How much more can we take? Is the end really in sight?.

[starship08]

I’m not trying to a pessimist, definitely not trying to be the doom and gloom type.

I felt incredibly positive this morning after hearing the news of the Oxford Vaccine.

I’ve tried so hard to keep positive and hopeful, but after watching the update tonight I can’t help but feel negative.

We still don’t know if the vaccine reduces transmission, which means even if the vulnerable are protected, they will still need to distance to prevent spread.

Boris and JVT mentioned that masks could be a long term measure, even after vaccines.

We still don’t know for certain that the vaccine will be effective for the new strain.

I honestly don’t know how much more I can take of this.

I’m totally and utterly fed up. I was diagnosed with PND and I know this is playing a part in how I’m feeling, but I struggling so much to see a future that’s bright.

Also there is a risk this will mutate again if spreading unchecked - and if it mutates in a way that makes the vaccine not work we are a bit scuppered.

inquietant even those in high risk groups have it mildly, on the whole.
People do die of flu. But we didn't adjust our behaviour up until 2019, did we? Other than high risk groups getting vaccinated.

Again, do you worry about flu mutations?

I’m reading about the Black Death, which wiped out 1/3 of the population. Covid sucks, but we’re not there.

Whooping cough is widely vaccinated against in childhood so we have herd immunity. It means you are really quite unlikely to encounter it.

Flu is massively less serious for all age groups - flu does kill but every age group is more likely to die from covid.

Chicken Pox we don't vaccinate for anyway and it kills very few people.

Covid is not like any of these things - Covid is only like Covid.

We be absolutely 100% don’t have herd immunity against whooping cough!

We do not worry about flu mutations because we understand flu much better and have lived with it for a long time.

Yes I would worry much more about covid mutations as it is very new and much more deadly than flu to start with.

I suspect the vaccine for covid will work much like the vaccine for other viruses. Milder illness plus lower viral load so lower transmission. They don't have evidence for this and I apologise in advance if I'm wrong.

I thought Whooping Cough was like Measles - it is not widely circulating due to the numbers vaccinated? Apologies if wrong. I have only ever known one person who has had Whooping Cough in the last twenty years.

Nope, pertussis is alive and well. I had it, and I can see why people die. It is terrifying. I ripped my bladder I coughed so hard. I have no other relevant underlying conditions.

Not only that, there were loads and loads in my region.

Yes I know someone who has it about seven years ago (probably just before the vaccine came on board). In Yorkshire.

Nope, pertussis is alive and well. I had it, and I can see why people die. It is terrifying. I ripped my bladder I coughed so hard. I have no other relevant underlying conditions.

I didn't mean no one gets it ever - but we have significant immunity in the population (herd immunity) due to vaccinations - obviously it hasn't been eradicated.

Herd immunity doesn't mean no one ever gets something, I think it just means it isn't circulating widely all the time as there are high numbers of immunised people.

There’s massive under reporting of it too because there’s really no treatment so if you rock up to the surgery with “hundred day cough” there’s no point in sending for serology because there’s nothing to be done anyway. I am a nerd though and insisted. But in any event there were 3500 ish cases reported at PHE last year.

Apparently whooping cough has been on the rise as people no longer choose to vaccinate their children thinking it is only a cough. When i was pregnant three years ago they were pretty insistent i had the vaccine as they were trying yo control a sharp tise in cases (id already had whooping cough itself). They wereel extremely eager to ensure bsure my child was vaccinated against it too. I think once illnesses disappear becauseof successful vaccination programes people can forget or not realise how serious they are which is presumably what has happened with the pertussis jab and uptake declines.
Currently, conversley, we have to find way to deliver all the vaccine everyone wants fast enough. Id happily go around injecting people!😁

@inquietant

Although Boris seems to think Easter

Surely no one still belives his bullshit? Jam tomorrow!

Fucking Boris fucking Johnson is a fucking bullshiter fucking liar.

But in any event there were 3500 ish cases reported at PHE last year.

That is tiny though, suggesting we are still mostly well protected. I appreciate vaccination levels are falling but we had 50k covid cases TODAY despite lockdown.

3500 confirmed Whooping Cough in a year is very small - and if it were causing a lot of deaths we would soon know about it.

Need to try and adjust now to this new normal. It's going to be like this for a long time. I'm resigned to it now.

@Lemoncheesecake31

I feel the same, I was hoping things would be looking up by March/April but it doesn’t seem that way when hearing them talk. Although Boris seems to think Easter.

All depends on the speed of the vaccines.

My guess is we'll start to see some normality by July/August but then more panic when cases rise in September due to schools and universities going back as younger people won't have had the vaccine yet.

Suddenly feeling a bit anxious tonight myself and I've dealt with it all relatively OK... For me it's that we've been at home over Christmas, not seeing anyone, no risk and now we're having to go back to school etc. Plus the figures rising alot in our area, that break from it all has done me no favours as now I'm more anxious than before when the kids were at school.

I worry about my kids getting covid, and wondering if there will be a long term impact from it later on, and that they won't get the vaccine so surely they are going to catch it with their schools going back.
Plus I'm breastfeeding so I probably won't have it, I have to stop myself over thinking when I start to get anxious

Continuing with hand washing is surely a good thing anyway, and I think I'll be wearing a mask in public places for some time to come. It's not really a hard thing to do - different of course for those who have to wear for hours at a time - but for me to wear while shopping etc, fine.

Dh and I had whooping cough a few years ago, apparently the vaccine only lasts 40 years or so. It was bloody awful and, having had it as an adult, I can quite see how children die of it. The cough just rips you apart and you cant breathe.

If there is anyone reading this who is thinking about skipping that vaccine for their kids, please, please reconsider. They will be so ill.

TBF, I am 60 and was vaccinated against whooping cough as a child. Christmas 2017 I started coughing, and coughing, in fits to the point of slightly vomiting. The coughing started late afternoon and was incessant.

My GP diagnosed it as whooping cough and said that the vaccine wears off and with reduced herd immunity it is transmitting again.

I had a little sob tonight after seeing may area was going into Tier 4. I live on my own and I'm finding it harder and harder to be positive. It spent Xmas on my own, as I couldn't go stay with my sister as she lives too far away to go for just one day. And yesterday was my birthday and obviously I couldn't celebrate it with anyone. So, yes it's hard right now, just trying to get through each day and hope in 6 months time, things will be looking a bit brighter?

There were long lines outside Tesco and M&S today which I know is because of Christmas primarily, but the thought of outdoors queuing in the icy cold, just to buy basics, makes me sad.

Not so much for me but you should have seen the old dears in the queue.