How do you think this will end now?

[pinkpetal2]

Sorry if there's been a post on here already, I can't see it.
So if we vaccinate all the groups he said by February.
What do you think will happen next?

Will there ever be a need for lockdowns again do you think?

Will summer be relatively normal...

Not anxious about it, but I do keep seeing people online like Neil Clark who keep saying this will be life forever. Honestly can't see that, nor understand it.

I'm actually more concerned about the economic impact, that will possibly cost more lives in the long term. If over the next 5 years we start to have food shortages, huge unemployment, not much of a health service left etc then the restrictons might still be in place- but not to control the virus, to control the population from mass unrest when things turn bleak.

@LaurieFairyCake

I'm getting a gnawing suspicion we're fucked - I've had this thought for about 2 weeks

Im starting to think this is pretty much a one way train...

I'm rarely wrong, I'm hoping I am wrong

I feel the same. I've felt this for... quite a while. But I SO want to be wrong on this. This also feels like a sort of dummy run for the next pandemic, which I do feel is coming in my lifetime. The only way I can live happily with thoughts of the above is just to stick my head in the sand and live stoically, zen-like in the present. I'm not managing that today, though...

Wait till Covid eases a bit and get over to NZ before the next pandemic (and there will be another as long as people keep eating wildlife).

I’d love to live there but they wouldn’t accept me. I’m too old.

As others have said, there will be another pandemic because of what we are collectively doing to the planet.

The sixth mass extinction of species is happening now - all caused by humans.

My son just asked me if tier 6 is where they just kill us all

Love this!

I can see hospital numbers dropping off once the vulnerable have been vaccinated but I don't think we'll start seeing the effects until May time. Even with the vaccine rollout, this new variant is going to keep case numbers high so I think they'll use that to keep restrictions, social distancing, etc in place.

The new variant has been the game changer, it's basically as common as the common cold but seems to knock you for six still if you get it. Even with the vulnerable and older age groups vaccinated I think they'll use it as an excuse to keep many of the restrictions. If we're lucky the new variant will also be seasonal and we might get a summer like last year but case numbers will start to spiral again once it gets to Autumn and schools go back just like last year. That could see lockdowns in effect again as vaccinating the entire country is not going to take a matter of months and I suspect it will constantly mutate like flu.

As others have said, this won't be the last pandemic, we've just been lucky up until now. The real worry is when something comes along with a 10-15%+ mortality rate like in that film, Contagion, that's when we'll see the breakdown of society.

I'm sincerely worried for the mental state of some of the people on this thread.

It can't be healthy.

This is the third Pandemic I have lived through.During those everything carried on as normal and nothing changed.

This is entirely different,the virus will go away,but our lives will not go on the same.The economy has been destroyed,people losing their businesses and homes.

The class divide will be worse than ever,the poor will be poorer and the rich richer.

Lockdowns are causing more harm than good.Protect the NHS,just stay home and die.

If you went by the degree of Covid hysteria and melodrama on mumsnet, then Godzilla attack or full zombie apocalypse is the only outcome that would be commensurate with the amount of 'woe is me/end of the world is nigh' nonsense.

Godzilla Attack!
Really made me smile thank you!

I feel optimistic that we will be living much more normal lives by the summer, still some social distancing, masks etc. but able to do things. Cases were generally much lower over the summer last year and we didnt have a vaccine then. We wont vaccinate all the vulnerable groups by the end of feb but will have made some good headway. This feels forever, it's awful but it will end.

Once the vaccination programme is fully underway it will become much more about hospitalisation and deaths.... Case numbers will Be obsolete if they have little effect on the NHS.... We were down to single figure deaths a day in the summer without a vaccine.. This will be the case come may/June again this year.

@mac12

China, why the laugh? Pretty much covid free. Yeah, a brutal lockdown in Hubei province that we couldn’t & shouldn’t tolerate here but it is certainly back to normal life - families, parties, sporting events & economic growth. We have fucking dust right now. We should be looking at what worked in other countries (Taiwan, South Korea, NZ etc) that can be adapted & made to work here.

Hello, China is censored, what China tell the world isn't what really happens, you should know that by pone - I mean, that's why we're in this shitshow!!!

The fallout from this will take a long while to recover from, but there will be an end to this pandemic like all pandemics in the past (usually with no vaccine). Yes there'll be another pandemic but could be many years from now.

The thing that worries me the most is if we get out of this a lot of scientists have said this pandemic isn’t the ‘big one’ they’ve been predicting we are due for.
But one day at a time. @LaurieFairyCake how do you mean? As in it’s just going to have to be left to run its course once measures don’t work? I’ve been feeling the same, a low level anxiety that we haven’t seen the worst yet and that stupid decisions by our inept government have ensured we aren’t going to get out of this any time soon.

I was feeling so so hopeful with the vaccines but since last night and reading between the lines of the language used, that’s all gone. Remember when good old Boris was promising it would all be spiffy in 12 weeks? They have to give us some kind of deadline to give us hope and so we don’t all go insane. Doesn’t mean anything IMO.

@Layladylay234 - Fuckin Ay

The issue with lockdown is that (a) if cases continue to increase or remain high, the lockdown has to continue, (b) if cases go down it’s because of the lockdown, so they can’t lift it, (c) if lockdown is lifted / eased cases will inevitably rise - solution? Another lockdown.

I think they will get on top of it with vaccines. Like the flu. People have to remember that the flu unvaccinated has a ten percent death rate. Covid is less than 0.5. The reason flu doesn’t stop us like Covid has is because all vulnerable people are vaccinated annually. And the vaccine is tweaked too, it’s not the same one.

I think that’s what will occur with this. They will get on top of it with the vaccine then it will eventually become like a flu vaccine for us

I’d say by early spring, we should be through the worst of this and be moving to opening up society again. A flexible vaccination program that works like the flu one does, will be critical.

I (think I..?) believe ‘they’ are trying to bring in a complete financial reset. Collapse economies and bring in new cashless banking etc. Like they have in parts of China. Sometimes I think it will all be over by the summer.. and the next minute think we are all doomed!

The combination of lockdown, Spring weather, immunity by infection and immunity by vaccination should see a much better picture in March.

January and early Feb will be tough. Late Feb and March should see an ever improving picture. Restrictions will mostly be lifted by late Spring.

This is reliant on people understanding the massive skew in risk toward the elderly. The uninformed healthy 30 year olds that refuse to step outside their door will be the ones that prolong this.

I'm really starting to get a bit twitchy sbout oyr future.
Sadly the vaccines aren't going yo solve thus. It's mutating. We've never eradicated flu with its million variants. What's worrying is the mutations all seem to be nak8ng it more and more transmissible which isn't always the case with flu variants.
I not saying we're all doomed but we'll be playing cat and mousec for a few years yet.

Sadly the UK has completely missed it's chance of eradicating this like NZ. The lack of trust in our government plus the apathy of the public means no lockdown will ever ever work as well as the one last spring (which wasn't a full or roaring success)
Sad fact is it's us, the people moving and spreading this virus. Unless we get boarded up into our homes with the threat of being shot upon leaving your house, no one now will follow the rules to the letter.

We were too soft, too late to for not long enough last Spring. Now we've all had enough and are fed up and fucked.

Riots starting in the Spring is my guess.

Q: How do you think this will end?

A: In tiers.

Oh wait!

I also think zero Covid is the way to go. Vaccines will just be catch ups, or another string to the bow.

Not sure how we do it though

I am starting to wonder what kind of world I’ve brought DS into.
I don’t think we will see riots personally. I think boris is too soft to be hard on restrictions for a long period of time and he will lift any kind of lockdown as soon as he possibly can in whether it’s sensible or not.

I could be wrong though. The mood is definitely turning.

I also don’t see how the vaccines are the answer to this - yes they will help but we’ve been told again and again they’re not a magic bullet. They might get it a bit more under control than it is now but they aren’t going to save the day and everything is going to be normal.