If this had happened 40-50 years ago...

[Swissrollypoly]

Do you think things would be different? Do you think we’d just have to get on with things as we wouldn’t have the means to work from home or communicate via Zoom or Microsoft teams etc.
Social media didn’t exist, so there wouldn’t be as much panic and scaremongering.
I just wonder how different it would all be, had it happened in another time period.

I got 2.5 of my income in 1981. No problem at all as a single woman of 21.

I recall eyebrows being raised when we requested 2.5 times joint income even then.

If I remember correctly, it was usually 3+1. The 3 was based simply on the highest earner.

@TheKeatingFive What about men ‘wanting it all’? the vast majority of men don’t want to be a sahp , they are happy with going out to work and providing an income for their family.

the vast majority of men don’t want to be a sahp

And plenty of women don’t either. They want to financially provide for their family too 🤷‍♀️

@GlowingOrb

People traveled much less 40-50 years ago. We wouldn’t be dealing with the same kind of spread. The consequences of closing the boarders to personal travel would have been much lower. Freight travel was still prevalent, but it was slower and more flexible to border quarantine.

We also lived in a world where women were just barely entering the workforce. That could have been stopped very easily if schools needed to close.

So no, I don’t think we would have just got on with it. I think the borders would have closed and if it got in, the men would have kept working and the women and children would have been forced to stay home. It would be just as much of a nightmare as now, but would impact society differently.

We certainly didn't live in a world where women didn't work. Maybe a doctors wife or similar could have stayed at home and arranged flowers but most women did work. My DGM, mum and aunts all worked. Often at more than one job. Twilight shifts in the factories were often manned by women with small children. Dad came home at 5ish to a cooked tea. Mum went out and started work at 6pm until 10 or 11pm. That is when clothes and shoes and many other thing were made in Britain.

Schools wouldn't have closed either. They never closed in the 60s and early 70s. If secondary school buses were late (because of snow) we were told to walk the 3 miles to school

People did travel abroad but it tended to be for a couple of weeks in the summer. Very few would have gone skiing in February. I went on a school skiing trip in the Easter holidays in the early 70s. I felt very fortunate and mum and dad saved all year to pay.

Older people would have caught it in the pubs, church, etc because they would have stayed open. Every family would have been affected but it was normal for people to die younger. If you made it to 70 you had had a good innings.

We certainly didn't live in a world where women didn't work. Maybe a doctors wife or similar could have stayed at home and arranged flowers but most women did work. My DGM, mum and aunts all worked. Often at more than one job. Twilight shifts in the factories were often manned by women with small children. Dad came home at 5ish to a cooked tea. Mum went out and started work at 6pm until 10 or 11pm. That is when clothes and shoes and many other thing were made in Britain.

The jobs women did wouldn't generally have been affected by schools closing though. There was no formal childcare and children were looked after by family and friends if mothers worked and that would have continued if school shut . People were of the opinion that school shouldn't be considered as childcare so women's jobs wouldn't have been a consideration.

Schools wouldn't have closed either. They never closed in the 60s and early 70s. If secondary school buses were late (because of snow) we were told to walk the 3 miles to school

They used to shut at the drop of a hat in the mid-to-late 70s! Were you at school during the winter of discontent?. As the school buses, if they didn't turn up by a certain time because of snow we were allowed to go home. No one would worry about children's mental health because most children didn't like school anyway plus mental health wasn't really a consideration.

Growing up in the 1960s, none of my friends mothers worked, except one. She was a GP.

friends'

@TheKeatingFive And plenty of women don’t either. They want to financially provide for their family too but those that do cannot. There would be no need for women to financial provide for their families if one wage could sustain family life.

In the 1970s and 80s many people were still working in industry. Mills and mines etc. So many were in the same "working class" boat. People were more resilient, more used to hardship. Food rationing had only just ended in the 1950s. Most people did not have central heating. Did not rely on fast food or ready meals. Many did not own a car or their own home. Most people did not holiday abroad. There would not have been the same amount of whining and complaining. People were less spoilt and less consumer minded. Less shopaholic

But, as is the case now, science at the beginning of the pandemic would have looked at the virus and understood straight away the very serious implications of what they were dealing with. We would have taken the same, or very similar measures, of lovkdown, probably even more strict. People back then did not take the NHS for granted, because many more would have remembered a time without it.

Growing up in the 1960s, none of my friends mothers worked, except one. She was a GP.

I remember the opposite. Most of my friends mothers worked in textile mills

There were very few ‘single parent families then, other than widows. My grandmother was a widow and had to live with her —ghastly— MIL because it was the only way she could work to support her children. Part of the massive childcare problem with schools closing is the fragmentation of households.

Agreed@EmmanuelleMakro, I don't recall anybody at all who was part of a single parent family.
And yes, far less obsession with stuff, far lower expectations, far more routine and monotony.
The Church played a bigger role and as I said ( much to the hilarity of some) the affects of WW2 still apparent. I still have some of my early reading books, black and white line drawings.

@TransplantedScouser

We’d have cracked on and got on with it

I was about to say even in the 80s it would have gone down as a bad flu / then I realised it was 40 years ago

I’m 44

Social and 24 hour media has a lot to answer for

Yes some young people have died but I general it kills people with an average (mean, median and mode) over 80 - three score years and ten used to be human life expectancy - we’ve pushed the boundaries so I can’t cry over 80 year olds dying

We seem to have a generation of people who think living to 90 and people not dying is a given right - it’s not.I would have hoped this would’ve a reality check but all we’ve done is fuck every one else’s lives

What a disgusting comment

What a disgusting comment

Wrong as well.

It’s strange that so many people seem to think the Conservative government is still running the furlough scheme because they are worried about what people might say on Facebook.

@Ladydowntheroad I don’t find the comment disgusting, I think it’s nuanced and understands that we’re not in a black and white situation where prolonging life at all costs=good, not doing this=bad.

Decisions and trade offs are complicated, and different people will come to different conclusions. How do you weigh up the relative merits of giving a frail 90 year old 6 months more of life versus the negatives that come about due to closing schools so a vulnerable child living in poverty cannot access education, school meals, pastoral care etc for months on end? There’s no simple right answer.

To pretend that extending the life of already elderly people trump all other considerations is naive at best.

There would be no need for women to financial provide for their families if one wage could sustain family life.

Women, like men, also want financial independence and to participate equally in society.

[quote HerculesMuligan]@Ladydowntheroad I don’t find the comment disgusting, I think it’s nuanced and understands that we’re not in a black and white situation where prolonging life at all costs=good, not doing this=bad.

Decisions and trade offs are complicated, and different people will come to different conclusions. How do you weigh up the relative merits of giving a frail 90 year old 6 months more of life versus the negatives that come about due to closing schools so a vulnerable child living in poverty cannot access education, school meals, pastoral care etc for months on end? There’s no simple right answer.

To pretend that extending the life of already elderly people trump all other considerations is naive at best.[/quote]
The hospitals aren't overflowing with people over the age of 90 though. Those people are probably dying at home or in care homes. The hospitals are full with younger people seriously ill with Covid and that means younger people who are ill with other conditions will not be getting treated. If that occurred in the 70s or 80s, schools would be the first thing to shut.

I think there would have been decisive action and a fair amount of ignorance is bliss.

@TransplantedScouser

We’d have cracked on and got on with it

I was about to say even in the 80s it would have gone down as a bad flu / then I realised it was 40 years ago

I’m 44

Social and 24 hour media has a lot to answer for

Yes some young people have died but I general it kills people with an average (mean, median and mode) over 80 - three score years and ten used to be human life expectancy - we’ve pushed the boundaries so I can’t cry over 80 year olds dying

We seem to have a generation of people who think living to 90 and people not dying is a given right - it’s not.I would have hoped this would’ve a reality check but all we’ve done is fuck every one else’s lives

It may be killing people with a median age of 80 at this point in history, but if it has happened 40 or 50 years ago it may well have been killing people with a median age of 60. The underlying conditions which make people vulnerable to Covid were much less well treated in those days. There may have been people arguing that nobody has a God-given right to live beyond 70 but that would be balanced by many who wouldn't see education is very important anyway. In addition the last thing people would have thought about is "mental health".

[quote AldiAisleofCrap]**@TheKeatingFive* And plenty of women don’t either. They want to financially provide for their family too* but those that do cannot. There would be no need for women to financial provide for their families if one wage could sustain family life.[/quote]
Then as I said before, why not equally blame men for not cutting back their work time to make space for the women who wanted to work, make time to look after the children/house themselves and then prices wouldn't have been able to rise so much? Isn't it just as much their actions?

The hospitals are full with younger people seriously ill with Covid and that means younger people who are ill with other conditions will not be getting treated. If that occurred in the 70s or 80s, schools would be the first thing to shut.

And the problem isn't just shortage of beds, it's shortage of staff who can't work if they have or might have covid.

This quite clearly shows that the 85+ age group are the majority of patients being admitted.

This quite clearly shows that the 85+ age group are the majority of patients being admitted.

However, most probably aren't being intubated, and regardless of whether in hospital or at home, even 70 years ago doctors and nurses provided care for the dying, even if they didn't except to save them.

It should also be remembered that these numbers would be much higher if there had been no restrictions and everyone had 'just got on with things'.

Lots of people still eat very bland, repetitive diets - probably more of them involve convenience food now, but lots of people still have very narrow palates and idea of what a meal is. Those people just don't much post on MN
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