The elephant in the room which is why these measures won’t work.....

[TransplantedScouser]

It’s not shops spreading covid or garden centres or people going on walks........

It’s also largely not down to offices or workplaces or even pubs and restaurants.

Two things :

Schools because children are known infection vectors

And people visiting friends and family

If the government said we’ll keep open the economy but you can’t see your friends and family in private settings then it would probably have a bigger effect

Sadly the latter is impossible to police and you get people saying “why can I go to the pub but not see my mother in her house”

And it’s because friends and family do not socially distance when there is not someone making them. At least in public there are monitors to come extent in the form of external people and staff.

It’s people like my 76 year old mum giving her friend a lift to the supermarket once a week so they are in the same car for over half an hour

Or having my aunt and uncle over to visit - well we sit on separate chairs - yes, in a small living room with the windows closed because you are old and feel cold

Or my friends kids running up to give us a hug when we pass them on the street.

Closing the economy down is a smoke screen because what actually needs to be done is impossible to police

"You've only got yourself to blame"
Are you going to stand in a covid ward and say that to the poor buggers on ventilators?

Of maybe climb off your high horse, unbutton your cardigan and accept that most people are trying their best. Fgs.

It's not, look at India and South Africa, or Latin America

Have different seasonal patterns.

Every single country in Europe saw strong suppression during the summer regardless of length, strength or even existence of lockdown.

We aren’t allowed to mix socially unless in a bubble.
Seems like you want a police state.
I do not

Also it’s a virus, it’s on all surfaces atm

@PicsInRed

If it's more transmissable, supermarkets will be a vector, as will hospitals, petrol station kiosks, apartment hallways and lifts and possibly even common airspace between houses (e.g. if you can smell their cooking, their air is your air). Door handles, buttons, pens, an (infected) neighbour's dog or cat jumping or brushing past you, mask adjusting. It's already been called lockdown resistant and that's the problem.

I agree with you completely

I'm ECV, believe me I am taking this seriously.

But I refuse to believe that I am in more danger in my mums car than in a random taxi. Especially as in order for me to go with DW (I'm a wheelchair user unable to self propel, so need someone there), I'd need to find someone to look after the DCs too. So then that would probably be my mum anyway!!

Im in NI and weve not been allowed in each others homes for months.. bar 1 day at Christmas

I've caught it and I think it must've been from school before Xmas. Daughter only had what I thought was a mild cold. We didn't see any family though so it's contained to our household, except a couple of shop visits before we knew. Hope we didn't pass it along.

@CompleteBarstool

Schools because children are known infection vectors

So why did Boris announce this lockdown after many schools had been back a day and after private school pupils had started to return to their schools from far flung areas of the UK and globe.

An announcement last week (or even at the weekend) could have prevented all these unnecessary contacts and potential spread.

Absolutely agree. In fact those of us the work in schools have seen this coming for a more than a month, but not in a position to do anything about it until 3 days ago.

It’s peoples’ attitudes that will stop this working. Selfish individuals and families bending the rules to suit themselves.

How do people know that they caught covid from the pub/garden centre/shop etc? I caught an awful cold - also viral - during the first lockdown after keeping very safe and following all rules religiously. I have no idea where I caught it just like people won't know for certain where they caught covid. Hospital acquired an exception. As for shopping, how is a single parent meant to shop if they have young children if expected to shop alone? We need to be less judgemental on others and look much more carefully at our own behaviour. Many complain at others 'bending the rules' but don't look at their own behaviour as it doesn't suit them.

There have been various studies showing that children under 12 are much less likely to spread the virus, although this doesn't account for the new strain. There obviously haven't been studies done on this. In Spain schools haven't been a major source of virus spread and certainly in the city where I live there have been very few classes having to go into confinement. However, children here wear masks, so that may account for the fact that the spread is much less.

I agree OP- any sustained close-proximity contact with non-household members drives the virus.

Yes.
It's really, really frustrating.
People "doing (their) own risk assessment" and bending the rules
People abusing the bubble system

But what can you do? They're not going to listen to anything anyway.

I was expecting you to say incorrect mask use. I only know one person who puts a clean mask on every time they take one off and washes them regularly....

Keeping nurseries open is a mistake if we are going to stop the escalation of cases. Staff are in close contact with children who cannot socially distance for long hours and the new variant is 70% more transmittable. The children, families and staff in early years should be afforded the same protection as in schools. I am not convinced that keeping them open is a safe decision but rather a political and financial one.

I think culture is a major issue, in Asia where I worked compliance is much better the general good is accepted as more important than freedom to bend rules. Our culture is not fit for purpose, we are learning the hard way , the virus is independent if our behaviour patterns, but we will get there eventually.

Our culture is not fit for purpose

What a bizarre thing to say. All cultures have positives and negatives and are the result of complex historical and societal developments over thousands of years.

I don’t think it should come as an enormous surprise that individualised, libertarian cultures like Western Europe struggled, but societies that suppressed it more successfully sometimes used methods that we would find intolerable.

We are who we are. Starting from a position of understanding this would be more beneficial in figuring out what works for us than ‘be more China’

Reading the BBC news coverage from inside University College hospital is harrowing. How can people justify breaking the rules when the NHS is at breaking point?

I know of a number of people who met friends to have a substantial meal in a pub before Christmas. That wasn't allowed but neither pub nor friends stuck to rules. If that has happened all across the country it's possibly contributed to current situation.

Ihave never seen a gang of unruly youths gathering around the wisteria at my gc, it is ONLY older ones that gather

@Tommo75

I know of a number of people who met friends to have a substantial meal in a pub before Christmas. That wasn't allowed but neither pub nor friends stuck to rules. If that has happened all across the country it's possibly contributed to current situation.

Same here, quite a few friends I knew did this in tier 2 at the time. It’s quite depressing how they thought the rules didn’t apply to them.

When we went to a pub - with our household - I would say a large proportion were non household groups, and it would make me not go back to that pub again.

There was one table of 2 young couples and about 8 young kids. Young kids were wandering all over the place, couples were running after them- not one mask worn.

There were multiple tables of older couples with younger couples and sometimes kids, eg parents, grandparents, grandchildren etc.

I hardly know anyone who’s caught it, and have myself tested negative five times.

That’s because I have been WFH, don’t visit other people’s houses or pubs, don’t go to church, don’t use public transport or fly on planes, and haven’t been to a hospital or doctor’s surgery in ten months.

However my DC has been going to primary school (zero cases in their year), I do go to supermarkets and walk around outside without a face covering.

The only people I know who have had it are those who’ve been to hospital, flown overseas or used the Tube recently.

I've been to pubs, had meals out, had friends visit in the garden, used public transport etc etc. Know very very few people who've had it aside from students and all very mildly. A friend caught it from an indoor yoga session.

Interesting segment on C4 news the other day from a medical scientific type person who belies this "people breaking rules" theory. The media loves to report on rule breaks, and the general public loves to spot it and gloatily and sanctimoniously take the higher ground re "flouting" Inc numerous FB friends who love ranting about a covid "flout" but had grandparents round at Xmas. The guy on the news was saying the "rule break" theory isn't supported and the majority have been mostly compliant, to what end as it's not working and we're still locked up and blaming each other.

Just seen elderly grandparents taking 2 grandchildren out for a walk, parents WFH, locally there's ample childcare available for those kids, they are pre school age. But it's easier and cheaper for them to risk their grandparents lives. Friend still using grandma for her school age childcare despite having the cash to use other options. Where money is an issue I get, however in all cases I've seen locally it really isn't. That's where the transmission lies, alongside those facing poverty who have to go to work as they don't have the luxury of furlough or paid for public sector jobs.

I have done all the mixing that has been legal and I haven't got it, unless I was asymptomatic and didn't know. But obviously, that is just luck and I know I could get it. I know plenty of people who have.