How long will people agree to make these sacrifices for?

[DappledOliveGroves]

Inspired by another thread here.

Let's assume the vaccines don't do what they should - either because the virus mutates so rapidly or because our government can't manage to adhere to Pfizer's protocol and a lone dose does nothing to protect people.

Then what?

For all those champing at the bit for curfews, harsher lockdowns, further restrictions on civil liberties - I'm genuinely curious - how long are you willing to maintain this status quo?

Would you be happy to still be in this lockdown in a year? Two years? Five years? Even if the lockdowns are eased and clamped down again, would you be willing to accept rolling lockdowns as a fact of life with no end in sight? At what point would those wanting tougher restrictions decide they can't live like this anymore?

Let’s face it, this government makes decisions purely based on public opinion. When that public opinion turns against restrictions, so will government policy....

I just hope that the measures work, so we can look back and decide that the sacrifices were worthwhile & truly achieved lots of harm reduction.

If I never heard another word about NZ again (in any context) it will be too soon.

We are struggling to limit learning loss & keep DC engaged with education. I thought I had bright kids who liked learning. Seems not true!!

I doubt there will be riots. I do think people will just start quietly ignoring more and more rules once the vaccine is well rolled out.

@x2boys

It's not up to you though is it Alexis my children have also missed a year of school as have the majority of kids I want them back in school more than anything but joining ant lockdown groups won't achieve that will it ?

I will not keep them away from their friends for 5 years. Obviously I have no control over actual laws but I wont cooperate with this if it goes on for 5 years. Also, in 5 years time, the people we are supposed to be "protecting" now will probably have died, spending their last years utterly alone and without human contact. 360000 people die every year of cancer, in 5 years time that number will have probably tripled due to lack of screening/treatment so people dying of things other than covid will have overtaken the covid death toll by then.

Thank you @SuperbGorgonzola I do think it will be ok when I go to have my baby, I'm due in April and I'm hoping that cases will have dropped even more by then. But my point is that services like maternity could only be ring-fenced for so long. If we were having double or triple the current rates then things would have to give at some point? You'd have people queuing up in the street to be seen in hospitals, no ambulances, etc. Obviously this is a very extreme version and I'm not trying to scare monger but this would happen eventually if the virus were allowed to just spread without any lockdowns or controls. Our healthcare system nearly breaks during a bad flu season let alone during a global pandemic.

So whilst I completely sympathise with people being totally fed up of the rules and not wanting to comply any longer, the logical conclusion of everyone doing that would be that people could go about their daily lives as normal but as soon as you needed healthcare - for whatever reason - you might not be able to get it.

@AlexisCarringtonColbyDexter but we aren't just protecting old people (or anyone) from Covid, we are protecting everyone by enabling them to access healthcare whether that be needed to due a car accident or cancer or having a baby or getting sepsis

[quote Rockettrain]@AlexisCarringtonColbyDexter but we aren't just protecting old people (or anyone) from Covid, we are protecting everyone by enabling them to access healthcare whether that be needed to due a car accident or cancer or having a baby or getting sepsis[/quote]
OP is referring to a period of 5 years.

By that time, the amount of people who have had operations cancelled will far overtake the death toll of covid.

@ptumbi Great post, completely agree.

Also this:

I wish people would stop pretending that they care about others, that they are wonderful self-sacrificing individuals who are doing all this to SAVE LIVES. They are doing it for themselves, and their own families, and then berating other people for having different feelings about what they want for their own selves and families.

Throughout the crisis I’ve volunteered for a local food bank, cooked and carried out food drops to the vulnerable, donated a lot of the money I’ve been saving to homeless and children’s charities, done grocery shopping for an elderly neighbour, cooked for another friend who has a critically ill toddler...

And yet on MN I’m ‘selfish’ because I dare to question the utility of rolling lockdowns and raise concerns about some of the groups worst affected (which I’ve seen first hand through my food bank work). Currently I am committing the heinous crime of sending my toddler to nursery, despite only working part-time in a non-key worker role - because she’s an only child and as a former teacher I know that proper socialisation is crucial to her well-being and development.

The constant cries of ‘SELFISH!’ are used on here to shut down any criticism of lockdown, and yet, while the most ardent supporters of continued lockdown paint themselves as doing it out of sheer altruism, it’s generally because they’re worried - either about catching Covid, about someone in their family catching it or about being unable to access other healthcare if they need it. Of course that’s not wrong in itself, but it’s self-preservation, just as it’s self-preservation on my part to send DD to nursery and to call for a timely end to the restrictions.

There are very few people in this crisis whose actions are driven exclusively by altruism, or who are making their sacrifices solely for some vague ‘greater good’. I just wish more people were honest about that.

Excellent post @TempsPerdu

[quote Rockettrain]@AlexisCarringtonColbyDexter but we aren't just protecting old people (or anyone) from Covid, we are protecting everyone by enabling them to access healthcare whether that be needed to due a car accident or cancer or having a baby or getting sepsis[/quote]
whilst the people with power and money can still access private medical care the government will do everything they can to sweep under the carpet the chaos and misery in the NHS

TempsPerdu Very well said.

@Rockettrain but again, I think this expectation that we are 'entitled' to healthcare is again a symptom of our western privilege.

Those dying in developing countries have no such expectation. Yet I don't see much hand-wringing for them.

[quote TempsPerdu]@ptumbi Great post, completely agree.

Also this:

I wish people would stop pretending that they care about others, that they are wonderful self-sacrificing individuals who are doing all this to SAVE LIVES. They are doing it for themselves, and their own families, and then berating other people for having different feelings about what they want for their own selves and families.

Throughout the crisis I’ve volunteered for a local food bank, cooked and carried out food drops to the vulnerable, donated a lot of the money I’ve been saving to homeless and children’s charities, done grocery shopping for an elderly neighbour, cooked for another friend who has a critically ill toddler...

And yet on MN I’m ‘selfish’ because I dare to question the utility of rolling lockdowns and raise concerns about some of the groups worst affected (which I’ve seen first hand through my food bank work). Currently I am committing the heinous crime of sending my toddler to nursery, despite only working part-time in a non-key worker role - because she’s an only child and as a former teacher I know that proper socialisation is crucial to her well-being and development.

The constant cries of ‘SELFISH!’ are used on here to shut down any criticism of lockdown, and yet, while the most ardent supporters of continued lockdown paint themselves as doing it out of sheer altruism, it’s generally because they’re worried - either about catching Covid, about someone in their family catching it or about being unable to access other healthcare if they need it. Of course that’s not wrong in itself, but it’s self-preservation, just as it’s self-preservation on my part to send DD to nursery and to call for a timely end to the restrictions.

There are very few people in this crisis whose actions are driven exclusively by altruism, or who are making their sacrifices solely for some vague ‘greater good’. I just wish more people were honest about that.[/quote]
So well said. Anyone who questions lockdown is instantly branded as selfish. Those idiots on their high horse didn’t care prior to covid about people dying of starvation or poverty did they? It’s suddenly only when it’s on THEIR doorstep that now they want to be all “selfless”. That’s the EPITOME of selfish actually!

Until everyone over 50 and the under 50's with health issues are all dead?

The thing is the Government are (perhaps necessarily) breaking it down in to little steps to keep us complicated for “just a little bit longer”. First it was 3 weeks, then 3 months, then “you’re in further restrictions but if you behave yourselves you can come out of them”, then “just one more lockdown to save Christmas” and now it’s “lockdown again but we’ll be out of this by spring” but there’s already noises about it being summer, September, 2022 etc...

We all keep complying because “the end is in sight” but is it really?

Then what?

Then, as I said on another thread, we find a way to accept that we can't necessarily cure everyone of everything all the time - something that's perhaps overdue when we still see insistence that even someone in their nineties "has years of life left in them"

That's not to suggest that anyone wants the very elderly to die or that acceptance would be easy, but then acceptance often isn't

@DappledOliveGroves

Inspired by another thread here.

Let's assume the vaccines don't do what they should - either because the virus mutates so rapidly or because our government can't manage to adhere to Pfizer's protocol and a lone dose does nothing to protect people.

Then what?

For all those champing at the bit for curfews, harsher lockdowns, further restrictions on civil liberties - I'm genuinely curious - how long are you willing to maintain this status quo?

Would you be happy to still be in this lockdown in a year? Two years? Five years? Even if the lockdowns are eased and clamped down again, would you be willing to accept rolling lockdowns as a fact of life with no end in sight? At what point would those wanting tougher restrictions decide they can't live like this anymore?

No one's champing at the bit for more restrictions on civil liberties - you're deliberately mischaracterising people's understandable wish to make things safe in the middle of a pandemic, and deliberately trying to stir trouble with your 'maybe vaccines are useless'.

Your 'thought' experiment is trollery. Your 'but why aren't you concerned about countries without healthcare' is whataboutery.

We all keep complying because “the end is in sight” but is it really?
They are putting out whatever message they think will placate us for now so that they can buy time... I wonder exactly what they are buying time for?
They must by now have thier own plans for the various possible scenarios?

@DameFanny speak for yourself. I have never supported lockdown and abhor these restrictions. I don't care if I'm selfish in saying so.

If the vaccines don’t work and infections continue at this rate, and you don’t want to extend lockdowns until it burns out naturally...

The other choice is to stop treating Covid patients. Use the nightingale hospitals as massive palliative wards and provide only supportive care, pain relief and end of life care. No ITU, no ventilators, no heroic measures.

The death rate will be massive for a while but will burn out much faster, and the rest of us can get back to normal in the meantime.

@LadyCatStark

The thing is the Government are (perhaps necessarily) breaking it down in to little steps to keep us complicated for “just a little bit longer”. First it was 3 weeks, then 3 months, then “you’re in further restrictions but if you behave yourselves you can come out of them”, then “just one more lockdown to save Christmas” and now it’s “lockdown again but we’ll be out of this by spring” but there’s already noises about it being summer, September, 2022 etc...

We all keep complying because “the end is in sight” but is it really?

Really well put

Oh at least check the words before you defend yourself against accusations I didn't make

My point is you're being pointless

While the most ardent supporters of continued lockdown paint themselves as doing it out of sheer altruism, it’s generally because they’re worried

Sometimes it's not even this, but that they're in a position where the worst of lockdown's effects are unlikely to affect them because of their financial, housing or employment status

Ironically that includes myself, but this isn't just about me and I've never yet reached the stage where I care nothing about the impact on others

Unfortunately (or fortunately) I think a lot of the people on here saying they're going to start breaking the rules as of March have not witnessed anyone die from Covid, or known anyone younger who's had it. I have had people die and at the moment a 33 year old friend with no underlying health conditions who has run marathons is currently being moved to ICU to be put on a ventilator. He has a newborn baby at home and his wife is in pieces. It is unbelievable how sad and cruel and how awful this disease is. It may not affect all of you, but when it strikes it is indiscriminate and sudden.

I have faith - not in the politicians - but in the scientists that even if the South African or Brazilian strains evade the vaccine they will be able to adjust the vaccines. The government have been atrocious, but at least the army are supporting this vaccine roll out to happen. If we need another vaccine I have faith it will happen eventually. We can't control the virus, all we can do is control our own actions.

@DappledOliveGroves yes of course we are in a very privileged situation here. But I'm not sure how that changes the answer to your question - you asked how long are people willing to keep obeying rules. The answer is that, we kind of don't have a choice because if we all ignore them then our healthcare system will be overwhelmed and we will go from the (privileged) position of being able to access good quality, free healthcare whenever we needed to... not. The fact that other people around the world already live like this is irrelevant in that respect. In the UK we are used to that privilege and the majority of people would be appalled to suddenly abandon that 'right' and just adopt an attitude of 'oh well, we don't need healthcare, lots of people around the world don't have it either'.

Imagine if someone close to you was having a heart attack, you called 999 and they said 'it's probably a heart attack but you can't come to hospital as there's no space, see if a neighbour knows any first aid and can help you out'. Your reaction would probably not be 'ok, that's fair enough seeing as this is the reality of millions of people around the world without access to healthcare.'