Only country with a household mixing ban

[ByTheHarbour]

Hi, I've been lurking for a while! Sorry for the long and rather ranty first post but I just wanted to raise some awareness of this and get it off my chest, because I'm feeling increasingly agitated about it and feel that there is very little awareness at the moment.

Obviously all mixing in our own homes is banned, indeed criminalised, as it was between March and July last year and now again in almost all of the country since November and apparently until at least May. Of course in many areas it also remained banned for some or all of the time in between - Leicester is going to reach at least 14 consecutive months under this law!

It is presented by our government and scientists as being totally inevitable that household mixing must be banned in a pandemic, and that anyone who disagrees isn't being realistic. Yet the reality is that almost no other European country has banned it. Here's the latest I can find on restrictions in comparable European countries:

France - no limits on being in other people's homes, as long as you don't come or go during the curfew hours.

Italy - Maximum of two adult guests per household at any time, plus any children

Belgium - a type of bubble system for non-household indoor contacts (called "cuddle contacts"!). But massively different to our bubbles, as every individual is allowed their own cuddle contact not just one per household. People living alone are allowed two cuddle contacts.

Netherlands - Each household may receive one adult visitor per day, children not counted (the adult number has only recently and temporarily been reduced to one, normally it has been two or three)

Germany - Any indoor gathering consisting of one household plus one person from another household is allowed. This was a temporary tightening introduced in January, and is being relaxed again from next Monday to be five adults from two households (plus any children).

Switzerland - rule of 5

Austria - General ban, but with exemptions for "closest relatives" and non-cohabiting couples.

Denmark - rule of 5

Sweden - advice to limit contact to a close circle

It's worth stressing that in many of these countries the rules have never been stricter than shown above at any point at all during the pandemic (and were of course much less strict during the summer), and furthermore the relaxation of household restrictions has generally been one of the highest priorities in each lockdown easing - see Germany above for example, easing this first in its unlocking. The sort of situation that we had in some parts of England last summer, where pubs and bars were open until the small hours of the morning but any mixing in your own home or even your own garden was completely illegal, is just absolutely off-the-scale compared anything that has been done anywhere else in the world as far as I'm aware.

Our government (and also Ireland) appear to be literally the only ones who have legislated to restrict family life to anything like this extent and duration. Nowhere else has attempted to confine people by law to a completely closed and rigid household/bubble system. In almost all other countries, this kind of government micromanagement of every private interaction just hasn't been on the agenda at all, as far as I can tell.

I've been astonished and actually quite frightened that this has happened here, and even more astonished at how little pushback there's been and how quickly it has come to be accepted as normal. In fact, despite already having these extra-draconian measures, it has often felt like most dissenting voices in this country have still been those calling for "even more, even harder, even stricter, even longer".

I think in part it's being driven by a widespread public misconception here that other countries are all doing "proper lockdowns" and therefore must be under similar or even stricter household rules than us, so I just wanted to post this to highlight that that really isn't the case at all and that our government has gone drastically further than others on this matter.

I really think that even the smallest of allowances, such as allowing one visitor at a time, makes such a huge difference to people. It means that, for example, a parent can legally visit a child or vice versa, or that a couple can legally see each other even if they don't meet the qualifying criteria for a support bubble, or that a lonely person who sadly doesn't have any close friends or relatives to bubble with can still have an acquaintance in for a cup of tea. I really do think that the countries such as Germany and the Netherlands, who have stopped at that level of restriction, have got it right - that that is as far as the government can reasonably go and that criminalising all mixing for months or even years just isn't an appropriate policy option in a free and civilised country - and that our government has got it very badly and uniquely wrong.

I think particularly of people who live in households which aren't their appropriate social group, for example one adult child living with one parent - they have been legally denied all indoor contact with anyone except each other, with anyone their own age, even with their own partners. Or people living in houseshares or as lodgers, whose "household" is just random people who they live with for purely financial reasons - they aren't deemed eligible for a support bubble as they don't live alone, and therefore all indoor contact with anyone who they actually care about has been outlawed indefinitely. If they've been completely following the government "rules" then they shouldn't even have hugged anyone since last March (if the people who they live with aren't people they would hug). Really, I think that's just appalling. I know people in this position.

A year ago this would all have seemed utterly unthinkable. Anyone suggesting that this degree of government control over our personal interactions could happen in this country and could be sustained for so long, even in a pandemic of this nature, would have been laughed out of the room. People in the other countries above would no doubt also have believed it would be unthinkable in their countries - and it turns out that they would have been correct about that. So how in this country have we ended up here? How have we gone off at such an extreme tangent compared to all the others?

The right to family and private life is one of the most fundamental rights of all, and while of course there can be emergencies which require those rights to be curtailed by the government I would have always just assumed that the level of government respect for these rights in this country, and the extent to which they would deem it appropriate to to curtail them in any particular crisis, would be broadly the same as in those other countries which we consider to be our peers as western democracies. It has shocked me quite profoundly and, I think, permanently, to discover during the last year that that clearly isn't the case and that we have diverged so far from the rest of the free world on this. I literally would never have suspected that about this country, and to be honest I'm really struggling to make sense of it. Family matters more than anything, even if you don't live in the same household as them. The sanctity of the family home matters enormously - how dare the government criminalise my young adult children if they enter. Intimate relationships also matter enormously, whether or not the partners live together, and banning them for most of a year is just not within the government's reasonable remit. The rest of Europe clearly gets all this. I used to be under the illusion that we did too.

And I fear that we have now uniquely set a horrendous precedent that it's fine for the government to intrude into our homes and completely switch 'household mixing' off whenever it likes, and for however long it likes, as a mainstream tool of public health policy. And I find that prospect totally unacceptable and terrifying. Am I wrong?

(I should also just add a little caveat about the Kent variant, as I know it will be brought up. Clearly that is something which came along and whacked us very unexpectedly and I would be far more understanding of the government if our unusually intrusive restrictions had only come about as a temporary response to that moment of acute crisis. But, what disturbs me is that they had actually already been in place for many months by then, throughout a time when we were facing exactly the same virus situation as the rest of the world.)

I fully support the no household mixing policy I haven't found it easy but it's necessary

There are very few restrictions in place in the USA, especially since each governor of each state has the absolute right to enforce or reject any restriction that they please. This is somewhat like having a peeing section in the swimming pool. And our current death rate is 525,560. So there is that. I have been in self-imposed isolation with one other person in my own bubble since last March. I will continue to do that until. Just...until. Along with our rights come resposibilities. Do remember that.

And I will repeat what I have been saying so often...IF COVID-19 had symptoms similar to smallpox, NO ONE would be talking about this, EVERYONE would simply be staying home.

You were wrong on France, Italy and Belgium so I didn’t read any further. To be honest, I don’t know the minutia of each country but I have close friends in all land they have suffered as much, if not more than us. Italy and France could not leave the house without a written ’pass’, they weren’t allowed to go for a walk with another person, etc.

Did smallpox not have a fatality rate of 35%?

Different proposition to Covid

sliceoflife
The roads are busy even though people are supposed to be working from home if they can. Gyms and non essential shops are closed. Where are all these people going?

"Work from home if you can" relies on your employer agreeing that you can. A number of employers whose staff can work from home, and did so in the first lockdown, are now insisting they need to come in to work. So people have no choice if they want to keep their jobs. And yet your post focuses entirely on "selfish" individuals and says nothing about the employers doing this or the government for doing nothing to address it except "encouraging" employers to allow their staff to work from home.

This article from January discusses the issue of office spread. It includes a telecoms outsourcing firm, Woven, who still want many of their staff to come into the office to answer calls. They simply say they have spent several months working on their IT infrastructure to try to enable more staff to work from home. (Ironically, one of their 3 core pillars is Agile Technology...)

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55843506

@Saralyn

I agree with you. I have been quite shocked at the rules in the UK.

I live in Norway, and here the government has concluded that it is too big an infringement on human rights to limit the number of people gathering in a home to less than ten people by law.

In the last few months there has been a strong recommendation to limit number of visits, and people mostly follows the recommendations. At the moment in Oslo, since Monday, the recommendation is no visitors in the home (except for those living alone which are allowed to visit one or two friends). We had the same recommendation for about two weeks earlier in 2021, and the government was very clear that this was an extreme measure, and it was the first restriction to be lifted. Right now all non-essential shops, cafes, restaurants are closed etc. I am sure the government will not consider allowing these to open until the recommendation to not have visitors in the home is lifted.

As a country, we are pretty compliant with following recommendations (even when they are not enforceable by law), but if we had not been allowed any visitors for months I think that would have shifted.

Thank you for that, which matches exactly what I've heard from a contact in Norway too. I was going to include Norway in my OP but didn't as I thought people would say non-comparable due to population density etc.

It does seem to me that all the Nordic countries have (as usual) remained pretty calm, measured and pragmatic during this crisis and the kind of panic and draconian legislative responses seen elsewhere have been largely absent.

Our government seems to be absolutely convinced that that kind of more mature approach (also seen in places like Switzerland and the Netherlands - Europe's most densely populated major country) just wouldn't work here and that a combination of draconian law and fearmongering is the only way. I'm really not sure about that at all - I think the vast majority of people here have been far more willing to behave sensibly and responsibly than the government gives them credit for.

@Margerine78

Norway have banned it, I work in music and spoke to an artist who can play a small gig but can't have people in her home. I'm sure the other countries' rules fluctuate too depending on infection rate.

I get it as people are more relaxed at home, locked in with no windows open (in this weather) breathing the same air. I hate it (live alone, going mad with boredom) but get the logic.

See the poster from Norway quoted in my post above.

@BestArty

I have family and friends in France, Spain, Greece and Cyprus. What you list above is actually untrue. In Greece and Cyprus there is a curfew beyond 10pm, no mixing of households and you need to send a text message requesting permission to move from part A to part B and you get fined if you get caught somewhere outside a reasonable route linking your planned trip. You are only allowed 2 text messages every 24 hours. So if say you are going to the supermarket you are allowed to get there and back, that’s it. You can’t visit anyone else.

In France and Spain it varies by area depending on the infection rate some you can mix but in most you can’t and there is similar curfews as above.

You cannot compare one country to another. Some countries are doing atrociously eg the U.K. and USA and others are doing amazingly eg NZ so their restrictions won’t be the same.

Furthermore I am a doctor and I have to look after people who are dying because of Covid so I suggest you being told to not mix is the least of your worries. Imagine all the families who have lost multiple members. Several families where both parents are dead leaving behind small children. So if you want to whine about how unfortunate you are to not be mixing, go ahead but I suggest you don’t break the rules. Lots of people are dying due to others being selfish and breaking the rules.

Admittedly I haven't looked at Greece and Cyprus but I would hardly say that they are relevant comparisons for the UK. I hope it was clear or at least implied in my OP that I was talking about reasonably similar countries to us.

I'm pretty sure that no part of France has (or has ever had) a mixing ban other than the curfew, and with the two relatively brief full lockdowns that they have had (spring and November) having effectively taken the form of a 24 hour curfew. As some pp have said, it is reported that laws specifically targeting mixing in homes would be unconstitutional in France. Whenever you can be outside of your home for general reasons, you can also freely visit other homes.

Spain has a very dense patchwork of local restrictions, but there is not a mixing ban nationally, nor I believe in most of the local areas.

NZ is playing a very different game with a zero covid strategy and is in a uniquely well placed geographical position to be able to do so. I certainly wasn't complaining about our restrictions vs their lack of restrictions - as you say, that wouldn't be a reasonable thing at all.

I sympathise enormously with what you have been having to deal with as a doctor and I also have close family who have been on the NHS front line during this. But when people's most fundamental freedoms are being restricted in an entirely unprecedented way for a year or more I don't think it's reasonable to just accuse people of whining about it, there needs to be a debate to ensure that we are striking the right balance. We cannot take an approach of saving absolutely every life at absolutely any cost - we have never taken that approach to any other risk in life and we can't with this one either. But actually the debate in this case isn't even necessarily about mixing vs more deaths, it could alternatively just be about the details of the restrictions, ie. mixing vs tighter restrictions on other aspects of life to compensate and keep overall transmission rates the same.

@chaosmaker

No idea what other countries people are like but her when a tiny let up has been given, people have gone totally overboard and at every step have been trying to find loopholes as to why none of it applies to them. Maybe this is why it's been specifically no household mixing and I'm sure everyone knows people who haven't changed any of their behavious all the way through.

Is that really true though or is that just the picture the media likes to paint? Maybe it's different in different areas etc, but I don't recognise that at all in the place where I live and among the people who I know.

People I know who have been breaking any rules have only been doing so in ways which are basically irrelevant (sitting on a bench when not technically allowed, driving a slightly questionable distance for exercise) or only minor (seeing one other person indoors such as a partner). Even in the summer when we were technically allowed to do many things, most stayed very cautious and diligent.

We are in a large town on outskirts of Rome. Not mixed with other households for a year approx

The people I know in the U.K. have generally pushed the rules as much as possible. For example, travelling out of London hours before the lockdown was enforced.

Having said that, i think the infringement of the government into people’s private lives has been astonishing - For example making casual sex illegal. Unbelievable.

I agree, it does seem intrusive & rather extreme for the government to control who we can & can't see in our own homes. But on the other hand, the rules here are pretty easy going about making trips for shopping, exercise etc. My brother lives in ROI, and he told me that they had police actually stopping people on the road & asking them where they are going & what is the purpose of their journey.

@pinkstripeycat

We are in a large town on outskirts of Rome. Not mixed with other households for a year approx

Is that because you aren't allowed or because you chose not to? Is that a local restriction?

Italian government website suggests at least two house visitors a day are allowed in all except the small number of red (full lockdown) zones. In the red zones it seems to be the general prohibition of movement which prevents it rather than specific rules about gatherings in homes.

'I think the government are getting away with it as part of their blame the public strategy.'
So you think it's really the government spreading this? 🤔

@newstart1234

The people I know in the U.K. have generally pushed the rules as much as possible. For example, travelling out of London hours before the lockdown was enforced.

Having said that, i think the infringement of the government into people’s private lives has been astonishing - For example making casual sex illegal. Unbelievable.

Those scenes in London have been seen in other world cities when lockdowns have been announced too though (Paris on the eve of the November lockdown, for example). It's only human that some people will decide to flee somewhere in those circumstances, and especially when it happens a few days before a Christmas which has just been cancelled! Many of those on the trains out of London were very young, probably living in a shared flat in a strange city, and decided to return to the family home. I know one of them actually. I don't blame them in the slightest.

It's not just casual sex which is illegal! People in established relationships can't legally see each other if their living arrangements don't meet the criteria to be allowed a support bubble (again affecting young people in houseshares etc)

'I hope it was clear or at least implied in my OP that I was talking about reasonably similar countries to us.'
But France is almost three times the size of the UK, with a similar sized population. I wouldn't say that was reasonably similar.

I haven't RTFT so sorry if this has been mentioned, but I live in Northern Ireland where we can bubble with another household. You don't have to live alone and can have up to 10 from 2 households.

It has been a lifeline.

The ‘fleeing from London’ comment was reference to not being allowed to see family legally. Here in Denmark it has never been illegal certainly not at Xmas or any religious festival. So no crowds were seen leaving Copenhagen or Aarhus for example.

Restraint hasn’t been shown by the gov, I think it’s a way of shifting the blame onto the public for their fuck ups.

@Stolengoat

'I hope it was clear or at least implied in my OP that I was talking about reasonably similar countries to us.' But France is almost three times the size of the UK, with a similar sized population. I wouldn't say that was reasonably similar.

Well obviously nowhere is identical, but clearly we are far more similar to France than to Greece? And France (and most of Europe) has similarly big and dense cities to us. As cities have been the worst hotspots in every country, surely that is more relevant than the overall density of the country.

In any case, we are even more similar (culturally) to the Netherlands, which has a far higher population density than us and yet has had significantly less severe restrictions.

The response from the media to covid has been frightening . They are now backing out . They have held the govt responsible for every death - watch BBC and ITV etc . Their rants from March last year has been nothing but irresponsible. All they tell us is about the people who are ill or dead never about those that survived or had mild symptoms . They have been at us about long covid . And never have they really highlighted obesity or chronic illness as being a factor in these deaths . I disagree with this lockdown and would have liked to see young healthy people out and about ( careful and with precautions ) .. when Boris spoke of herd immunity he was accused of genocide ; every care home death has been his responsibility.. Can you blame them for this type of lockdown . The U.K. was highlighted as the worst affected and worst managed by the great BBC and ITV. - the press and the loud voices of some people of U.K. have created this situation .. and when reasonable people speak out they are silenced by the press . Unfortunately they and a whole bunch of do gooder type of groups / associations are responsible for where we are today ..

Myself and my partner had Covid a couple of weeks ago - contracted as a result of my partner’s short hospital stay. We are both CEV and partially vaccinated, and were both horribly ill and terrified throughout. How many of you on this thread have had Covid and really know how bad it can get ? How many have seen family members struggle with it, or worse still, have lost loved ones to it. So we’re restricted in what we can do for a while - the alternative is to let the virus get out of control and more people will die. Someone on here actually posted that the right to life is the most fundamental right of all. Can someone please tell me what good is that going to do you when you’re dead from Covid as a result of breaking the rules ? Wakey wakey people, 100,000 deaths - what are we supposed to do, just ignore it and hope it’ll go away ?

It's awful OP. But alas criminalising hugging your own grandchildren is a direct result of this country having a government that has cocked up literally everything that could have cut down Covid transmission. Late introduction of the first lockdown, non-existent test and track system, lack of PPE, not closing the borders, not punishing employers who have been forcing employees to come to office where WFH is possible, the asinine "eat out to help out", and now not having vaccinated teachers before the big bang school reopening...

All that means that the burden of cutting down covid transmission is mostly on us and the way we live our personal lives. That also means the government has a convenient scapegoat should the transmission rise. It's much eaier to blame us for "killing granny" by seeing friends and family than plan and implement meaninful pandemic policies in a competent way.

Covid itself is what is concerning, not the media reports. Still an alarming amount of denial around.

The medical facts are the medical facts.

The NHS is preparing for many hundreds of thousands with significant long covid (meaning not the group who cough for six weeks).

... the way the government tackled the Dom Cum affair didn't help either.

Other countries also shut things down sooner, closed their borders, didn't have people in government or linked to government more bothered about horse racing and their mates in business than people's lives.

You can't just cherry pick individual restrictions for comparison between countries.

With the best will in the world, an hour on Mumsnet earlier last year showed you just how many people apparently couldn't (read selectively wouldn't) understand the concept of staying at home and limiting shopping trips for essentials. Apparently it absolutely was essential to go for a wander to the shop for chocolate, wine, ice cream. Anyone who disagreed was branded evil and then there were the illogical claims that anyone taking an issue with endless trips out when you fancy a treat equals 'look at all the people who think you should survive on gruel, the trolley police probably hate anyone who bought chocolate or ice cream as part of their weekly shop... nobody should have anything nice in their basket at all these days'. Very much a case of selectively ignoring the massive difference between doing a supermarket shop once, maybe twice a week and popping to the shops whenever you fancy a bit of chocolate.