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Deaths everywhere, yet we are still going to work this morning. Why?

532 replies

TwirpingBird · 21/01/2021 06:56

I am sitting here watching BBC breakfast with another harrowing video of ITU nurses at breaking point, ambulances lined up outside, 1800 dead yesterday, and headlines of 'lockdown isnt working', 'people arent complying' blah blah blah. Its all 'you need to follow the rules, you need to stay at home. I am seething.

My husband is leaving for work in an hour where he will enter 5 houses today to do completely non essential work because the government deem him a 'key worker'. My best friend will go to work in her office in a interior design company because she is a 'key worker'. Her husband will go to work giving quotes for kitchens in people's houses because his boss deems him a 'key worker'. None of my friends are on furlough. We are all seeing nobody outside of work. We are all sticking to the 'rules'. But how could we possibly expect the rules to work when everyone is still getting in their cars this morning?

I am raging angry. I am SICK and TIRED of being told 'follow the rules'. WE ARE!!! The rules make no bloody sense. And people are still dropping like flies, and experts are saying the lockdown isnt working, and the public are still being tarred as 'lacking empathy' because we are killing people. We are going to work! Kids are still in school! And then we come home and we do what we can but its never going to be enough. I am starting to wonder why I am bothering to hide myself away, managing a 2 year old and a newborn alone 5 days a week, naively thinking I am helping to manage transmission, when in reality its not helping at all because people are still at work.

OP posts:
PinkSparklyPussyCat · 21/01/2021 21:39

Also, where do you draw the line? DH is 66 and therefore a pensioner. Should he not be going out?

MarshaBradyo · 21/01/2021 21:39

@AmoElCafe

Since you are happy with your lockdown and not in the UK anyway, I can't understand why you are on this thread, just trot off and enjoy your way of doing things

She can’t, she needs to tell us how entitled we are.

So many people hanging around to tell us about the U.K.
rowmaccerd · 21/01/2021 21:40

@TheKeatingFive

My mum is 84, she lives on her own, and so by the law of the land here she hasn't been allowed out or anyone else into her house for nearly 3 weeks

Well there’s your answer. Lots of people in the U.K. have been under restrictions for a lot of the last 10 and a half months. How would your mother feel about staying in her house, seeing no one, for that kind of timeframe?

She doesn't have to because she and her friends and all the rest of us locked down for a few weeks in a way the UK never has.

That small sacrifice means that next week we all get our freedom back, same as we did in June after a 3 month lockdown last year

AmoElCafe · 21/01/2021 21:41

@PinkSparklyPussyCat

Also, where do you draw the line? DH is 66 and therefore a pensioner. Should he not be going out?
My mum is 65 and still works full time in the NHS. She’s been doing Covid vaccinations for the past 3 weeks. Maybe she should stay home too, as she’s old!
Shehasadiamondinthesky · 21/01/2021 21:43

Businesses are in a panic and forcing their employees to come back to work. First lockdown the roads were completely empty of cars on my way to work (NHS) but now they are heaving with normal traffic so it's plainly obvious people are going to work as usual.
I've given up caring, this situation is getting farcical. i just do my day at work and go home and don't even stick my head out of the door any more.
I'm going to be a proper hermit when this is all over.

PinkSparklyPussyCat · 21/01/2021 21:44

How dare she leave the house @AmoElCafe, anyone would think there was something important like a vaccine roll out going on! As for my DH, why couldn't he have black tea and dry shredded wheat rather than buy milk in the corner shop?!

In all seriousness thanks to your Mum for what she's doing.

Bambi1222 · 21/01/2021 21:44

I've been reading lots of the covid threads tonight. Off topic but I just want to say as I can't out loud. I CANT do this until Easter or summer or whenever it ends. I just CANT.

TheKeatingFive · 21/01/2021 21:45

She doesn't have to because she and her friends and all the rest of us locked down for a few weeks in a way the UK never has.

The U.K. had a very successful first lockdown (a lot more than a few weeks) that got numbers down very substantially. The older population were confined to their homes in this period.

I suspect wherever you are had the benefit of having fewer cases at point of lockdown. Which is mostly lucky timing.

And you didn’t answer the question. How would she be feeling about the guts of 10 months of isolation?

PinkSparklyPussyCat · 21/01/2021 21:47

@Bambi1222, it might be best for you to step away from the Covid board, it seems to be especially batshit tonight.

MiniTheMinx · 21/01/2021 21:50

@TheKeatingFive

The elderly too have a moral obligation to society and to do the right thing, and if they are slow to assimilate this, or need it spelt out then, yes maybe it needs spelling out?

How? Shall we get the welders in?

You miss the point that many in this age group do not actually want society to be locked down to ‘protect’ them.

Prolonging an isolated, joyless, lonely existence for the sake of it isn’t worth it in their eyes.

But by their own actions they are prolonging the agony for everyone, irrespective of their personal opinions. And, no I am not suggesting we get "tough" on elderly people. I don't know the answer.
TheKeatingFive · 21/01/2021 21:51

Off topic but I just want to say as I can't out loud. I CANT do this until Easter or summer or whenever it ends. I just CANT.

I know how you feel. Don’t then.

Just do what it takes to survive. That’s what I’m doing.

MarshaBradyo · 21/01/2021 21:51

@Bambi1222

I've been reading lots of the covid threads tonight. Off topic but I just want to say as I can't out loud. I CANT do this until Easter or summer or whenever it ends. I just CANT.
I hear you. Just hearing SAGE or whoever

No words

TheKeatingFive · 21/01/2021 21:53

But by their own actions they are prolonging the agony for everyone, irrespective of their personal opinions

But it’s them we’re supposed to be doing this for. 🤯

At their age, every month is precious. Who are we to curtail them at this stage in their lives?

McCorona · 21/01/2021 21:55

@Tinty

You are all perfectly happy for Nurses to HAVE to go to work and nurse the sick patients or supermarket staff to work so you get your food and delivery drivers have to work to deliver it to you. Just so long as YOU don’t have to go to work and be at risk. I hope no one complaining of having to go to work, are buying non essential items from Amazon etc or sending your DC to school because it’s too hard to homeschool them, and you are a keyworker even though you are working from home.
I'm very grateful for all these people who keep things going for us. But I can do my job perfectly adequately from home; me going into work is not going to do anything but put me and my family at risk. By not going into the office, I am keeping myself out of hospital and from taking up a valuable bed from someone who needs it. I am very thankful that I can do this.
Waxonwaxoff0 · 21/01/2021 21:55

@rowmaccerd you are aware that not all non key workers can work from home? I'm a non key worker that has to leave my house every day to work.

rowmaccerd · 21/01/2021 22:06

[quote Waxonwaxoff0]@rowmaccerd you are aware that not all non key workers can work from home? I'm a non key worker that has to leave my house every day to work.[/quote]
So am I.

I have just had three weeks off, unpaid, and run into debt and missed a mortgage payment to help get us back to normal more quickly.

It takes everyone to do it at once though

roarfeckingroarr · 21/01/2021 22:14

Why are nurseries open but schools aren't? Is it down to teaching unions putting pressure on government or something else entirely?

bookworm14 · 21/01/2021 22:18

Because nurseries rely on charging fees to survive. If they shut long-term they won’t open again unless the government props them up. Also while it may be almost impossible to work whilst home educating older children, it is literally impossible (and unsafe) to do so while caring for a baby or toddler).

PinkSparklyPussyCat · 21/01/2021 22:21

I have just had three weeks off, unpaid, and run into debt and missed a mortgage payment to help get us back to normal more quickly.

How is being in debt and people possibly losing their homes ‘normal’? I can’t decide who’s more deluded, your government for doing it or you for thinking it’s a good idea

MarshaBradyo · 21/01/2021 22:21

@bookworm14

Because nurseries rely on charging fees to survive. If they shut long-term they won’t open again unless the government props them up. Also while it may be almost impossible to work whilst home educating older children, it is literally impossible (and unsafe) to do so while caring for a baby or toddler).
Yes and cases very low in this age group
IggyFigs · 21/01/2021 22:36

@Bambi1222

I've been reading lots of the covid threads tonight. Off topic but I just want to say as I can't out loud. I CANT do this until Easter or summer or whenever it ends. I just CANT.
Get yourself on the Good News thread! It's the only one I really read now. Lots of positivity and general goodness over there 😊
TableFlowerss · 21/01/2021 22:42

Well I think there’ll be some kind of uprising if the kids aren’t back by April. If they’re not back in April, it’ll obviously be September. They’ll have then missed 9 months of school. Same for uni students etc...

People won’t stand for it any longer than easter at the absolute maximum. That gives them plenty of time to get the most vulnerable vaccinated.

Come summer no two fucks will be given by most of the population I imagine, because they’ve been stripped of basic human needs.

The more people hear the doom and gloom of new strains and whether or not the vaccine will even work etc against these new strains, people won’t be able to see light at the end of the tunnel anymore. They’ll just be de-sensitised and think we’ll what’s the point.... and they’ll go on with life as normal making decisions for themselves.

That’s my predictions....

BBQ weather will be the end of covid sanctions

PinkSparklyPussyCat · 21/01/2021 22:48

@TableFlowerss I agree, if we are still locked down in any form come summer people are going to see family and friends indoors and out. I think to have any chance of compliance going forward some restrictions will need to be lifted once the vulnerable are vaccinated.

TableFlowerss · 21/01/2021 22:57

[quote PinkSparklyPussyCat]@TableFlowerss I agree, if we are still locked down in any form come summer people are going to see family and friends indoors and out. I think to have any chance of compliance going forward some restrictions will need to be lifted once the vulnerable are vaccinated.[/quote]
100% agree!

Also, if they don’t start lifting restrictions soon (next few weeks) I don’t think covid patients will be their only concern to overwhelm hospitals....

I hope they’ve got a few billion in the pot for Mental Health services that are going to be needed very soon for the amount of people that are going to have MH issues as a consequence! There’s going to be a crisis in that dept as well soon I imagine

partyatthepalace · 21/01/2021 23:14

Because the economy has to keep going as best it can, or the knock effects of this are going to be even more horrendous than they already are.

Do people seriously not understand this?? It’s not about ‘only caring about money’, it’s about caring about people’s quality of life once this is over - the more debt we are carrying the weaker the economy is - and that means fewer jobs, lower quality public services, poorer mental and physical health.

We have to limit interaction as far as possible to stop the NHS collapsing, so industries that encourage a lot of mixing have to shut. The rest of us have to go to work if we can’t work from home.

I seriously wonder about people - do those of you who think everyone should stay home unless they work for the NHS think money grows on trees??

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