Is there a reason we are the country that's been worst hit economically and had the worst death rates

[velveteenrabbittales]

Trying to work out why, do we have a more elderly and unhealthy population? Has the whole thing been managed badly? Should we have resisted lockdown? We've ended up with the double whammy why is it?

Fat people who vote badly?

Has the whole thing been managed badly?

Do you live in the U.K.? Have you been in a hole for the last year?

Resisting lockdown until the situation was dire (every time) and failing to get testing and tracing sorted early on were critical mistakes. Plus Boris telling us to go out and enjoy summer instead of getting prepared for winter.

What’s the source for greatest hit economically?

One factor is that we’re fairly good at collecting and reporting relevant stats

Population density is also a factor, as is being a major travel hub

Boris?

High population density, combined with Government mismanagement at a guess.

go out and enjoy summer instead of getting prepared for winter

I think the ‘go and enjoy yourselves now, for there’s a tough winter ahead’ was the preparation - fill your reserves as it were. There were plenty of posts along those lines late summer and early autumn 2020

Tories

I think the ‘go and enjoy yourselves now, for there’s a tough winter ahead’ was the preparation

Boris was not talking about tough winter to come. It was all go and spend.

It has been managed extremely badly, and no, resisting lockdown would not have helped the situation (what a bizarre idea).

It was the UK's reluctance to lockdown in the early stages, when the vast majority of countries around Europe were doing so, that caused the high case numbers and death toll. Having football matches, Cheltenham, concerts, etc, still happening in the middle of March (when everyone had locked down) was insanity.

When everyone else had locked down, that should read.

Trying to work out why, do we have a more elderly and unhealthy population?

Yes, ironically, our Achilles' heel is that we've been good at keeping people alive who might not have survived elsewhere. Further, our relative wealth and western lifestyle exacerbates acquired conditions which contribute to higher covid morbidity in the young. We're then struggling as a large number of these otherwise unhealthy or end of life (but medically stable) individuals become acutely unwell all at once - a demand no health system can meet.

I do think some posters just thrive of negativity, many countries in Europe and Worldwide have been badly affected, real economists have said its likely that Spain and Italy will bear the worst due to economic downturn. And the UK is well ahead of Europe in vaccination programme. Many other countries are having to fight for more doses.

A statistician friend told me that the U.K. have some of the most sophisticated data collection and statistics gathering systems in the world. We’re also very honest....this is not the case elsewhere. I’m no Brexiteer but even in Europe look at the EU audit data etc.- other countries routinely under report and are creative in the accounting. I don’t believe for a minute that we are massively out of step with different countries. Our leading stance - which is probably less than it seems - is probably partially attributable to the large numbers of U.K. people afflicted by obesity which massively increases your risks.

I'm not sure we have been the worst hit economically. And we are making good progress with vaccinations. But we don't have military police and I wouldn't have supported forcing children to stay inside for months, like they did in Spain so what exactly do you want?

If you are looking for a league table of failings, and given the different ways countries measure things I don't think we'll know who did worst until this is all over.

Economics: Does our economy maybe have a larger contribution from the services and hospitality sector than other comparable EU countries? We measure GDP differently and I believe that accounts for around 4-5% of the difference.

In terms of managing the pandemic, we closed late and we know the increased death toll that was immediately responsible for. And we haven't had a strong lockdown (no curfews, letters needed to leave the house), we don't really track and trace in anything other than name (hotel isolation when you return from overseas? Na, get on the tube, the train, pop into Tesco's on your way home, and promise not to leave your house for 14 days) And that's understandable when you won't get paid if you did. Financial support if you test positive, but none if your kids do.

And then there's the failure to understand (actually I think it's a deliberate decision to ignore) the difference between a LFT and PCR test.

Does anyone in the cabinet have any sort of scientific background?

I'm not sure the rest of Europe are handling particularly well are they?Maybe look at the countless threads about people who refuse to follow the rules.

Has the whole thing been managed badly?

Yes, yes it has.

Should we have resisted lockdown?

No. At the points where lockdown occurred they were unfortunately necessary. Lower co-operation would have resulted in more deaths and more economic damage.

What we should have had was a government willing to make hard choices earlier and plan in advance. Ideally we also wouldn't have started with a public health apparatus crippled by a decade of cuts.

Yes, it has been managed badly. We also weren’t as strict as other countries and people spread it more. I’m not in favour of state control but people could have been more responsible.

I don’t know what the other countries have been doing but I do think we could have had better information about how we can help ourselves more.
Taking vitamin d, vitamin c, having an oximeter or asking for one (I think nhs issues then if people start having breathing issues?), doing breathing exercises, Sleeping on stomach is all information that’s supposed to help but I don’t think it’s widely available?
Of course, this isn’t a cure and there will be people still who need hospital treatment and will die, but I wonder if more information would have helped people to manage it better.
We’ll never know of course.

Inadequate track and trace.
Slow/completely refusal to close boarder at the start of the pandemic
Inadequate quarantine arrangements for those entering the country
Refusal to adopt widescale mask wearing as a society
Boris setting a bad example still shaking hands into the start of the pandemic. Cummings setting a bad example.
Not closing schools early enough first wave. Not closing schools mid November. Sending kids back to school for one day January.

All the countries who have done better than us have done the first 4, very well.

The only thing we have done right is the vaccination program

There was a thing about the economy situation in More or Less. Basically our economy has of course been hit very badly, partly because we’re quite service sector heavy, but we’re not much worse than other European peers - we just calculate the figures differently. For example if two countries both shut schools but still pay teachers then most countries would still count those wages in GDP, but the UK wouldn’t because the output of education is lowered.
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p094vd4x

Economics: Does our economy maybe have a larger contribution from the services and hospitality sector than other comparable EU countries?
We have an inflated service industry. The countries who have suffered less financially have a larger manufacturing base

The “reason” is a pandemic is almost impossible to predict.

With hindsight maybe things could have been managed differently. But when you are in a literally unprecedented situation, you have no idea whether your decision will be correct until it’s over.

The government have scientific consultants. They assess the information and the ongoing situation, and make decisions based on that. But we had no way of knowing how this was going to go.

Trying to work out why, do we have a more elderly and unhealthy population?

Our elderly live to much older ages but don't necessarily carry good health forward with them. Many spend a couple of decades with poor health propped up by medication. You only have to sit inside a doctors surgery to see that they are overwhelmed with older people.

Also, our country is overweight, eat complete crap and gets very little exercise. There are extremes where some people, usually younger, are vegan, fitness obsessed and very health conscious and don't drink and then there are the polar opposites.

We are a very unhealthy, unfit nation and this has been reflected in the death toll. Our eating is only going to get worse. Companies like "Just Eat" should be banned. Now you can ring up and get a Macdonalds delivered to your house and some Greggs cream buns for dessert. At least before you had to burn off a couple of calories walking for the carpark to the shop.

We are all going to end up like the humans in WAll-E

FindHungrySamurai

I also listened to that!! More or less is awesome

Taking vitamin d, vitamin c, having an oximeter or asking for one (I think nhs issues then if people start having breathing issues?), doing breathing exercises, Sleeping on stomach is all information that’s supposed to help but I don’t think it’s widely available?

I don’t think there’s great scientific evidence to back up advising the population to start taking vitamins and sleeping on their stomachs (I have never heard this).

Losing weight and being active really could have been pushed. There was an anti obesity strategy mentioned early on that seemed to come to nothing.

Oximeters help you identify when you need to go to hospital if you become unwell. They’re a good thing to have to ensure you get treatment when it’s more likely to be successful.