I haven't yet RTFT but I have to say I agree with
*@TheDailyCarbuncle*. Just like with Brexit people are reacting emotionally and believing tabloid headlines rather than looking at facts.
Initially there was a good case for lockdown: to stop the virus becoming endemic in the UK population until we knew what we were dealing with. In Jan and Feb many of us asked MPs to do this. We are an island, we saw what was happening in China then Italy and Spain. But Boris went off on holiday and our requests were ignored until it was too late. Friends accused me of "scaremongering".
At that point our fate was pretty much sealed, and it has been nothing but mismanagement since. Anyone familiar with Boris' professional history should not be surprised frankly.
I found this video extremely upsetting, and can really empathise as I've been that poor before, with no food, no electricity, no heating etc. And nobody cared. I am now very lucky personally but it's totally unacceptable for people in a developed country to be living like that and lockdowns are causing more damage now than they are preventing. It's hard to see how anybody could deny it (the Government's claim it was "impossible" to produce a cost/ benefit analysis of this even though that is meant to be a requirement for Government policy changes speaks volumes). The worst recession in 300 years and that's before we add on all of the Brexit job losses, price hikes, GBP devaluation and supply chain issues. Yes Covid is horrible but believe me, things are going to get very ugly.
There are no good choices left at this point but to blindly follow the Government's rhetoric without considering wider impacts is illogical and will do much harm for many years to come. And I say all of this as someone suffering from long Covid who has been unwell since April.
If anybody is interested in factual and staristical analysis the FT has some really good articles and the comments section is full of intelligent discussion on these topics.
This particular comment from September (not mine) really struck me, if anybody is interested in weighing up the human and economic costs of lockdowns:
"Those who defend such [lockdown] measures need to understand the facts and statistics and clearly don't, because i suspect they are retired and have a pension, work in the public sector so don't need to worry about losing their job, or are independently wealthy.
So lets be clear who is dying, 50% of deaths have happened in care homes, 95% of deaths are those over 60, mostly with underlying health issues, the rest below 60 have underlying health issues.
Children and healthy adults don't die from COVID, the one case that does, is one in a million.
The vulnerable groups should undoubtedly be given the protection and means to shield, but not at the cost of the 99.99% of the population this doesn't apply to. As the death rate calculated in the Economist is 0.01%....
...So, for this tiny fraction of the world population, which yes could be a few million people dying, which nobody wants, is killing or is going to kill even more people with the actions the UK and other governments are taking. Facts:
- UNICEF - 150m children have been plunged in to poverty due to COVID restrictions, which will either kill them or reduce their life expectancy. In India it is being reported that 300k of children will die of malnutrition because of Lockdown.
- In the UK the FT and BMJ, have reported that 40k to 50k of people will die because they haven't received treatment or diagnosis for cancer, heart and other life threatening diseases, with a further 100k over the next few years. I personally have two friends who have their cancer treatment on hold in their late 30's, who are scared to death.
- The closure of education destroys the life chances of children and young adults, which leads to reduction in life chances and life expectancy.
- Woman and Children are being recorded in record numbers being abused, mental health and drugs services cannot cope with the influx. That is first hand from a Doctor i personally know and a councilor in the NHS.
- Industries have been decimated, leading to long term unemployment, again reducing life expectancy and pushing people in to poverty.
If you cannot see that the cure we are applying is worse than the actual disease itself, you must be completely selfish, stupid and blind.
What ever is left of economies after this, be sure there will be no additional health care spending, as there wont be enough taxes to pay for it. Its basic economics, that if we don't get the economy moving, there will be no spending, no taxation and a reduced level of health care, again reducing life expectancy and treatment for people. Its not rocket science, its logic.
So in short, it is plainly clear to anyone with half a brain, that we are going to kill more people by our actions of lockdowns and restrictions, than the virus ever will, as the above points i have made will be repeated the world over.
We take decisions everyday in healthcare systems around the world, that an older life is worth less than a younger life, its a fact, because we have limited resources, and a child has their whole life ahead of them, i know its sounds cold, but there is a cost benefit analysis that goes on, and it is common sense to prolong someones life at 15 or 20, compared to someone at 85 and we make that decision everyday.
I am not saying that we should let vulnerable people die, i am saying that they have to take responsibility for shielding themselves, and as a society we should give them the support needed, but not at the cost of killing people with longer lives to lead, and destroying their life chances.
Everyone else should be allowed to get on with life, with basic restrictions in place to help, but to more normalized patterns, so that we can get the world moving and save further despair to the 99.99% of people who COVID wont touch, other than a few days in bed in the overwhelming majority of cases, with some 80% of people being completely symptom free.
So it is not we who are selfish that want to get on with life now, we have done our bit, we have done more than enough. It is the turn of the vulnerable, their the ones who are being selfish, say your not to the children the world over your killing and plunging in to poverty.
Finally, the government are completely tone deaf, inept, incompetent and lots more, with a media that should be ashamed of itself for its lies, reckless reporting and facts that have been skewed.
Boris, Matt, Pritti, Grant etc should be ashamed of themselves for how badly they have performed, with no strategy and zero integrity. Matt Hancock being the biggest comedy act. BJ really has surrounded himself with the inept team to ever form a government."