To think we have gone collectively insane in our response to covid

[PlumsAreNotTheOnlyFruit]

This is something I have thought for a while. I feel like we are in the grip of insanity when it comes to our response to covid.

We seem to be prepared to destroy our economy, get into massive debt, surrender our freedom and mess up our children's education over covid.

It's a virus which can and will spread, and now seems more virulent than ever. Unless you have a total eradication policy, which is impossible for the UK to implement now anyway, then only mitigation is possible.

All of Europe whatever their policies have been now have many cases. Why do we have to suffer covid AND watch our businesses go under with a potential decade of economic misery.

How many lives have been saved by our policies? Has anyone even done an analysis? We reject cancer drugs because we say they are too expensive for the number of years of life saved. We allow polluting diesel vehicles to drive in urban areas despite the 40,000 who die each year from the effects of air pollution. Why is covid different?

I am cross that we haven't thrown everything at expanding health care capacity since March and instead have spent our money paying people not to work after closing things down.

Right now I feel that the virus will continue to spread whatever we do and that that our focus should be on shielding the most vulnerable until they can be vaccinated. I realise that isn't likely to be 100% effective but neither are our present policies.

I don't understand why DNR orders (which I partially see the logic in in some cases) and the Liverpool Pathway are routinely used for even over 70s, yet there is such a focus on vaccinating over 80s.

Because DNR orders and the Liverpool pathway are used for people at the end of their lives when they are very ill. A lot of people in their 80s are still perfectly healthy!

@AcornAutumn

“ In fifty years time I suspect this will be remembered as the Great COVID Derangement. They’ll probably study it in schools: how politicians and people were gripped by a death spiral of irrational group think.”

I hope so. But history is already being rewritten. Look at the WHO changing their definition of herd immunity.

A helpful explanation of herd immunity here www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31924-3/fulltext

" it remains unclear whether these antibodies [generated following covid infection] will protect individuals or generate herd immunity. Until there exist vaccines that can do both of those things, societies will need to continue to try to control the spread of the virus at the local level through public health measures and community action, to protect the most vulnerable people, and to support public health and medical systems. We should not simply put our faith in the immunity of our herd."

@herecomestheSon

'As regards everyone getting on with things and leaving the vulnerable to shield, only the bonkers fringe think this is a goer in the medical world. It would be very difficult to create a 2 tier society like that in reality.'

We're about to go into a total lockdown in my country again, exact same as March. How is it ok to make EVERYONE stay at home, but not ok to suggest only the medically vulnerable shield themselves while they are supported financially by that government?

@lavenderlou Of course lots of people in their 80s are healthy, but they're not the ones dying!!!

As per attached news report on SKY, 95 percent of Covid deaths had a pre-existing condition.

www.google.ie/amp/s/news.sky.com/story/amp/coronavirus-95-of-victims-in-england-hospitals-had-underlying-health-conditions-11979733

No one just wants to kill all the old people, that's ridiculous. But if you are only saving the life of someone who may possibly only live for a few more, poor quality months, filled with ill-health, how is that fair on the lives of others that are decimated for all the reasons we've discussed on this thread already? The NHS make health decisions based on cost every day. Why is Covid the exception?

95 percent of Covid deaths had a pre-existing condition.

Those pre-existing health conditions include things like diabetes or asthma that people could live with for years. My Dad's in his late 70s. He has a pre-existing health condition - hypertension. If he caught Covid and died he would be counted under the pre-existing health condition category despite the fact that his hypertension is perfectly well-managed by medication and he could likely live a healthy life for the next 10-20 years.

It’s not money vs people or ‘let it run rip through society’ vs ‘total police state’. It is a systemic and far more complex issue than that.

This absolutely. Talking about not destroying the economy isn't just 'prioritising business.' The economy is peoples lives, if people can't work then they can't eat. Mass poverty, deprivation, it's disastrous.

@lavenderlou But then your father should be protected and supported financially to stay at home? But why should everyone healthy be made stay at home?

I think everyone was on board with staying at home in March. But we're 9 months down the line and nothing has changed. With the vaccines, they've been v clear that this won't stop masks or social distancing, as they don't know if it stops transmission of Covid. Matt Hancock is talking about the possibility of normality in 2022!

"As regards everyone getting on with things and leaving the vulnerable to shield, only the bonkers fringe think this is a goer in the medical world. It would be very difficult to create a 2 tier society like that in reality.'"

It's hard to believe though (for me at least, though not in the medical world!) that for £350bn (is that the total cost so far - I'm not sure) we couldn't have achieved something in the way of shielding. it wouldn't have saved all lives, but then nor has lockdown. It would have involved massive organisational effort - but there you are - that's government!

The costs of lockdown are so great, and it seems its effects so quickly reversed when it is lifted, that it is worth looking at shielding in more detail, I think. Has anyone/govt/institute of this that/other, done a detailed analysis of what a combo of measures (pay care workers 10 * current salary more to live in or live in a hotel;, rehouse young workers living in multi-generational homes - all financially incentivised and not compulsory;) would achieve? Not sure how many children live in multi-generational homes - obviously they couldn't be re-housed! There I suppose the answer would be to suggest (not compel) the older generation be rehoused temporarily, with domiciliary care if necessary. Yes massively disruptive - but then, so is lockdown to many people (though not, i think, all).

"I think everyone was on board with staying at home in March. But we're 9 months down the line and nothing has changed."

Tbf, I think Sage were saying even then that the measures would have to be in place on and off for some time, and did point out that if you suppress the virus it will have a second peak (not sure they got as far as the third, fourth etc!). But was long-term suppression what was envisaged in March, or was the original aim to just to slow the spread in the short-term to keep it within NHS capacity?

What did Sage and other scientific bods say at the time about mutation, does anyone know - I can't remember?

I understand businesses are people’s livelihoods but it is surely inhumane to look the vulnerable up for a year so people can continue having fun in bars and restaurants etc.
To me it makes more sense to pay the businesses to close.
To shield the vulnerable you would effectively have to ban them going anywhere except a walk with all food and medicines dropped at the door and no contact with family members. You are even suggesting moving people into temporary accommodation away from thei families , bearing in mind some of these people need assistance. How on earth do you think this is doable?

@JS87 many vulnerable people should and are shielding anyway so how dues it not make sense why should everyone suffer?

"You are even suggesting moving people into temporary accommodation away from their families , bearing in mind some of these people need assistance."

Yes, they would need to have domiciliary care - or even a live-in carer. Obviously it should be voluntary though - many older people would prefer to remain with their families. I agree, it's difficult because it would be very lonely for older people living alone. Then on the other hand, paying businesses to close doesn't solve the problems of multi-generational houses where there are school children in the house. (I think you'd only need to do this where there are school children in the multi-generational household - young adults could be financially incentivised to move out themselves. )

It would be interesting to know - where is transmission really occurring? I wonder if it would be possible to take a sample of people testing positive on one day, track their previous contacts and do genomic analysis to try to work out where they got it, and how. Is that already being done, does anyone know? If we knew where transmission was most likely, we could take measures to address that in particular.

@Wemayhavemetbefore I don't think anyone envisaged we'd be here in December.

Why did they not try and build up capacity during the months where there were no issues? Medical professionals on here have acted like it's totally impossible to imagine that capacity could be built up , as there aren't enough ICU trained doctors and nurses. But couldn't all medical staff from different specialities been trained up on respiratory illnesses? Also, surely every single person who require hospitalisation with Covid are not ICU levels of sick?

Why is there so much hospital acquired infection if masks are so effective and staff are wearing full PPE?

Why do people keep saying the NHS staff will get sick themselves with Covid and the system will collapse.
Here are stats from the peak in March/April, when staff didn't have full PPE.

www.nhsemployers.org/news/2020/09/new-statistics-show-covid-related-nhs-staff-sickness-absence--content-page

There was a small increase , by about a percent or so to 6 percent total staff absent. So in March, 5.3 percent were out sick(all sickness, not just Covid related) then in April, 6.2 percent were out sick. (Again, all sickness, not just Covid)

Why did more retail staff not get Covid? If it's so contagious. Up until late Summer, no one wore masks. They were working through peak Covid, facing the public for 8 hours a day? Yet they got minimal amounts of Covid, almost certainly none of it acquired in work.

So many unanswered questions.

it remains unclear whether these antibodies [generated following covid infection] will protect individuals or generate herd immunity. Until there exist vaccines that can do both of those things, societies will need to continue to try to control the spread of the virus at the local level through public health measures and community action, to protect the most vulnerable people, and to support public health and medical systems. We should not simply put our faith in the immunity of our herd

I know someone who thinks they had Covid last December. Since then they have worked with a group of people who all tested positive for Covid afterwards but they had no symptoms and they were the only one to not be ill.
We think because they had antibodies still because of having the disease a couple of month before.

They also worked closely with another group of 5 who all then tested positive for Covid apart from them who isolated and the company got them tests. All came back negative.

They are surprised that they didn’t get Covid given how closely they were working with these people.
We can only assume that they still have some immunity nearly a year later.

"@Wemayhavemetbefore* I don't think anyone envisaged we'd be here in December.

Why did they not try and build up capacity during the months where there were no issues?"*

I am not sure about not envisaging December - I do remember there were a number of highly depressing convos on mn with some people saying we'd be here until 2021 - to the extent that i stopped reading!! They turned out to be right though. I think some Sage members were talking in March about on-off lockdowns going on for some time. I do wonder, if people had known that, would they have thought we should look at (possibly to reject, on close examination, I'm open minded) other possible measures such as shielding. I find it interesting that it was never considered even worth considering, iyswim.

Re NHS capacity - I wonder if we/govt got sidetracked in the summer into thinking suppression by test and trace/whackamole was the way forward? Has there been much progress in recruiting recently retired medics to address staff shortages - I think a register was set up which got a positive response, but not sure how many have actually been brought back.

@Wemayhavemetbefore

"As regards everyone getting on with things and leaving the vulnerable to shield, only the bonkers fringe think this is a goer in the medical world. It would be very difficult to create a 2 tier society like that in reality.'"

It's hard to believe though (for me at least, though not in the medical world!) that for £350bn (is that the total cost so far - I'm not sure) we couldn't have achieved something in the way of shielding. it wouldn't have saved all lives, but then nor has lockdown. It would have involved massive organisational effort - but there you are - that's government!

The costs of lockdown are so great, and it seems its effects so quickly reversed when it is lifted, that it is worth looking at shielding in more detail, I think. Has anyone/govt/institute of this that/other, done a detailed analysis of what a combo of measures (pay care workers 10 * current salary more to live in or live in a hotel;, rehouse young workers living in multi-generational homes - all financially incentivised and not compulsory;) would achieve? Not sure how many children live in multi-generational homes - obviously they couldn't be re-housed! There I suppose the answer would be to suggest (not compel) the older generation be rehoused temporarily, with domiciliary care if necessary. Yes massively disruptive - but then, so is lockdown to many people (though not, i think, all).

Of course it's been modelled and thoroughly examined as an option. Do you not think if it had been a viable option the government would have gone further down that path? And a CEV person myself I'd have been prepared to keep shielding if it had been a proven way of containing this thing, even though this year's constant shielding has been horrible (consultant advised me to keep doing it even when eased.)

'The vulnerable' are not just a few very elderly people who have months left and are of no use in society - they number over 20 million. Around a third of the population. And millions of them work, and have young children in school, and have businesses. If you propose to lock them away, would you:

. also lock their families away? Would their children have to stay at home? Work online? When everyone is talking about how this is affecting children's mental health, does the mental health of children of the CV matter, or children who are CV themselves (and what about their parents - are they also paid to stay home?

. Carers. You mention paying carers a certain amount to stay in hotels. Many carers have families of their own, do you want to shield the families too or do you want to rip the carers away from their families for months or years or however long?

. The vulnerable who work in schools, the NHS, industry, the public sector. When you keep them away from work what do you think will happen to these workplaces? With non vulnerable staff still falling like flies even with a mild version? It would be disastrous!

. Hospitals. Of course, this is where a lot of vulnerable end up and also where people catch covid. So do you propose to seal off all health workers too, as this is where they catch it, pass it on to their families, and so on and so on? Or do you propose to keep all 'shielded' out of hospital altogether, so bringing in a form of eugenics?

. All those people with conditions like cancer. Treatments are already so often delayed. As they fall under the vulnerable, what about them? Are they shielded and so barred from hospitals for their treatment? NHS staff attest to the impossibility of containing covid on hospital sites. If it's even more rife due to keeping most vulnerable locked away and allowing others to 'live as normal' then how do you propose to keep these people safe?

. What you are proposing is to subject 20 million people plus their families plus their carers plus their families plus plus plus to this shielded existence that you say destroys mental health and businesses. So in effect saying that it doesn't matter when it comes to these people, they are going to die anyway, we should only prioritise the young and the fit, we should only worry about their mental health and their businesses and their physical health.

. It's not just the vulnerable who contract and pass on covid. It's not just the vulnerable who get sick and die. Not just the vulnerable who get long covid. When you propose this course of action, you are basically condemning more non vulnerable people to death and disability, because numbers grow numbers when it comes to covid.

Just a few reasons why 'shielding the vulnerable and cracking on' is not at all a viable option, and would lead to greater inequality, poverty and collapse of all sectors of society.

"Why did more retail staff not get Covid?"

Yes the supermarket experience is interesting - I don't have the data, but I gather there have not been more (known) infections than average - even though supermarkets are kept at fairly cold temperatures. Obviously there may have been asymptomatic transmission to supermarket workers which was not detected - though perhaps no more likely than anywhere else?

On NHS capacity, does anyone know if the current 'we are at x% capacity' take into account private hospital beds? I imagine the government could pay to use those beds again this winter (as in spring), which would mean that there might be more capacity than appears from just looking at NHS beds. In London that might make a significant difference to forecasts as there are quite substantial numbers of private beds. (And they are are already staffed, of course). But perhaps the published capacity figures already take that into account.

I think we had far too many restrictions still in the summer and schools not going back then was an absolute travesty in my opinion. WHY was it ok for all kids to be back in September but not June/July? Weather wise spring was the best we've had in a very long time, the summer was decent too. Most people know respiratory viruses are worse in the autumn and winter and with so much school already lost, why was there so much resistance for the kids to be back? The infections were way way down in the warmer months. That's a prime example of mass hysteria.

"Of course it's been modelled and thoroughly examined as an option"

Has that work been published - it would be very interesting to see it?

No, I'm not proposing to lock anyone anyway - my suggestion is that we could look at it in more detail - with all measures to be non-compulsory and with financial incentives for those who want to do it. Sorry, I thought I'd made that clear.

"'The vulnerable' are not just a few very elderly people who have months left and are of no use in society hmm".....So in effect saying that it doesn't matter when it comes to these people, they are going to die anyway, we should only prioritise the young and the fit, we should only worry about their mental health and their businesses and their physical health."

I don't think I've said any of those things, and certainly don't think them.

@Madhairday honestly I don't think that taking mitigation seriously and increasing shielding whilst not ordering businesses to close would lead to the collapse of society. In fact I think keeping so many businesses shut until Easter is more likely to do that.

I just don't think the IFR is high enough at about 0.6 to cause society to collapse because of the disease itself. The black death killed a third of the population of Europe and still those societies didn't collapse. I read an interesting article in the Lancet which said that one of the reasons we didn't shut down in the flu pandemic in the 60s was because we didn't really have intensive care anyway.

@herecomestheSon thank you, very helpful.

@IloveJKRowling

Of course once levels are back down, suppression would still be possible. Suppression was possible in the summer, rates were relatively low but they did 'eat out to help out' instead, then decided to open schools with no extra funding and no mitigation against airborne spread.

It’s an upper respiratory virus, there are always less in the summer and more in the winter. It doesn’t survive well in strong UV light and we are outdoors more. Nothing to do with suppression, we lifted the lockdown June and cases started to increase significantly in October. It’s just following the pattern of any coronavirus.

@TheGreatSloth

In fifty years time I suspect this will be remembered as the Great COVID Derangement. They’ll probably study it in schools: how politicians and people were gripped by a death spiral of irrational group think.

I actually think the emotions involved are very similar to religious fanaticism. Fear, hope of salvation by following sacred rules, hatred of non conformity, hatred of those who deny or question the sacred rules, outward signs of compliance and allegiance (crucifixes, masks), devoted respect for an elite caste of sacred lawgivers (priests, SAGE).

It appeals to something very primitive in human nature & gives meaning (through hatred of dissenters and fear and rule following) to people whose lives perhaps have been lacking in meaning until now.

Also strong resemblances to Fascism - the importance of the group, no divergence of opinion allowed, strong social enforcement of norms, hysterical praise of sacred caste (the NHS clapping!).

Religion played a useful social role in many ways. Without it humans are prone to grasp at substitutes - I think this is one. It’s a psychological phenomenon.

Ironically, given the recent mutations, it rather looks as though we would have been better off protecting the vulnerable and letting the healthy build up natural immunity, by exposure, 9 months ago...the Great Derangement may have brought about the worst possible outcome. A mutated virus to which the population, masked and carefully locked away, has had no opportunity to build up immunity.

This is utter bollocks.

It is to do with people prioritising money over people's lives in a misguided belief that if they pretend there isn't a problem everything would just ping back to normal

What a load of bullshit. I don't think anyone's saying that at all. I'm sick of seeing such lies to prove someone else's "agenda"