If the vaccines do not work and lockdown isn't working

[RosieLemonade]

What happens now?
Will this actually be my child's life? Nothing but walks outside the house? I feel emotional but is this truly it now?

@JosephineDeBeauharnais

The ONLY purpose of mass vaccination and lockdown is to manage pressure on the NHS.

I think that’s unduly pessimistic and not accurate. The purpose of both is ultimately to reduce the number of lives lost to Covid, and the number of people suffering long term effects from it.

@duffledaisy thank you for that explanation.

@RosieLemonade

No need to be rude. I was looking for an answer. Other people have agreed it is a question worth asking.

Fruitless quest OP. I no longer read the papers or watch the news. I don’t enter into Covid debates here either. I look at the NHS website once a week/10 days or so to update on the basic best practice and to get an idea of where the numbers are in my area, but that’s it. Then I just get on with this situation day by day. I’ve done this for my mental health and I’m glad I did.

There’s no point in speculation or reading the papers with all their contradictions and catastrophic interpretations of data - they are in the business of presenting information in the most click-worthy way.

They say humans have two basic demands, for control and certainty, the two things we can never have. Certainly isn’t such a great prize; imagine if someone could give you absolute certainty and tell you for sure that “you will die at 4.02pm on Thursday 24th of April 2029 when you are knocked down by a number 51 bus in your local high street”. Imagine how the absolute certainty would mess up your life. So why ask the question? Answers are not available and the only certainty is you make yourself miserable.

That's why everyone who can have one, whichever one works for them, should, to protect the small number who can't
I agree with you but what this means is that younger healthy people who aren't particularly at risk of complications from the virus are having to subject themselves to a vaccination which we don't have long-term data about in order to protect people who are old and/or haven't taken care of their health.

@Floomobal

If the vaccine doesn’t work, the government will come to the conclusion at some point that normal life must resume. The vast majority will be fine, and the people who will die from Covid will die, and life will carry on.

It won't be that simple. People won't fall neatly into 'die or be fine' groups, but will get ill (some for a long time) and seek hospital treatment, so life will still not carry on in any normal way. Society will still have to rearrange itself in a way that somehow reduces infections, whether we like it or not.

[quote lightand]@duffeldaisy You say that the vaccines do work. But even pfizzer itself says 90% or is it 95%. Which means one in 20 people who have the pfizzer vaccine[oxford is 60% or whatever], can still catch the virus.

@PurpleDaisies. True. But between all the vaccines, there are still going to be significant numbers who will still catch it.
Older people are going to find they are not so immune to the virus as they are expecting to be.[/quote]
If your definition of working is that a vaccine has to prevent absolutely everyone who has it from catching the disease, then there is basically no vaccine in history which has ever worked.

And yet through mass vaccination we have eradicated smallpox, all but eradicated polio and made measles a rare event in this country. At least, we had until vaccination rates dropped below the levels needed.

The FDA’s minimum efficacy level for approving any Covid vaccine was 50%. Even that would make a substantial impact on the spread of the virus, and what we have already is substantially better than that.

"Something that is slowly dawning on me. Our NHS is supposed to be the best in the world, but since we are now the worst country in the world this week for covid deaths, what does that say about the NHS? Not good for its image, and perhaps a point best left for another time."

It's not the best in the world for all outcomes, although it was found to be v efficient. The thing is that it is free at the point of use (apart from dentistry and opticians), and that's massive in allowing people to access healthcare, no matter how much money they have.

It's not the NHS's fault that so many people are dying. They've been underfunded for decades now, and have tens of thousands of vacancies, so they can't do any more than they're doing.
We just need to train more doctors and nurses for the future. Can you imagine if we didn't have the NHS and so everyone surviving their hospital stays then got stung for huge bills afterwards?!

@lemmein

Haven't read the whole thread - but I think, until the government/employers start covering people's wages whilst they self-isolate, this won't end. There are millions of people in this country that live payday to payday - they cannot afford to stay at home, and who can blame them? It's easy to be sanctimonious about 'killing granny' whilst your security is not as risk. They've paid an absolute fortune out for furlough - if instead they'd sorted test & trace out, and covered wages for isolation we'd be in a much better position now. Most WANT to do the right thing but circumstances prevent them from doing so.

Locking down the whole country is not the answer - without an economy our nhs is fucked anyway, and arguably was fucked before covid was even a thing!

And whilst I'm on a rant - if masks/hand washing work how are people who are bedridden catching covid in hospitals? Are the staff not wearing PPE/using sanitiser? On BBC Hospital a few weeks ago an elderly lady was admitted (not covid related) and tested positive on her 12th day in the hospital - how? All that poor lady wanted to do throughout her whole stay was go home, she wasn't allowed any visitors until her last hours when she was barely conscious - it's barbaric I'm not being goady, I just genuinely don't understand how so many are catching it in hospitals. If hospital PPE doesn't prevent the spread what use is my silly little handmade mask?

The staff do wear PPE etc but don't change it between patients. PPE is more to protect the wearer than who they're providing care/treatment to.

My OH has regular infusions (cancer treatment) at the oncology day treatment centre at our local hospital. Yes, they've spaced out the chairs and take temperatures etc on arrival, but the staff don't change their PPE between patients, don't wipe down the blood pressure cuffs nor the finger oxymeter between patients, don't even change their gloves between patients. So if one of the patients is infectious, it will almost certainly be spread to the other patients by the staff who are going patient to patient continuously. My OH has started reminding the nurses to change their gloves and wipe down the cuffs/oxymeter as they come to his turn!

"this means is that younger healthy people who aren't particularly at risk of complications from the virus are having to subject themselves to a vaccination which we don't have long-term data about in order to protect people who are old and/or haven't taken care of their health."

Look up the AstraZeneca vaccine. The main part of it has been in use for years in other drugs with no problems. They've just tweaked the final bit to match the covid part and tackle this virus.

@DappledOliveGroves

It's a question that needs to be asked.

If the government ignore the necessity to give the Pfizer jab three weeks apart, as they are doing, and it transpires (as the Israeli data suggests), that a lone dose offers efficacy of 30% or less, and we can see that lockdowns do very little other than destroy the economy and roll the issue forwards, with cases spreading again as soon as lockdown lifts, then what?

I've recently read books about the Spanish Flu pandemic. I cannot see any evidence which showed endless, rolling lockdowns being imposed across the globe. There were some short lockdown attempts in various cities but ultimately the Spanish flu virus ran riot, millions upon millions of young, healthy people died, yet people had little choice but to crack on, go to work, and get through it. And the pandemic ended fairly swiftly.

As this drags on, surely there will be more and more mutations as the virus seeks to spread in the face of lockdowns? I'm not a virologist, but surely the more we lockdown, the longer we draw out the pandemic?

Oh do go away, you're just scaremongering.

We have vaccines that do work and you can be absolutely certain that the scientists are working on the vaccines right now, in terms of keeping them effective. We also have others in the pipeline.

We're gonna be OK @RosieLemonade

Hold on tight, and roll with the punches.

I am sure things will be better 6 months from now. Possibly even 3 months.

I am feeling quite low myself today. Feel like crying. It's like it never ending, and things keep going wrong for me (just trivial/first world problems etc,) but they feel amplified when you feel blue.

Look after yourself and your lovely DC

The vaccines do work. They’re not a magic bullet yet but they are a very good first step. The fact that we had several vaccines already available within a year of the start of the pandemic is awesome and should give us real hope. New vaccine candidates, combining or modifications of current vaccines will be produced in the future. I suspect we could end up with a yearly vaccine at some stage.

We know more about the disease, what it’s doing in the body and how to treat it, and how we could target increasingly effective treatments in the future.

The lockdowns do work. Numbers of deaths are likely to rise for a week or so but looks like the death rate is already slowing. This is in line with the data showing that the number of cases is declining. Lockdown is working. It’s unsustainable long term but we need to keep in (in strict or less strict regional tiers) until the number of cases doesn’t overwhelm the NHS - which would lead to deaths which would otherwise have been preventable (from covid and everything else).

A better functioning track and trace system would be awesome too. And possibly once numbers are lower we’ll stand a better chance of that being effective (although I’m much less hopeful about given where we are currently with our systems).

The NHS has done a great job of increased surge capacity but there’s also going to need to be future COVID planning to increase capacity (beds, specialist nurses and drs, changes to hospitals designs for oxygen and infection controls). At some stage when numbers are e.g. similar to flu we probably will have to accept annual vaccination and a certain number of ‘manageable’ (by that I mean that the NHS can cope with and function normally) covid deaths as part and parcel of life. But we are a way off that at the moment. But it will come.

Long winded...but there’s lots to be hopeful about. Just need to keep the faith that things will get progressively better - albeit slower than we’d all like. It’s bloody shit though at the moment. Feeling quite overwhelmed with thinking of months more of this even though logically I’m sure we’re on the right track.

I just saw something in passing on LinkedIn which said that the Pfizer vaccine does neutralise the new variants and in the over 55s. But LI is such a painful website and once you've browsed past something it disappears unless it's a "top post" so unless you know who posted it, you can't find it again!

So I can't now find the source. I did check the BBC and Sky but no luck.

Christ I’m low today too.

But - but - the vaccines will help. They will bring hospitalisations down. Even if we need a new one every year for the vulnerable. We are also seeing more people infected (sadly) who will develop some immunity.

I think we are in for another tough year and let’s see this as a long game. But this isn’t it. We will muddle through with vaccines and treatments and some herd immunity. Gonna take a while though

twitter.com/EssexPR/status/1352245581834575872?s=19

This explains why the REACT study is wrong and not representative, cases ARE coming down and the peak was around 2 weeks BEFORE lockdown.

Vaccines do work, not only that but we have 3 vaccines with a 4th looking positive that only requires one dose (J&J) .

Ignore the doom mongers saying this will be life forever, it wont be. The world has had pandemics that have been and gone even without today's scientific break throughs.

@redsquirrelfan

I just saw something in passing on LinkedIn which said that the Pfizer vaccine does neutralise the new variants and in the over 55s. But LI is such a painful website and once you've browsed past something it disappears unless it's a "top post" so unless you know who posted it, you can't find it again!

So far only data is for variant 1 (originally detected in the UK, Kent), data on variant 2 (odi South Africa, Eastern Cape) is imminent (by Monday). Not sure about data on variant 3 (odi Brazil, Manau).

www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-a-preprint-suggesting-the-pfizer-biontech-vaccine-might-be-protective-against-the-b-1-1-7-lineage-of-sars-cov-2-the-kent-variant/

www.statnews.com/2021/01/20/pfizer-biontech-covid-19-vaccine-works-just-as-well-against-variant-first-detected-in-u-k-study-indicates/

@DecemberSun

The vaccine doesn't stop you getting the virus. Not sure why people think it does. It just means you don't get it so badly. You can also still pass it on.

So cautionary measures will need to be in place for a long time yet.

For fuck’s sake we don’t yet know how well it prevents infection or how well it prevents transmission.

Why do people do this? Is it an issue with reading comprehension?

@Anniegetyourgun

Society doesn't break down if you can't go to the pub It's bad news for publicans, for example, but they could be supported to start a different business. Just because we are currently used to living in each other's pockets doesn't mean we have to. A lot of people already have fairly isolated but perfectly sustainable lifestyles.

And people being fed won't happen if we go around infecting farmers, food processors and distributors.

I’m not taking about people just not being able to ‘go to the pub’ jeez it goes so far deeper than that. Millions of people have built their whole lives around working in a job where social distancing isn’t possible longer term. It isn’t a case of ‘oh just find another job that works from home’! That is extremely simplistic! Imagine if all the people who work in restaurants, pubs, bars, theatres, cinemas, events, or indeed any job which involves people gathering inside is no longer viable. Millions without a job, you can just re train and find other jobs for millions of people. Far less council tax paid which means that you are affected. No one to pay for the bin men, the lighting, road repairs and the 100’s of other unnoticed jobs that YOU rely on being done to function. Now you cannot drive your car safely and lots of road around you are closed for months on end with no one to repair them. Mean while, thousands of people and families can no longer afford their homes as their jobs no longer exist. They want what you have and it doesn’t take long for some of the less fortunate and less moral to start to think about taking it from you by force or stealth. This is the break down and it’s what we would be facing if millions were unemployed

@Hardbackwriter

Agree with this, there are other ways of organising human societies, we need the basics of food clothing and shelter and provided these can be achieved in covidsafe ways humans will survive. We can then find covid safe ways to fulfill our as a needs and wants.

Erm, can you name one of these other societies that has no close contact between people unless they already live together? Because I don't see how either the incest or the lack of babies hasn't yet brought about their downfall...

All human societies, in all times, have valued and had spaces for sociability, it's utterly mad to imagine that we could just jettison that permanently or even long-term.

There's a lot of space between a temporarily locked down society with no close contact as you describe, and society as it was before with no restrictions on contact.

If we did actually find vaccines didn't work then we'd have no choice but to find ways to live in that new space, and we would. We wouldn't, when actually going through it, find the alternative - of not trying to keep a lid on infections at all - practical or palatable (even the people who think they would at the moment).

@RosieLemonade

People on here said they are only 33 per cent effective and the papers are reporting infection rates aren't falling. I understand the lag for the death rates.

It's always a great start to trust rumor and ignore science.

Perhaps you could get a subscription to Qanon, whilst you're at it?

A lie gets halfway round the world while the truth is still pulling on its boots

Certainly seems as if there is no plan B, and there seem to just be blithe statements about children being resilient.

There is gradually getting more data about immune response after a single dose of vaccine (decent antibody levels and difference in symptomatic infection rates between active vaccine and placebo after two to three months - so far). On this I am quite happy for one parent to wait three months ago the other parent can have an earlier appointment so both can have much improved lives and less worry and they agree.
Manufacturers are only allowed to quote results exactly within the terms of their licence (ie 2 doses 21 days apart).

Look out your window. Your neighbours are still going to work, or working from home, the dustbin men are still on time, the birds are still flying, seasons still changing, cats still prowling, little Tescos still trading, cornershop still giving out the wrong change, and people still walking their dogs, in no hurry at all.

If you’re seeing nurses sobbing on the news, care home staff suffering mental health breakdowns, business bosses hollow eyed with bankruptcy fears ; yes that’s all occurring too, but there are side effects of pandemics, and meanwhile on your street the postman is still delivering letters in his shorts in winter. Life is still carrying on regardless as it always does.

Change is the constant you can rely on with Covid and everything else in life.

Whatever you think of the government they’re trying to do their best to look after you. There’s no riots, looting, protests, strikes, panic and apocalyptic social behaviour occurring because of that.

Everyone is doing the right thing, with just a small minority breaking the rules, and you will invariably see them all over social media if you insist on seeking them out. They’re generally low educated, so you can safely ignore them. If you keep looking for them, they’ll continue to fill your head with nonsense.

This pandemic whips itself up on social media and news platforms and worriers will take it to heart too much. Just stop reading the news or social media....for a bit, or regulate yourself. Your home is your port in the storm and everything will soon get back on track, it’s guaranteed. And if it doesn’t, it’s also guaranteed that we’ll adapt to it, because History has evidence of that.....every single time.