Do people really think this is the road to the end...?! Surely NOT!

[Violetsarered]

Do you honestly think we’re on the road to the end of all this...?!

Here’s how I see things...

New variants will emerge - back into lockdown
Vaccines won’t be as effective as thought - back into lockdown

I’m not sure why people believe that life will be normal by June.

I would bet my house on the fact that it won’t.
We are such a long long LONG way from normality.

Don’t mean to be a doom monger but people really need to keep things in perspective

😂😂😂

I wonder what’s behind that?

Trying to understand what’s behind posts like yours op. I don’t think anyone believes for a moment you just felt the need to be realistic and share your insight with 16 million people. Maybe you did.

But generally my feeling is there is something driving peoole to post like you do, something that’s not said. Generally people don’t believe as you do. So I was considering if it was extreme anxiety, or maybe this way of life benefits you, maybe you enjoy the drama and being able to offer your “insights” like your Chris witty’S mentor. I don’t know because you’re not telling but there is clearly something behind this.

I remember the start of the vaccine roll-out and various posts saying what a shambles it was going to be and how it was inevitably going to screw up and how it was all going too slow. When that was proven decisively incorrect, they moved onto “well just wait until they have to do the second doses at the same time as first doses”, desperately chomping at the bit for it to all go pear shaped. It wasn’t just constructive, realistic comment on what was going on, it was just a litany of negativity. It’s a really, really odd mindset and not very healthy.

@Bluntness100

I wonder what’s behind that?

Trying to understand what’s behind posts like yours op. I don’t think anyone believes for a moment you just felt the need to be realistic and share your insight with 16 million people. Maybe you did.

But generally my feeling is there is something driving peoole to post like you do, something that’s not said. Generally people don’t believe as you do. So I was considering if it was extreme anxiety, or maybe this way of life benefits you, maybe you enjoy the drama and being able to offer your “insights” like your Chris witty’S mentor. I don’t know because you’re not telling but there is clearly something behind this.

Why attribute to malice what you can to misunderstanding, or in this case, personal perspective?

Why do you have a bee in your bonnet about OP having an ulterior motive to continue lockdown?

@ChancesWhatChances Sorry "love" but where did I ask that the army did shopping for me? I'm talking about the elderly or the vulnerable who have had to take public transport to supermarkets and risk death! Communities had to rally around for the first few months before government food parcels kicked in. Then they cancelled shielding so nobody was entitled to help anymore and then re-instated it with none of the help that came in the first round. THAT is what I was talking about. The army may be helping with vaccines now but I don't recall seeing them doing much in the first few months. Considering the huge army we have and being one of the richest countries in the world, the elderly and vulnerable have been treated diabolically.

Update from Prof Phil Spector from data collected via Zoe app. Not a doom monger. Declared early data showed the R rate was less than 1 three months ago. Latest early data shows the R rate has plateaued and is now back to 1 nationally for unknown reasons. They have since revised calculation to account for vaccine side effects but the national rate is still estimated to be 0.9 and plateauing.

Given that we know that full opening of schools may raise R by as much as 0.4 it would make sense not to do this before the rate was at least 0.6 if the aim was still to keep the rate below 1.

So perhaps Johnson saying opening will inevitably mean that rates rise is a covert acceptance of R rising above 1 and a signalling that this is acceptable provided the NHS is not overwhelmed. Does this include palliative care for people that could have survived if they met the criteria for treatment and providing normal service?

Perhaps the government is hoping that 1st dose of the vaccine to over 75's will mean that the NHS is not overwhelmed despite rate being over 1. Maybe the NHS will hospitalise less over 75's but average age in ICU is 60 - ie not yet received 1st dose and unlikely to before schools reopen and in case have to wait weeks before benefit is seen.

It is not rational to throw caution to the wind but wild optimism that caution is not needed (despite the science, data, and even politicians saying deliberate actions will lead to increased (possibly unnecessary) death is a different kind of irrationality - understandable if the actual or imagined alternative is believed to be worse - but still irrational.

Just because everything is risky doesn't mean you think fuck it. If science tells you to take a sharp bend at no more than 20 mph but you are late to pick up DC from school or nursery and NSP is 60 mph (so you are not breaking a rule/law), you are not thinking clearly if you think that attempting the bend at 50 mph makes sense. Subjectively it might seem to be essential in the moment but objectively it really isn't.

@CheeseJalapenoBread

I remember the start of the vaccine roll-out and various posts saying what a shambles it was going to be and how it was inevitably going to screw up and how it was all going too slow. When that was proven decisively incorrect, they moved onto “well just wait until they have to do the second doses at the same time as first doses”, desperately chomping at the bit for it to all go pear shaped. It wasn’t just constructive, realistic comment on what was going on, it was just a litany of negativity. It’s a really, really odd mindset and not very healthy.

But are you checking that the posters are in fact the same ones?

I haven't posted about the vaccine roll out, but I must admit I didn't have much hope after test and trace and the shit show that was Christmas planning and London remaining in Tier 2 for so long. But I've been pleasantly surprised. I'd have definitely had low expectations in December, but still wanted to be out of lockdown.

I think people are doing a grand job of lumping people together, basically, when actually there are very different matters at play for individuals.

because some of us agree with the fact that we can't keep living in fear, and except that like a lot of other potentially deadly respiratory illness, like pnuemonia, and flu, that eventually we have to be realistic and learn to live with it, vaccinate against it and get on with life.

We cannot continue to live this half life thats killing people with secondary illness and mental health crisis.

I'm happy to follow the careful journey out of lockdown as the vaccine programme ramps up, but i'm done with living in constant fear.

Completely disagree. This is the beginning of the end. Vaccines are our way out and they are working. I am an optimist but have heard from enough reputable scientists to have hope. I have booked 3 international trips from May! Woo hoo!

@pilotsprincess

Some people on this website just really do have a half empty glass dont they🥴

I think it's more than half empty, it's bone dry and smashed on the floor 😆

OH btw...

I have a friend on the front line.. as in she's a microbiologist who has been involved in the creation of one of the vaccines and actually understands what the fuck she's talking about.

She is quite positive about us all being able to come out of this.

I think i'll listen to her, rather than the Dementors on Social Media.

@CheeseJalapenoBread

I remember the start of the vaccine roll-out and various posts saying what a shambles it was going to be and how it was inevitably going to screw up and how it was all going too slow. When that was proven decisively incorrect, they moved onto “well just wait until they have to do the second doses at the same time as first doses”, desperately chomping at the bit for it to all go pear shaped. It wasn’t just constructive, realistic comment on what was going on, it was just a litany of negativity. It’s a really, really odd mindset and not very healthy.

I remember that too. And the “vaccines don’t stop transmission” which has now been proved blatantly false. There’s a small sector of society enjoying every minute of this who will be completely lost at the end.

I have a friend on the front line.. as in she's a microbiologist who has been involved in the creation of one of the vaccines

I've got one of those too. She worked on the Astra Zeneca vaccine. She was saying last April that we'd be out of it by September - last year - so you know, they aren't 100% right all the time either.

I don't get why anyone is slamming the OP here. It's all out there in the data - government data and other data like Zoe stuff - that we're not really there yet in terms of transmission rates being low enough to open up - and definitely not low enough to start saying what can happen in June.

School going back is going to raise transmission rates - directly or indirectly with all these people 'getting their lives back' now their children aren't at home. We have to absorb that before we can do anything else - as everyone on MN shouts 'think of the children... especially the vulnerable ones'. To properly think of them, we need to reduce other wider opening. We just do. They are going to be closing bubbles and things - probably loads in the first few weeks - education is still going to be interrupted. The only way to stop that is to reduce community transmission by staying at home still and not mixing with people until more people have the vaccines.

Dull as shit, but it's not rocket science to see it as fact. They will work, but we're not there yet - not enough younger folk have been vaccinated, and until they are...

I've got British and foreign holidays booked for this summer. I'm cautiously optimistic that they will be happening, but I'm not jumping about raving about them yet.

The Gov has done the right thing in buying lots of vaccines, and letting the NHS roll it out properly. They've also relied upon the goodwill of thousands of volunteers who are as desperate as everyone else to get this done with.

It's possible to think they've done a good job of buying vaccines and delegating the rest to the NHS, but also think they are a shower of shit in every other way. Their only hope was the vaccine, and they only had one hope because they fucked everything else up very badly indeed. I hope the vaccine roll out isn't the only thing they are remembered for. Although of course that's what Johnson wants.

@Violetsarered

I'm so pleased you shared your version of doomed.....

Here's mine:

Ah, well, op, look at it this way: if I'm right, life will get increasingly better for all of us over the coming months. If you're right, I get the pleasure of feeling less fucking depressed about it all for a while and you get the joy of being a told-you-so gloater when it all goes tits up. Either way, I see no reason to be Mrs Doom and Gloom right now.

The only thing i cant see opening is nightclubs and festivals. Other than that yes back to a somewhat normal by june with the exception of still adhering to wearing masks in shops etc..

What’s the point of this post if not to bring people down?
“Do people REALLY believe...” “...get some perspective...”
Does it make you feel better to kind of ensure someone who was feeling happy about it starts to feel a little bit worse?

I think it is unlikely that it will all be perfect by 21st June but throughout this pandemic we’ve grabbed what opportunities we could as a family to make happy memories within the spirit of the rules ... that isn’t going to change because normal might not happen by June . That said we have employment and have had only one bereavement of an elderly family member in the last year - I can fully see that those less lucky may well feel very differently

Why attribute to malice what you can to misunderstanding, or in this case, personal perspective

Have you used the wrong word? I am guessing you mean something else and not malice ? Malice is a desire to cause pain or injury. Thr reasons I gave, happier in lockdown, extreme anxiety, enjoying the drama would clearly not fall into the definition of “malicious”, more self preservation, or selfish motivations.

I agree that people need to keep things in perspective, OP, starting with you! Pandemics do not go on forever and vaccines work. This we have seen many times over throughout history.

I agree OP.

Too soon to be opening schools to everyone in one go when we are still at 10,000 cases a day.

@HelloMissus

I’ll be optimistic because it will gain me nothing to be pessimistic. And I will take advantage of every single minor change to the restrictions as they’re lifted.

Absolutely! Me too

I can’t wait for the restrictions to be lifted and intend to take full advantage.

There’s so much to be hopeful about.

Anyone got Chris Witty and Patrick Valence phone numbers, we need to let them know all their scientists are wrong and the OP is the one with all the knowledge.