Normal life will not resume by May

[LemonadeFromLemons]

The article below is brilliant at explaining what the vaccine will and will not do. Unfortunately, it also makes clear that it is going to be years not months until we are able to go back to normal. I would strongly encourage every person to read it to get the clear facts in an easy format:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-b6360f40-84f9-469b-b6a3-a4568e161c4f

@PurpleDaisies

Anyone remember Jonathan Van Tam's freudian slip around long term mask wearing - for years to come?

What makes you say that was a Freudian slip? He was asked a question and he answered it clearly and honestly. It was Boris who was embarrassed.

People need the full picture. Being given half truths and overly optimistic predictions for what’s next is not helpful.

A freudian slip in the sense that he was thinking it, and intended it to happen, but wasn't meant to say it as it was quite off message (and he did walk it back to "optional" after Boris' rapid intervention).

As a PP said, people can do short term, but living the bulk or even all the rest of our lives with covered faces isn't palatable - it is inconsistent with our culture and our way of life. We were told the vaccine was the end point, people have largely complied, however now we're looking at an indefinite period.

As an optional measure, that's reasonable, and both surgical and N95s should be commercially available for the willing to purchase. However it mustn't be compulsory in the long term.

The UK will get back to normal sooner than most of the world because we can vaccinate the majority. It’s not our problem if other countries are still having problems. We just vaccinate our own people and close the border like NZ has.

LoveYour Thanks, I'm not looking for sympathy though, it's more that I want to explain to people how the NHS is affected.

Before I was ill, I thought the hospitals were not really in trouble if there weren't many Covid patients in the area.

Now I realise that all the normal wards and clinics can only run on 1/2 to 1/3 capacity because of social distancing, preventing spread in the hospital, and staff having to isolate.

The normal diseases are just the same but not getting seen as fast, I'm sitting here with blue legs, knowing that the answer is chemo I should have had a week ago and won't get til the end of December, and even then if the virus hasn't caused more disruption.

Come January, after the Christmas mingle, the schools will be a covid soup and iIll be a sitting duck with no immune system. So I'm just saying less mingling will help the NHS.

I have followed the media quite closely on this since March and I don't feel it has been explained well about exactly what the pressures are on healthcare.

“As a PP said, people can do short term, but living the bulk or even all the rest of our lives with covered faces isn't palatable“

Yes, it is really odd! I said something similar to DH this morning when we were making sure we had masks as we were leaving home.

In someways I like the anonymity, especially if I am also wearing sunglasses and a hat. But it is sooo odd, in general!

Loveyourideas

It's handy to be able to cover your nose on a freezing day and still walk into a shop or the bank without being arrested.

At the same time, I'm greatly looking forward to having the option not to mask up and to be able to communicate with facial expressions again. It's our non verbal language and our way of life.

I am genuinely interested in others views. I think maybe survival of the fittest is coming out in a primal way in a crisis, which is understandable, but feels slightly brutal when you find yourself on the wrong side of vulnerable all of a sudden.

I don't think it's that. I think people have sacrified a huge amount - mostly with good grace - but that there is a limit to how much people can be asked to do so indefinitely.

[quote Bajalaluna]@picsinred such a disgustingly selfish attitude. What about those vunerable shop workers, who have no choice but to serve you when you're "done" with wearing a mask? Putting them at risk because you don't want to mask up for half an hour is such a selfish attitude. I work 12 hour shifts in a supermarket, wearing masks, which rub the backs of my ears raw and irritate my skin no end. I'll be putting my mask back on in an hour to go back to work, despite my ears still being tremendously sore from my 12 hour shift yesterday. I have severe asthma so could pull the exempt card, but I mask up, to protect my colleagues, customers and myself. Have a little damn respect for others around you. Refusing to wear a mask for the hour at most you'll be in the supermarket when the staff around you spend more time wearing them than not it just pathetic. [/quote]
I don't have to wear one anymore at work as I work somewhere else but when I wore one all day, I used those crochet strips with buttons on them to hook the ear loops onto rather than your ears. Works even better if you put it above a pony tail. I can't recommend them enough. I'd gladly make and send you one but j can't imagine that sharing an address on mumsnet is a good idea as we're all strangers (although I guess I could send it to the shop you work in ) but you can buy them yourself in any case and I thoroughly recommend them:

www.etsy.com/uk/listing/849606166/free-uk-delivery-3-x-face-mask-mates-ear?ga_order=most_relevant&ga_search_type=all&ga_view_type=gallery&ga_search_query=button+strap&ref=sr_gallery-1-3&frs=1&col=1

@Loveyourideas

I think a ‘new’ normal is quite a good thing. Covid and the lockdown have made me evaluate what really matters. It is like the noise has been stripped and I hope that once the pandemic subsided we still reevaluate how we want to live as a society. Especially in relation to other living beings and our environment

Much of what you consider 'noise' is people contributing to society and the economy. If you're happy with this kind of life, you may continue to live accordingly, but most people will be looking to get back to normal as soon as they can.

@AnnnaBananna

The UK will get back to normal sooner than most of the world because we can vaccinate the majority. It’s not our problem if other countries are still having problems. We just vaccinate our own people and close the border like NZ has.

What about the countries who can’t afford vaccination? Surely we have a duty to help.

IcedPurple true, I think everyone has had it up to the back teeth tbh. The whole thing is a shambolic shitshow.

I don't think it's indefinitely at all though. The vaccine will change the picture, and some natural immunity will develop too.

In normal times if I was immunosupressed I'd just be getting on with a normal level of risk from non covid disease, normal nhs eg chemo when you need it, and not expecting anything from anybody.

Enough of this scare-mongering.

The piece is written by a senior BBC journalist so will have been well researched.

Hahahahaha. Hahahaha. Have you any idea how woeful BBC science journalism is?

@onedayinthefuture

We'll have to start accepting that death is part of life, it comes to us all and then wake up and realise we might as will live our lives in the meantime.

I feel the same . I think life will start resembling pre covid normal towards summer , 1 year is a long time with these restrictions and we are all tired . A large amount of people will just use common sense and do what suits them. What else can you do when not many know what we should /shouldn't be doing ? I think fear gave in to exasperation /frustration a long time ago .

Once those most vulnerable to death or hospital admission are vaccinated then death rates and hospital admissions will plummet.

At that point life will get back to normal. The rest of us will catch it and the vast majority of us will have a week or so of feeling unwell.

Most people are willing to comply with restrictions to save the lives of the vulnerable but once that is out of the equation life must resume. Governments will lift restrictions because they will become unenforceable and unjustifiable,

I think long term mask wearing is a good idea - they do it in other countries. Not to the extent we have to now, but going forward wearing a mask when you have a cold to protect others from your germs seems a decent and courteous thing to do.

Pre all this I use to commute by train and I can well remember sitting next to someone on a crowded commuter train in winter who was stinking of the cold - you just knew you would get it and pass it on to your colleagues and family. I would happily wear a mask for using public transport if I have any sort of a cough or cold in future.

Frankly, as soon as the overall risk is suitably managed by vaccines, we all need to go back to normal life. There seems to be a mad level of expectation that we can all go through life with little or no risk. It’s unhealthy and demoralising.

Everyone will be back to normal come easter

I don't buy this. You only have to look around to see how utterly desparate people are to get back to living....the shops are rammed, the Government has basically had to give everyone a Christmas break from the rules, restaurant visits were 75% of normal last week according to the ONS (despite restaurants in a chunk of the country being closed!). Next week London will lose their shit about being put into Tier 3 and half the North will lose their shit about not being taken out of it. The government's own MPs are already increasingluly restive, so securing a majority for extending a restrictions far into the spring will be fun. As in many other areas of life, the recommendations of public health types will hit the buffer of people's willingness to comply and politicians' willingness to advocate very expensive and depressing measures. I think personally that buffer will be hit once death and hospitalisation rates really start to go down, especially if thar coincidences with lots of depressing headlines about the social and economic cost of all this.

Also I think the Government will love the idea of the UK being the first country in the world to officially declare Victory Over Covid and lift all restrictions, especially as it can be flogged as a benefit of Brexit.

@SomewhereEast

I don't buy this. You only have to look around to see how utterly desparate people are to get back to living....the shops are rammed, the Government has basically had to give everyone a Christmas break from the rules, restaurant visits were 75% of normal last week according to the ONS (despite restaurants in a chunk of the country being closed!). Next week London will lose their shit about being put into Tier 3 and half the North will lose their shit about not being taken out of it. The government's own MPs are already increasingluly restive, so securing a majority for extending a restrictions far into the spring will be fun. As in many other areas of life, the recommendations of public health types will hit the buffer of people's willingness to comply and politicians' willingness to advocate very expensive and depressing measures. I think personally that buffer will be hit once death and hospitalisation rates really start to go down, especially if thar coincidences with lots of depressing headlines about the social and economic cost of all this.

Also I think the Government will love the idea of the UK being the first country in the world to officially declare Victory Over Covid and lift all restrictions, especially as it can be flogged as a benefit of Brexit.

Agree with all this. For every person on MN saying that lockdown has given them a chance to 'reflect' and 'enjoy the slower pace of life' there are any number of others desperate to get back to some kind of normality.

It's all very well for well-paid public health experts to say restrictions should go on indefinitely, and from their narrow perspective, they're probably right. But in the real world, people have priorities other than Covid, and having been told that vaccination would be the beginning of the end, it will be very hard to justify continued harsh restrictions beyond the first few months of next year. Especially as rolling on-off lockdowns don't seem to be having much long-term benefit, either here or elsewhere.

Agree with all this. For every person on MN saying that lockdown has given them a chance to 'reflect' and 'enjoy the slower pace of life' there are any number of others desperate to get back to some kind of normality.

You’re wrong to assume that people wanting restrictions to continue like lockdowns abs hand enjoyed them.

It's all very well for well-paid public health experts to say restrictions should go on indefinitely, and from their narrow perspective, they're probably right. But in the real world, people have priorities other than Covid, and having been told that vaccination would be the beginning of the end, it will be very hard to justify continued harsh restrictions beyond the first few months of next year. Especially as rolling on-off lockdowns don't seem to be having much long-term benefit, either here or elsewhere.

Totally agree. This is why I have no time for Whitty, Vallance, SAGE and all the rest of them. They don’t live in the real world and the 4000 deaths a day figure which was clearly pulled out their arse to scare people has really finally stopped me believing anything they have to say.

You’re wrong to assume that people wanting restrictions to continue like lockdowns abs hand enjoyed them.

Not everyone by any means, but there is no doubt that some people have indeed enjoyed lockdown. Right here on this thread we have someone saying how much she has enjoyed the lack of 'noise' and wants this to continue.

It's The Truman Show.

We just need to find the edge.

In countries affected by SARS people continued wearing masks for years afterwards ...didn't they 🤔

@Yohoheaveho

In countries affected by SARS people continued wearing masks for years afterwards ...didn't they 🤔

Not all of them and crucially they weren't required to.