PM to decide tomorrow whether to put whole country back into full lockdown.

[Calmandmeasured1]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9109023/PM-decide-Monday-plunge-England-lockdown.html

@LobotheBotanist

I am dreading a full lockdown and school closures and I think it’s the wrong decision

Me too.

I don’t want school closures, I don’t think anyone really does but there isn’t really any other option. All I want is for them to make a decision ASAP so I can prepare my kids and get home learning in place (as much as possible) but again they have left it to the last day to decide. My dd is due back tomorrow, she attends a sn school, she has ASD and needs preparing before going back, it’s taken her 2 weeks to get used to being at home and now she doesn’t know what’s going on tomorrow and I have no idea what to tell her.

I hope so. I mean I def don't want lockdown but it's better than the mixed messages so my friends can't pretend they don't understand and keep doing what they like!!

You might get the lockdown you all seem so desperate for but I doubt it will make a blind bit of difference. Unlike March, people are not complying with the stay at home order. All another lockdown will do is further hurt business, people’s livelihoods and kids education. The government has lost control of both the virus and people’s trust. There is no magic bullet solution, you can’t control a virus that is endemic and highly transmissible. Nowhere is safe. Time to accept that and move on.

Random I kind of like the way you're channelling the passive, enervated nihilism of the family in 'The Cherry Orchard'.
It has a kind of inter-textual and satirical quality.

However, make no mistake: since this is an actual, real pandemic, the cost here is actual lives - real people, embodied and loved.

People can be exhorted to accept a rising body-count. However, that exhortation founders and crumbles when it (inevitably) comes to pass that the abstract 'acceptable number of deaths' becomes someone they know - even live.

Then the abstract ethical calculation (economic cost and inconvenience versus acceptable deaths) gets very real. And people get angry.

Plus: an overwhelmed NHS means this:
It's not risk from coronavirus you have to worry about.
It's death from delayed treatment, road traffic accidents, heart attacks.

All of a sudden those have to get folded into the calculation of 'acceptable level of death'.

Anyway - it's academic now.

Johnson knows he has to lockdown.

He's just doing what he does: letting things get utterly critical for the public so that the headbangers in his Party have to go along with it.

We're now being used as collateral damage to protect Johnson from defenestration by the zealot wing of his Party.

@Purplethrow I've been reading Captain Pugwash to my kids and I think that's a really good analogy. Grand plans, no detail and super stroppy with actually can plan things Tom.

@Randominternetbitch so what happens with hospitals if we do nothing? Surely a lockdown will buy us some time especially with the vaccine being rolled out.

Maybe, horrifically we need to see pictures like we first saw in Italy with bodies lined up and people being sent home to die as no room in the hospital and they were elderly so weren’t priority to save, before people start taking this seriously again.

I'm absoloutely in pieces this morning about keeping the DC's off. It's the right thing to do for our family but what if they don't close this week? No idea what I'll do.

Most of the country is in tier 4, a lot of businesses are already closed (retail and hospitality) so going into lockdown won’t make much difference other than to the tier 3 areas, the economy is already f#cked.
This is about slowing down cases in hospitals, the backlog in hospitals for ‘non emergency surgery’ is huge, people are unable to get appointments for referrals (me being one of them), this virus is killing more than the people catching it.

The vaccine is being rolled out, hopefully quicker now we have the Oxford vaccine and there is talk that the vaccine has some effect after the first dose, this could eventually ease the pressure on the NHS, free up ICU beds so people awaiting surgery can actually get that surgery.

Of course lockdown is going to effect people in many ways, you can’t do what’s right for everyone but the focus needs to be on reducing the number of people needing critical care so the NHS can continue with what they are meant to be doing instead of focussing on Covid.

@Beebityboo

I'm absoloutely in pieces this morning about keeping the DC's off. It's the right thing to do for our family but what if they don't close this week? No idea what I'll do.

I feel the same, one of mine is off until the 18th but the other due back tomorrow. We need to know what’s happening.

@Randominternetbitch

You might get the lockdown you all seem so desperate for but I doubt it will make a blind bit of difference. Unlike March, people are not complying with the stay at home order. All another lockdown will do is further hurt business, people’s livelihoods and kids education. The government has lost control of both the virus and people’s trust. There is no magic bullet solution, you can’t control a virus that is endemic and highly transmissible. Nowhere is safe. Time to accept that and move on.

I agree. The thing with lockdowns is that businesses close down - restaurants, gyms, pubs, shops etc - because they can’t risk breaking the law and being fined or discredited. But individuals do what they want. The population aren’t committed to it like last time, because they know it doesn’t work. And for every one person who sticks rigidly to the rules, there’ll be several who don’t.

@Lovemusic33 near identical scenario here.

If I don't prepare her or prepare her wrong then school will end up with an explosive meltdown.

Being in a few days and then schools closing would be more catastrophic than being off from the start too

I’ll still stick to the rules but I’m not happy about it

Bloody lockdowns so miserable. Especially this time round.

Exams need to be altered so they are 100% coursework.

If you can do a degree with the Open University by remote learning I am sure more lowly qualifications such as A Levels and GCSEs can be too. In fact I’m sure there are online GCSE and A Level courses you can do....

@MarshaBradyo

I’ll still stick to the rules but I’m not happy about it

Bloody lockdowns so miserable. Especially this time round.

It will be much harder this time, it’s winter so it’s harder to get outside to do things, we have exhausted all the things we did to fill our time last lockdown and everyone’s fed up. I can’t imagine going back to the home school routine, forcing dd to do exercise (just dance), making bloody banana bread and trying to keep every one entertained. Last time I managed to do a lot in the garden, we grew veg and we walked a lot but that was April when the weather was good, this time it’s cold and depressing outside. I really hope that lockdown does not last months like last time because people just won’t comply, they have had enough.

A hard line on rule breakers needs to happen. Remove their passports and driving licences for ten years and slap them with a fine.

No more holidays, no more independent travel and a hole shot in the pocket. And if work depends on travel or driving then they can be unemployed too.

Not really sure what the difference will be between Tier 4 and lockdown?

IMO Tier 4 works if people comply which clearly many don't as shown here by the Covidiots who love to boast they are not taking any notice of it.

Schools are a different issue and there are conflicting points of view on that by educationalists and scientists and between themselves.

I am in Tier 4. I have been nowhere for months other than the odd supermarket trip almost at closing time. Even when we were in a lower Tier and more mixing was allowed, we didn't as it seemed risky.

It's people who spread the virus. If they don't comply, numbers rise.
And the harsher the rules - unless backed by military or the police- the more likely it is people will stick 2 fingers up and ignore them.

Bagamoyo1
Is there anyone on mumsnet who doesn’t want a full lockdown with school closures? It’s like a parallel universe here.

I think the majority of the U.K. support a full lockdown. 25m are over the age of 50 or CV. Those 25 m have close family or friends who don’t want to infect them. That maybe adds up to more than 1/2 the population, which is why so many support them.

Lockdowns DO work though. The first full one reduced cases to a tiny level. And this time we have a vaccination programme to be implemented during it.

They are a misery for all but presume all of us would want a hospital bed for covid/non covid should we or a loved one become very unwell.

@treedragon

Exams need to be altered so they are 100% coursework.

If you can do a degree with the Open University by remote learning I am sure more lowly qualifications such as A Levels and GCSEs can be too. In fact I’m sure there are online GCSE and A Level courses you can do....

Many OU courses have an exam at some point, They are not all coursework.

@ArseInTheCoOpWindow

Bagamoyo1 Is there anyone on mumsnet who doesn’t want a full lockdown with school closures? It’s like a parallel universe here.

I think the majority of the U.K. support a full lockdown. 25m are over the age of 50 or CV. Those 25 m have close family or friends who don’t want to infect them. That maybe adds up to more than 1/2 the population, which is why so many support them.

Tier 4 is pretty much full lockdown.

Shops are shut other than for food and essential services.

No mixing in homes or gardens.

Nothing else open.

Just make them 100% coursework then and send assignments off for marking.

Put exams online. A lot of the City and Guild ones are. As are things like NHS training courses with a test at the end.

What scares me most is how long a lockdown will go on and if it will do any good. Most European countries are struggling and the US is struggling so it's not as if we are uniquely doing something that is making everything worse.

All previous lockdowns seem to have done is bought some breathing space. Now if this lockdown did that and actually used the breathing space to vaccinate all the CV, I could support it but it just won't. The new strain seems to be able to spread regardless and the vaccination schedule seems a shambles. So what we will end up with is another long lockdown with no end date and very little achieved.

I'm also struggling with the impact it will have on my kids. My youngest is now Y7 so she was Y6 last time schools closed and missed out on all the usual end of primary stuff. She is awaiting an assessment for autism and finds the social side of school difficult but tries so hard. She was just starting to settle in and make some tentative friendships. Every time there is a new announcement she says 'but schools are open, right?'. I have been warning her they may close but it really is going to break her little heart and I'm worried for her.

What is missing in Tier 4 is schools closed and non essential workers who can’t work from home having to go into work. I know a few of those.

Always late on decisions, kids have a started mixing this morning, so a good part of the damage is already done.