We cannot cancel life, to preserve every life

[Slytherin]

I actually find myself agreeing with a Tory for once...we’ve given up so much and the goalposts keep moving, yes it’s an unpredictable situation, but it’s also unsustainable long term. The idea that this summer will be possibly worse than last summer makes zero sense, when we have a vaccine roll out that far exceeds any other nation (except Israel) currently.
First it was let’s get the elderly and vulnerable vaccinated, then it was let’s get the over 50s vaccinated, now we’ve got members of SAGE suggesting restrictions have to continue until everyone, including children are vaccinated and beyond, because of the possibility of new variants. Professor John Edmunds said some would have to stay “forever” last night on Peston.

We must at some point live with an element of risk. I’m in no way suggesting we lift lockdown yet, but suggesting that things won’t have much improved by the summer, is, in my opinion encroaching into dangerous territory.

The government were over promising before, now they’re under promising. There’s got to be a middle ground, people’s mental health cannot sustain this level of pessimism and not having a single thing to look forward to. Everything gets dangled like a carrot, then taken away at the last minute. It’s beyond cruel.

Then it’s the mixed messages, Matt Hancock telling us he’s going on a summer holiday to Cornwall and he’s all booked up and Grant Shapps then telling nobody to even consider booking a holiday abroad or domestically this summer.

Yes, I support restrictions to save lives and support the NHS, but I don’t support the way the government are handling this once again. And I don’t support these restrictions indefinitely, especially when the majority of the at risk groups have been vaccinated.

www.channel4.com/news/we-cannot-cancel-life-to-preserve-every-life-tory-mp-sir-charles-walker-on-lockdown?fbclid=IwAR2RnQNKwJoQ4FSBxT9oTbwbFOCTWcIU9wD9WdYkTEA2sVlJ1posWZAfmsU

'Just because you are retired, doesn't mean your life is now worthless. Don't we deserve some life now after a lifetime of work?'

I think the general consensus is let over 70s and 80s die, because they will one day anyway. Doesn't matter if they have full active lives just maybe give them palliative care as soon as they start displaying symptoms? Maybe like wise for overweight people whom we know are at higher risk of severe symptoms. Not sure if disabled people count or not.

Let the under 40s have their lives back! They're all so very sick of the boring pandemic and want to hug nan, but don't care if nan dies because old people do.

People's right to go on holiday versus the vulnerable in intensive care or dying

Where did I mention holidays? Despite your attempt at emotional blackmail that isn't an accurate representation. It's almost as though you just made it up!

www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-9251989/We-start-living-lives-writes-former-Home-Secretary-DAVID-BLUNKETT.html

David Blunkett has it right.

Why do people keep going on as if reasons for wanting to end lockdown are shallow and selfish? Whole industries are shut with a loss of jobs and businesses. People are isolated, lonely and desperate.
Calling anyone struggling with that "selfish" is despicable.

I haven't RTFT but I agree with OP and have felt much the same since the start. I work in a school and I've seen the attainment gap widen massively, and children we'd worked hard with to get them to engage with education just not giving a damn again. Their life chances are very likely screwed for good, or at best worse than they would have been, even before we get onto the damaged and debt-laden economy in which they're going to be trying to live their lives. Their lack of success - the fact that little Johnny Bloggs never learned to read fluently so doesn't start up that fencing company he might have done - will pull all of us down

Beyond that, I consider myself robust and resilient and not madly social, and I have had enough. I have a friend in her 80s I desperately want to go and see, a godfather who is over 90 I'd love to visit again, an adult child a six hour drive again I didn't see at Christmas. It's been a year of big disappointments and small ones too, and the boredom is getting grinding. I'd deal with it if I felt that the economy could cope and we weren't damaging our futures so badly.

How really social extroverts are managing I have no idea.

@lubeybooby

it's not about preserving every life, it's about maintaining a functioning NHS that doesn't have to choose who gets a ventilator or not

Frankly there needs to be tough decisions. My cousin's neighbour - aged 84 - was ventilated and died quickly from Covid. Why on earth would any hospital ventilate an 84 year old?

Let's accept immortality isn't perhaps viable and that some people should have palliative care at home and should absolutely not be admitted to hospital.

I am retired. So far that retirement has consisted of caring for a sick OH. Willingly done, but far from pleasurable. He died last year at the beginning of the pandemic.

Call me greedy if you will; but I quite fancy having some life now - I have been caring for people for most of my life and would really like to stay alive long enough to have a bit of fun. Please do not write me off just yet.

OP, so if we stop cancelling life and the ICU beds fill up with Covid patients. If your DH has a heart attack or one of your children is in an accident. Are you happy for their life to not be preserved?

All those saying I obviously have a reasonable cash flow. You’re correct. That does not mean my life and those of my family have not been severely affected by this pandemic.

@morninglife But, 4.5m people are waiting for surgeries and other treatment postponed or cancelled due to pandemic.the 9m checkups for babies are not happening, how many issues are not being picked up. For example, my son has a squint, his appointments are "on the phone" so effectivelly cancelled as he is 4 and you cant check his eyes on the phone. As an example the surgery for squint has to be done in a short window between the age 1.5-2. How many children will end up with squint because of this now etc etc. It is not just covid that matters.

@MintyMabel

Yes, yes, we know. The lives of the elderly, vulnerable and disabled just aren't worth it.

Put their lives into one side of the scales and the life chances of vulnerable children in the other side and try and find the balance.

Fucking hard, isn't it? It isn't simple, and I'm starting to think that it's really swung far to hard away from the poor bloody kids.

Children in former years didn't have all the excess today's kids do. And we worked out ok.

You went for months at a time where it was literally illegal for you to play with other children your own age or to see your grandparents? I don't think attending school regularly counts as an "excess" for children, and you must have reached a remarkable age if you were a child before education was compulsory for under 10s (that was brought in pre-1900 I believe).

@Jaxhog

I am gobsmacked by the level of selfishness here!

Not all medical staff have yet been vaccinated. Most of those have only had the first jab. Having worked flat out for a year, they deserve not to be overwhelmed because some people want to go to the pub.

'Mental Health' problems affect ALL of us. Including those of us who've shielded for nearly a year.

Just because you are retired, doesn't mean your life is now worthless. Don't we deserve some life now after a lifetime of work?

Children in former years didn't have all the excess today's kids do. And we worked out ok.

So children in former years couldn't go to school or meet their friends ? Rubbish. You have had your time our young people are suffering from being locked up. You can stay in the young people are what should matter now you've all had your vaccines and you have lived your lives now stop going on about your retirement

I’m hopeful we will gradually ease restrictions over the spring and summer at the correct pace and be close to ‘normality’ for good by this time next year. There’s a load of scare-mongering in the online papers atm which I’m trying to ignore as there are a lot of ‘could’ and ‘might’ being thrown around which is unhelpful.

I do find it frustrating to hear the ‘make the best of the situation/life is dancing in the rain’ and advice on new hobbies and redecorating. I have young children including one with SEN who take up the whole day with care and homeschooling. House is small, garden is tiny. I go to work in the evenings when DH gets back. Funds are much lower than pre-Covid due to DH losing his job and having to take on a lower paid one. Day-to-day is just surviving at the moment and none of the tips to make lockdown enjoyable are actual options for me, and many, many others.

@Mischance

I am retired. So far that retirement has consisted of caring for a sick OH. Willingly done, but far from pleasurable. He died last year at the beginning of the pandemic.

Call me greedy if you will; but I quite fancy having some life now - I have been caring for people for most of my life and would really like to stay alive long enough to have a bit of fun. Please do not write me off just yet.

You are 100% not selfish. I'm sorry to hear about your husband and that the start of your retirement didn't start pleasurably. I hope the rest of your retired years are full of joy and relaxation once this malarkey is over with.

All those saying I obviously have a reasonable cash flow. You’re correct

And there we have it. Don't you dare call me selfish from that position.

I understand the 'NHS is overwhelmed' rhetoric but why in the last year have we not managed to increase bed capacity and train thousands of auxiliary medical staff? That would have at least helped. To be honest I also would have been supportive of some stricter criteria on people actually being admitted to hospital if it meant that restrictions could be reduced - if they have a life-limiting condition such as the above already maybe they could have been supported to die comfortably at home rather than admitted to hospitals with Covid. Maybe we could have had much stricter restrictions for elderly and vulnerable people including carers and medical staff, so at least the rest of us could have had more normality. I'm not saying any of these three ideas (increasing bed capacity and staff; hospital admission restrictions; stricter restrictions on vulnerable groups and carers) would have worked but I'm frustrated we didn't even do any trials. It's not very scientific, we've just decided locking down the whole population is the only way.

1. Where are you going to find these ‘thousands’ of people to train as medical auxiliary staff? How long is it going to take to train them. (Not saying it couldn’t be done, just asking about the practicalities.)

1. So you think that someone with a ‘life-limiting’ disease that means they’re unlikely to live beyond 50 (but are now 40) should have been supported to die ‘comfortably’ at home? Wow.

1. Trials? How long do you think these should have been - days, weeks, months? While COVID ripped through the population?

@LucilleTheVampireBat

People's right to go on holiday versus the vulnerable in intensive care or dying

Where did I mention holidays? Despite your attempt at emotional blackmail that isn't an accurate representation. It's almost as though you just made it up!

Plenty of mention of holidays on this thread, if not from you. You say millions and millions make sacrifices - what are all these many millions sacrificing and who are they exactly? And you think I made things up? Right. The sacrifice is for the NHS and NHS workers. They deserve it.

Your tone is vile. "Pretend they are safe" they are safe if people keep to the rules - it's the idiots who don't who are spreading it. Surely you can see that.

Your callous disregard for the vulnerable is awful.

Someone on this thread asked if people knew anyone who has died of covid. I do. A young woman of 37 who had just finished treatment for a type of cancer that has very good survival rates. She caught covid, had to be ventilated then died earlier this week. Her death from covid will probably be recorded as one of those "with underlying health conditions" which some people on MN say don't matter, because "they would have died any way".

@MaxNormal

All those saying I obviously have a reasonable cash flow. You’re correct

And there we have it. Don't you dare call me selfish from that position.

That’s an extremely simplistic view.

[quote kingat]@morninglife But, 4.5m people are waiting for surgeries and other treatment postponed or cancelled due to pandemic.the 9m checkups for babies are not happening, how many issues are not being picked up. For example, my son has a squint, his appointments are "on the phone" so effectivelly cancelled as he is 4 and you cant check his eyes on the phone. As an example the surgery for squint has to be done in a short window between the age 1.5-2. How many children will end up with squint because of this now etc etc. It is not just covid that matters.[/quote]
But if we ignore covid even fewer facilities will be available to us.

My grandson's speech assessment was cancelled back in March and hasn't happened since, but at least my husband's cancer checkup, my mum's cancer treatment, my daughter's doctors appointments and a friend's end of life care all went ahead.

If we ignore covid we will be in an much worse situation than we are now.

It’s not about preserving lives, it’s about preserving the NHS so that god forbid someone’s child has a terrible accident, they’re not turned away from a hospital because there’s no space or told, we’re ever so sorry but we have no ambulances.

This is coming from someone who is as fed up as the next person. “Protect the NHS, save lives” literally what it says on the tin.

Preserving the NHS at what cost
And why, when the vast majority of the people who will get sick have been vaccinated with a vaccine that is shown to reduce severe disease massively, should the NHS not cope??

Oh and a friend of a friend (in her 20's) had a sudden bleed on the brain and is in a coma. She has been well looked after in ICU because they aren't completely overwhelmed with covid patients, although it's a close thing.

If we could guarantee the NHS would be protected by killing five children at random would that do?
Is it truly at any cost?

The countries who locked down hard and fast are those whose death rates have been the lowest. They are also, magically, those countries whose economies have suffered the least. We lock down to prevent meltdown of our health service and paralysis of our economy. The death toll would have been far higher had we allowed this virus to run rampant throughout the country. We would also have more variants, and quite possibly ones resistant to the vaccines that are now being made.

I prefer to follow the advice of scientists rather than the advice of gobshite journalists and others on social media.

@Jaxhog

I am gobsmacked by the level of selfishness here!

Not all medical staff have yet been vaccinated. Most of those have only had the first jab. Having worked flat out for a year, they deserve not to be overwhelmed because some people want to go to the pub.

'Mental Health' problems affect ALL of us. Including those of us who've shielded for nearly a year.

Just because you are retired, doesn't mean your life is now worthless. Don't we deserve some life now after a lifetime of work?

Children in former years didn't have all the excess today's kids do. And we worked out ok.

With an ignorant, narrow minded view like that you clearly didn’t ‘work out ok’ Maybe if you had a little more ‘excess’ as a child you wouldn’t come across as such a horrible person.