Are you ready for another 6 months of restrictions ?

[Xtfc123]

Does anybody think that this will all be normal by March/April, no more masks or restrictions ?
Ready to 'do your bit' and not see family and friends and have restrictions on your lives until potentially summer ?

No. The treatment's worse than the disease.

I know 3 people who had covid - NHS nurse (now fine), a 90 year old (also fine) and a 92 yr old (also fine).

They've all recovered and are back to normal. Unlike the rest of us.

@Xtfc123

Does anybody think that this will all be normal by March/April, no more masks or restrictions ? Ready to 'do your bit' and not see family and friends and have restrictions on your lives until potentially summer ?

No, I'm not willing to have another 6 months of working from home and seeing people outside. I hope some restrictions will ease once the most vulnerable are vaccinated and hospital rates go down. Masks and some restrictions, yes, can live with that for a while longer.

@Thespidersweb

No I think we are going to have another year of it. I read an article at the beginning of the epidemic where a scientist said to expect it to be here for two years as that’s when it’s normally burnt it self out by.

We’ve been through many of these before. It’s not the first and won’t be the last. It’s not even the worst one we’ve had. It’s just that SM wasn’t around before and people just got on with their lives.

We're not waiting for it to burn itself out though. Life should resume as soon as the hospitals aren't under too much pressure. Covid doesn't hav to disappear, just become manageable.

@Wigisfashion83

I know some people would just love to carry on existing in their cosy little home bubble, living with hubby, WFH on full pay, Ocado deliveries and nice walks in the country.

Exactly! I know of friends saving up to £400 a month on commuting. A lot of those were the ones screaming to stay at home. But they still managed to enjoy a summer holiday this year.

@LadyCatStark

After keeping us in tier 3 restrictions for months and promising mass testing but not delivering anything at all and now offering mass testing to London school children but not us, they can fuck right off. I’m not doing it anymore.

If you are in Leicester you have my sympathy and if I'm honest I don't blame you. I cannot believe LRI wasn't included in this weeks round of vaccinations. London needs to be in tier 3 like most of the midlands and the north.

Don't give in though take care.

However if you were a young, child-free person whose social life revolved around clubbing/gigs/playing sport/partying etc. - basically mixing in large groups, you would consider it all a bit shit

Or someone who has already lost their job and livelihood, or is about to.
Or a single parent who relies on multiple members of the family to provide childcare, or even just moral support.
Or a young person who has just left home for the first time to work in a city 100’s of miles away from friends and family and is now stuck working from home in a flat share with people you have nothing in common with.
Or any number of scenarios which mean the whole thing is fucking awful.

reason.com/2020/12/10/stop-saying-lockdown-is-not-that-hard/?amp&__twitter_impression=true&fbclid=IwAR3L1OmkvtziVWK1JQSy5EjJp7gIXHLoVjm0yyIsBWqtysD8eQ6W6GbzdVM

Never ever was I into conspiracy with this or anything - but I too think it’s all a load of codswallop now.

We’re in one of the highest affected areas. I know no one whose has it.

My kids are at schools where infections supposedly are running rife. Classes and year groups keep being shut down. Yet no one we know has had it.

So many people I speak to here and all over the country say this.

"If the goal is well some excess deaths / long covid are acceptable then why did we get £390 billion in debt, trash people's lives, trash the economy children's education cation, mental health etc etc in the first place."

To save the NHS, to avoid a situation where ICUs were totally full and people being turned away or refused treatment. That's why. It wasn't to eradicate Covid.

@Thespidersweb

No I think we are going to have another year of it. I read an article at the beginning of the epidemic where a scientist said to expect it to be here for two years as that’s when it’s normally burnt it self out by.

We’ve been through many of these before. It’s not the first and won’t be the last. It’s not even the worst one we’ve had. It’s just that SM wasn’t around before and people just got on with their lives.

Unfortunately I agree with this. I think it will take two years to get everyone who needs to be vaccinated and then topped up and for the virus to be sufficiently under control that all restrictions can be lifted.

@Againstmachine

Years down the line we won't remember so much the lack of nights out at the pub for a year but we'll remember our loved ones' deaths forever.

People will remember the times they lost their businesses and their homes, the poverty and much worse due to the restrictions.

This..... Also the loved ones of people that were lost due lockdown etc... Lack of treatment and missed cancer diagnosis... Suicides, domestic abuse....

It's as if these people don't matter any more.... Trying to Compare a 102 year old dying With covid and a 30 year old with 2 young children who died after having a missed cancer diagnosis..... You can't!

Well if the anti vaxers and conspiracy nutcases don't worry too many people/put them off and enough have the vaccine for the number of infections that need hospital care fall then it shouldn't continue.

It's about not overrunning the hospitals so that they can cope with number of people with covid needing hospital care....it's not done just to piss people off

I know it's real, many of my school colleagues have had it, obese, young, old, BAME, all recovered. I do sadly know somebody who died with it, he was in his 70s and also had cancer. I know one person who almost died from it but thankfully made it,in his 60s.
It's not the responsibility of the public to save the NHS.

@Nellee

Never ever was I into conspiracy with this or anything - but I too think it’s all a load of codswallop now.

We’re in one of the highest affected areas. I know no one whose has it.

My kids are at schools where infections supposedly are running rife. Classes and year groups keep being shut down. Yet no one we know has had it.

So many people I speak to here and all over the country say this.

What does it matter if it's people you know or not though? Or are you saying the authorities are lying and nobody has Covid?

@Wigisfashion83

I know it's real, many of my school colleagues have had it, obese, young, old, BAME, all recovered. I do sadly know somebody who died with it, he was in his 70s and also had cancer. I know one person who almost died from it but thankfully made it,in his 60s. It's not the responsibility of the public to save the NHS.

"It's not the responsibility of the public to save the NHS."

It's us who will suffer it if becomes overwhelmed. It should be better funded to begin with, but all countries' health services are struggling.

Restrictions are in place to slow the amount of people being admitted to hospital, not to stop the spread, if all vulnerable people are vaccinated or even all the elderly people there will be no need for restrictions so restrictions should be at least reduced by March, I do think masks will still be worn to prevent spread amongst the unvaccinated. I think the next 3 months will be tough and we will see a lot more deaths before vaccines start working especially after people mix over Christmas, but there is a end in sight and we need to focus on that.

[quote 1dayatatime]@Hapixmas

Why do restrictions need to stay in place if people are vaccinated. Ludicrous
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Because the vaccination allows your body to create resistance to Covid so that when you do catch it you a lot less likely to die. The vaccination doesn't prevent you from catching the virus, carrying the virus or infecting other people.the virus will not simply disappear - the genie is out of the bottle and it's here forever.

To be honest I'm struggling either the responses tonight.
If the goal is to stop excess deaths / long covid then yes we should all continue to wear masks, social distance and have periodic local restrictions/ lockdowns until everyone who wants to be vaccinated has been vaccinated, which could be some time.
If the goal is well some excess deaths / long covid are acceptable then why did we get £390 billion in debt, trash people's lives, trash the economy children's education cation, mental health etc etc in the first place.[/quote]
The aim is, and always has been, to protect the NHS. Not to protect each individual person. We have restrictions now to stop the NHS being overwhelmed, and to keep other vital services running whilst we still need to isolate. Once the vulnerable have been vaccinated it will be perfectly acceptable to stop restrictions. The goal isn't to stop all excess deaths/long covid. The virus will always be here and people need to get used to that fact. Some people will get it and dies, some people will suffer from long covid. The NHS will not be at risk any more as the majority of vulnerable will have been vaccinated. We won't be social distancing any more and everything will have opened up at this point.

I am seeing less and less mask wearing...people pulling them down, cashiers not wearing them. I applaud this

I've stopped wearing a mask.

There is so much other post-viral fatigue and long-term health issues but we don't talk about 'long flu' or anything like that.

Well I know of two people who have died from it, and one of DC's friend's dad is in an induced coma.

Just watch CNN for a few days if you have Sky - and see what happens to a country when people don't take sensible precautions.

@Crazycatlady83 What do you mean lockdown 'hasn't worked'? What do you think the lockdown is for? Do you understand how a virus spreads? Even if there are only a handful of people left with the virus, it will eventually spread back to bigger numbers again as soon as people start mixing.

The only aim of the lockdowns has ever been to reduce pressure on the NHS, because a virus of this nature cannot be eradicated. If that's what you were hoping for, I'm afraid you will be hoping for a very long time.

Why would you applaud people not wearing a mask - selfish attitude.

@Wigisfashion83

I know it's real, many of my school colleagues have had it, obese, young, old, BAME, all recovered. I do sadly know somebody who died with it, he was in his 70s and also had cancer. I know one person who almost died from it but thankfully made it,in his 60s. It's not the responsibility of the public to save the NHS.

Totally agree. The government are elected to do our bidding, not the other way around. If not then why are we sleep waking into a disastrous no deal Brexit that will probably cause more harm than Covid.

@maddiemookins16mum

Yep. Whatever it takes. I clearly recall back in March someone in power saying life would be nowhere normal for at least18 months.

God knows how our relatives ‘back in the day’ survived nearly 6 years of war.

Different time yes, but horrendous hardships/losses that make WFH, not being able to head off to Corfu for 2 weeks, soft play being closed, etc etc pale into insignificance really.

But then most of MN seem to just flaunt the restrictions anyway.

God knows how our relatives ‘back in the day’ survived nearly 6 years of war.

They had no choice... they couldn't exactly say 'fuck the war I'm done with it all' as people are saying to this lockdown/partial lockdown/restrictions.

Maybe if more/all people followed the guidelines then we wouldn't need a further lockdown... however the fuck it brigade are making things longer and longer and so cannot wait until the vaccinated numbers rise to a crucial point to stem this virus. Let's face it if we reply on people social distancing, mask wearing, hand washing etc etc if will drag on for years.

@MarshaBradyo

Rafal what date would you have shut down and to what outcome?

based on a post I made on here I’d say before the 16th of March, but almost certainly not as early as the 5th. My guess is something started to go badly wrong in Lombardy between those two dates.

Based on watching my family go on living their normal covid free lives, working, having parties, going out, I’d say very low or elimination as an outcome. Obviously easier to get to that point when you haven’t stopped testing and start taking precautions earlier in the curve.

@dinglethedragon

Well I know of two people who have died from it, and one of DC's friend's dad is in an induced coma.

Just watch CNN for a few days if you have Sky - and see what happens to a country when people don't take sensible precautions.

And even then they’ve not had the same number of daily deaths that SAGE and their scaremongering have said we’d have had here without a further lockdown. Why are we still paying attention to them?