Further Restrictions 'Stricter than March' Needed

[Bewareoftheblob]

From the Telegraph today:

Sage advisers are calling for a lockdown tougher than the one seen in March as they argue the current restrictions do not go far enough.

Professor Susan Michie, a health psychology professor at University College London who sits on a Sage subcommittee, said more stringent action was needed.

While around 90 per cent of Britons are sticking to the rules there are also "more people out and about”, Prof Michie told the Today programme.

"It should definitely be tightened,” she said. "This is quite a lax lockdown because we’ve still got a lot of household contact, people go in and out of other’s houses. We should have stricter rather than a less strict lockdown than we had in March.

“You have this wide definition of critical workers and therefore you’ve got really busy public transport. There's also this new variant, and we have the winter season and the virus survives for longer in the cold.”

Link

Do you think they'll follow through with this? Reduce the amount of children in schools, ban support bubbles, heavier policing of people going about their daily lives?

Yes I do. One thing I’ve learnt, if it is in the Telegraph it is happening. The fact that they printing that schools are too busy, too many people are in work is mind boggling. The writing is on the wall. It’s a bit worrying if I’m honest.

I feel like I'm living in some hideous build-up to 1984.

I’d argue with the ‘90 per cent of Britons‘
are complying statement!!

Did you see the complaining here yesterday about women out having coffee and people complaining police were intervening with people travelling for ‘exercise’ ?

And the threads about how many kids are in school and people off to home bargains because all the Easter stuff is on the shelves?

This is no lockdown

Really @Everleigh2021? I think people are obeying it - mainly because there's no choice and nothing to do, admittedly - but there are no gatherings where I am. As far as I can tell, of course.

Or are people just lying about bubbles?

The issue with this - and I’ve said this throughout - is the legal mixing

The bubbles
The advice that ‘you can work if you absolutely can’t work from home’
Every business is milking that statement now they’re covid secure in theory

I worked from home 7 months from March but suddenly I’m full time and I’ve been given a key worker letter to use if stopped by police!

I’m not key worker but boss says I am now

I’m not alone

I don’t know a single person working from home

This creates false sense security

I work with 40+ people in an office building

All these people forced into work this time now need childcare etc

Two girls meeting outside for coffee are not causing this

Government does a lot of research into how many people are complying and how much people are moving around (not the same thing), but that’ll be on a national level so maybe everyone on your street is breaking the rules all the same.

In the spring lockdown social media was full of ranting about selfish covidiots flouting lockdown and flicking to beaches, but most of the country really was complying.

@Pastanred

The issue with this - and I’ve said this throughout - is the legal mixing

The bubbles
The advice that ‘you can work if you absolutely can’t work from home’
Every business is milking that statement now they’re covid secure in theory

I worked from home 7 months from March but suddenly I’m full time and I’ve been given a key worker letter to use if stopped by police!

I’m not key worker but boss says I am now

I’m not alone

I don’t know a single person working from home

This creates false sense security

I work with 40+ people in an office building

All these people forced into work this time now need childcare etc

This.

@Everleigh2021 I agree. In my experience it's much higher than that. At least 95%

Neither are support bubbles. Mine makes up a household size of 5. Not a chance I’d give it up even if banned when there are plenty of families that size.

Bubbles for single people living alone should remain but the government needs to get much tougher on companies making people work outside the home when they could be at home and on rules around the number of children in school.

Well the current "lockdown" is a complete waste of time - around here people are just carrying on with life as normal just with less shopping opportunities and a somewhat reduced social life.

I work in essential retail, non food

It’s laughable. Store had queues yesterday of people wanting to come in and buy essential cushions,plants and curtains. Whole families bored, kids in tow to ‘get them out for a bit’

Masks when worn all seem to have little noses peeking out

Customers wandering round browsing with a Costa in hand

90 per cent?

Oh and the bubble thing....yeah it’s open to interpretation that one!

That’s just my store but there’s hundreds of branches in this country and our company talk forum is full of identical stories in other parts of the U.K.

@countrygirl99 where do you work?

Susan Mitchie is also a member of the Communist Party. She is a behavioural psychologist who does research on 'behavioural manipulation.' Interesting.

I think that since that cafes and takeaways from hospitality should be stopped because while it seems legal to sell from these places, purchasing and consuming these takeaways seems to break all the guidelines (the reasons for leaving your house don't include getting a takeaway so there is no legal way to leave your house to obtain the takeaway). It is a really bizarre situation if it is legal to open your premises to sell something but not legal to leave your home to purchase what they are selling.

@Itisasecret

Yes I do. One thing I’ve learnt, if it is in the Telegraph it is happening. The fact that they printing that schools are too busy, too many people are in work is mind boggling. The writing is on the wall. It’s a bit worrying if I’m honest.

I think they will too and really hope they do clamp down further. It’s not just covid hospitals treat but many many other things and many don’t think of that.

There is still too much mixing going on and people using the exercise and shopping as a way to socialise. As for bubbles, some have two so that’s three households mixing straight away.

A significant proportion of people simply won’t comply and the public services and businesses don’t have resources to enforce.

Support bubbles are essential for those who really do need them and are really isolated. The current criteria for support bubbles are fine. The problem is the abuse of them. To prevent this, it would be relatively simple for the government to create a website where you list the one support bubble that you have and the reason for this. That would stop people having several or creating new ones everytime they want to socialise with someone different. it is quite easy to enable those that need support bubbles to have them and stop the abuse of this lifeline without removing them altogether.

Customers wandering round browsing with a Costa in hand

90 per cent?

That’s 90% of people complying with the lockdown rules, though. If your shop is open and Costa is open then someone wandering through with a Costa coffee is not breaking the lockdown rules.

So yes there’s a good argument for changing the rules around what’s allowed to open if they need to reduce all contacts further, but it’s not because people aren’t following the rules in place at the moment.

I posted this on another thread:

I think schools including nurseries should only offer places for NHS/Care/Police/Fire staff for the next 2-3weeks. As this would stop many people with children from working it would become a very harsh lockdown for 2-3weeks and therefore disrupt the covid transmission. Yes work places will suffer, including those that are critical, however with the way numbers are increasing it calls for drastic action. This should be known as Total Lockdown,we then revert back to the current lockdown and as soon as possible (End Feb/Mar) move the country back down the tier system.

Um, you might need to include children of school staff...

Not willing to give up my support bubble. They can go to soddery