redundant. Thankfully got something else. But sure, you keep telling yourself objections are just about giving up luxuries.

But that’s the point @Tiredeyesneedsleep. Why is the NHS in the shitter every winter? It happens every year.

Ageing population with complex health needs? The NHS is a victim of its own success.

@MadameBlobby

But that’s the point *@Tiredeyesneedsleep*. Why is the NHS in the shitter every winter? It happens every year.

I know. Its the people who seem to think this year is different just "because covid" who need to do some research and not just belive the headlines.

So far (and ig might cbange) its a fairly standard october as far as hospital beds go

@StealthPolarBear

Ageing population with complex health needs? The NHS is a victim of its own success.

Yes but this is every year. Winter pressures, flu season etc. Why don’t we have an NHS with the capacity to deal with a regular winter?

Creeping privatisation, top heavy with management and spending cuts

That description is certainly very apt when describing the whining bleating moaning about any (admittedly in England, incompetent) attempt to actually do something about the situation (instead of shouting we can't we can't we can't).

The more rational calm countries realised pretending it wasn't real doesn't work. They rolled their sleeves up (calmly) and got on with taking effective containment measures.

9 months on, these are the countries who are now living life largely as normal.
Good for them.

I've decided my favourite bit of the 'hysteria and folly' is the anti vaxxer claim that vaccines will turn us into chimpanzees. I think I'd quite like being one. No need to buy clothes ever again - and how cool to be able to swing from trees.

25% of my local hospital beds are full of covid. That means that people can't get cancer surgery, or any other elective surgery etc And staff are at risk. It's not huge numbers, relative to the population in catchment but it's enough to topple your health care provider.

I've decided my favourite bit of the 'hysteria and folly' is the anti vaxxer claim that vaccines will turn us into chimpanzees. I think I'd quite like being one. No need to buy clothes ever again - and how cool to be able to swing from trees.

Hahahaha me too

The irony being “chimpanzee” would be an increase in IQ for a lot of the eejit anti vaxxers

@Beepbeepa

25% of my local hospital beds are full of covid. That means that people can't get cancer surgery, or any other elective surgery etc And staff are at risk. It's not huge numbers, relative to the population in catchment but it's enough to topple your health care provider.

Link? Or hearsay?

@Beepbeepa

25% of my local hospital beds are full of covid. That means that people can't get cancer surgery, or any other elective surgery etc And staff are at risk. It's not huge numbers, relative to the population in catchment but it's enough to topple your health care provider.

Yes it's terrible. I read earlier today about an nhs hospital having to cancel cancer treatment - because Covid has got onto the ward. These patients being already unwell are, of course, vulnerable to Covid.

This isn't the first time it's had to happen sadly. The same thing happened in Edinburgh a while back.

Lots of NHS staff off sick too.

The inevitable consequences of failing to contain Covid.

Patients in Australia, New Zealand, much of Asia, and the Isle of Man are able to access all healthcare as normal.

So are France and Germany - both gone back now into full lockdown - also just hysterical?

German Chancellor Angela Merkel acknowledged that the measures are “strict and arduous” but she urged a “national effort”.

At the current rate of new infections, she said: “We will reach the limits of the health system.”

My DM who is 84 was supposed to have a blood test in March Didnt happen till late August. Last weekend she collapsed at home and was taken to hospital. Shes home now with medication.

Im fucking sick of vulnerable elderly people being used as emotional blackmail on the rest of the public when certain quarters couldnt give a shit the rest of the time.

@StealthPolarBear

Ageing population with complex health needs? The NHS is a victim of its own success.

Hmmm not really. Chronic underfunding of public health on issues relating to poverty and poor lifestyle are as much of an issue as old age itself when it comes to covid.

Life expectancy in many covid hotspots is less than 80. And you are more likely to have a serious problem and require hospitalisation if you have poorer underlying health.

Bottomline: If you are over 80 you aren't going to be the one taking the icu bed because you are unlikely to survive ventilation... And the covid crisis is essentially a bed management issue at its heart.

We have the lowest number of hospital and icu beds in the western world and this ultimately gives us few options for covid policy. This is something inescapable regardless of how you ultimately decide to manage the problem.

@cbt944

So are France and Germany - both gone back now into full lockdown - also just hysterical?

German Chancellor Angela Merkel acknowledged that the measures are “strict and arduous” but she urged a “national effort”.

At the current rate of new infections, she said: “We will reach the limits of the health system.”

Germany's 'lockdown' sounds like a mix of tier1 and tier3 restrictions. Not a lockdown in the Welsh sense.

I absolutely agree with Sumption on this. I find it chilling that we now live in a society where it is a criminal offence for many people to meet their family. I'm a lawyer and most of my colleagues have also been horrified that such fundamental freedoms have been removed from the population on an indefinite basis with so little scrutiny. But many of them are unwilling to say this in public because they don't want to be accused of being selfish granny murderers.

And we have removed these fundamental freedoms despite there being very little evidence that this will save lives. As I see it, we know, almost for certain, that lockdown and associated measures do and will continue to do very significant harm. Most of this harm will be in the future (e.g. long term unemployment and lack of resources to fund public services which in turn lead to poor health outcomes and decreased quality of life).

Lockdowns only might save lives from covid. They might just spread out the same number of covid deaths over a slightly longer time period.

So people are being required to give up fundamental rights in order to possibly (but not definitely) save others in a way which will very likely damage their own futures and the futures of their children and others, including in many cases their own life expectancy. No one should be forced by government to do something of such significant detriment to their own future, particularly when there is so little certainty that it will do any good to anyone else.

Here's Macron. He's just being silly and over-reacting too, I guess:

“The virus is spreading across France at a speed that even the most pessimistic did not predict,” Mr Macron said in a television address.

He admitted that a curfew for Paris and other major cities imposed two weeks ago had failed to stop a second wave of cases that has sent the death toll in France spiralling to nearly 35,000.

“As elsewhere in Europe, we are overwhelmed by a second wave that will probably be more difficult and deadly than the first,” he said.

Chilling that a lawyer (solicitor or barrister?) talks of 'fundamental rights' then dismisses the most fundamental right of all. The right to life.

Whilst we're on the subject of rights. Close behind the right to life is the right to shelter. Something many are still denied in this country. It would be nice to see such vocal campaigning to change that. Instead of fighting to prolong the pandemic.

As for Freeeedoom. A poster on another thread put it well (apologies to you if you're here because I can't remember your name to credit you).
Your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins.

So basically the whole world is hysterical, is that what they are saying?