Is life never going back to normal?

[JuneMoonstone]

I feel incredibly lucky that I've lived 44 years of a normal life. I am heartbroken at the way life has become. Like so many others, I feel like I am existing, not living. I don't see any point in making plans, I don't feel any hope for the future. I was feeling quite positive about the progress made in the UK with vaccines and seeing the infection rates and death rates lower. However with the news about the rest of Europe going into lockdown due to escalating infection rates, I can't help but feel that we are never going to get out of this bloody mess. I cannot help but believe that we will have to live our lives under constant restrictions forever now because of this virus. Is life really going to be shit from now on? Will I ever be able to, for example, go into a busy pub on a Friday night and watch a live band and have a bloody good time again? Will we have to wear face masks permanently in public places from now on? I get a very strong feeling that this will be the case. It's my daughter I feel for the most. She's just 5 years old. What kind of a life is she going to have?

People who are vulnerable get a flu jab every year and nobody thinks about Spanish flu. We will add a covid jab, possibly in the same injection, and that will become routine.
Maybe masks will stay but if wearing a mask in some public situations is the cost of hugging people I love then I'll take it.

How on earth do you reach that daft conclusion?

Perhaps go read about life expectancies pre vaccine eh and look at the causes of death...

I don’t think masks will stay in any numbers at all tbh. People associate them too much with this pandemic and won’t want to be reminded of it.

Hate to point it out to you but China, S Korea, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore all well ahead there.

@notrub

How on earth do you reach that daft conclusion?

Perhaps go read about life expectancies pre vaccine eh and look at the causes of death...

do you know what ‘pandemic’ means?

Diseases don’t go away (usually, although sometimes they do). Pandemics do. In the same way that covid won’t become extinct, but the pandemic will end, all the same.

@Bargebill19

No we won’t go back to how it was completely. At home, possibly schools and small clubs possibly we will. By working practices and the nhs - no. Lots of big companies will be keeping things such as home working, masks, sanitisers, spit guards, one way systems and on line meetings. Shame because it will bring a host of other problems. But life goes on albeit changed.

Why are you stating this as a fact?

@notrub

The world won't return to normal maybe ever but that doesn't mean the UK can't. Much will depend on how well the vaccination program goes and what happens with mutations but I'm quite relieved that the UK iseems to be pursuing a zero covid strategy which if successful will mean a largely normal 2022.

I really don't think the UK is pursuing Zero Covid at all. They've actually said the opposite. If we were going for Zero Covid then schools wouldn't have opened up until cases were much lower.

@Suzi888

“Waxonwaxoff0

ilovesooty
Well we can't please ourselves and go back to normal if our normal is going abroad on holiday.

And if travel isn't permitted that's that.
It will be at some point. Foreign travel won't cease to exist, it's a big money maker.”

Erm I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but foreign travel HAS in fact ceased for the regular holiday maker.

We were told “get the vaccine, get back to normal”. But that’s not the case is it.... and no one seems to have died of anything apart from covid since March 20.

I think things will return to normal eventually, fingers crossed!

Well yes, for the moment! The PP was seemingly suggesting it would be permanent though.

Life definitely never went back to normal after Spanish Flu.
'One of the great tragedies of 1918 is that those dependents just vanish into the cracks of history. We don't really know what happened to them but we get the occasional glimpse, for example, from a study in Sweden we know that a lot of old people moved into workhouses and a lot of the children became vagrants.

Men were more vulnerable than women overall globally, though there were regional variations. Pregnant women were particularly vulnerable and had miscarriages at frighteningly high numbers because, to fight the virus, the body took resources away from the womb and the growing foetus. Some of those babies survived and we know now there's a lifelong effect called foetal programming. That generation was physically and cognitively slightly reduced. They were more likely to suffer from heart attacks and to go to prison – and came of age just in time to go and fight in the Second World War.'
It also brought about an era of social medicine and loads of other stuff, but life had changed for ever. WE CAN NEVER GO BACK. That is not necessarily a bad thing. We will adapt to the changes.

Pandemic is a media term. It has no scientific definition so you can call things what you will.

As I said above, the TB epidemic lasted over a century. Many other epidemics have been described as lasting decades.

With covid exactly what do you think will happen in 2 years. The tooth fairy step in and make it vanish?

My eldest DD wanted to watch some old home movies tonight (she's 17). I always get a bit wistful at seeing them as there are people on there who have died or drifted apart and of course seeing my DC being so much younger. But I got very sad this time watching all the fun. We went for days out and had parties. Christmas and new year with a packed house. My 4 year old has spent a year indoors almost and hasn't experienced much of this and I feel so sad for her.

I'm fed up now and just praying things start to pick up. I want to go back to the carefree times that I didn't appreciate until it was taken away.

There is zero chance that most UK offices will still be having masks and one-way systems and social distancing indefinitely. Those things cost money and what would be the point? If you have a really generous employer maybe they’ll pay for hand sanitiser refills.

Pandemic is a media term. It has no scientific definition so you can call things what you will.

okay then.

I really don't think the UK is pursuing Zero Covid at all.

Neither did I from what various ministers have said but when it became apparent the impact vaccines have had on transmission I think the gov accepted this strategy but don't want to raise hopes. We'll see I guess. The problem with any other strategy is that well there isn't any plan. It's a strategy of hoping that the virus mutates into something weaker or stops mutating and neither are scientifically likely right now.

@GoldenOmber

There is zero chance that most UK offices will still be having masks and one-way systems and social distancing indefinitely. Those things cost money and what would be the point? If you have a really generous employer maybe they’ll pay for hand sanitiser refills.

All the places I have worked this year have already implemented these precautions. They are not making any plans to rip them out. They are one off sunk costs with the exception of sanitiser refills - which are less than a pound for 500ml when bought wholesale. So add little to the overall budget when one foaming refill last 2 months - assuming you have around 18 points for 500 people.

They are one off sunk costs

Social distancing in office spaces isn’t, though. Unless you’re really fortunate to have much more floorspace than you need, most offices can’t accommodate everyone kept 6ft apart without a knock-on estates cost. You can shift half the staff to WFH, but even then you’ve got twice as much floorspace than you’d need if everyone left in the office sat right next to each other.

And even the offices that want to pursue this are going to find out that their employees don’t, long-term. People will put up with working in masks and not getting that close to any colleagues for emergency measures and exceptional times, but once the emergency’s passed and all the staff are vaccinated, basic human behaviour is going to overrule any sign on the wall saying “keep 2m apart!”

Again: what would be the point? What incentive would employers have to keep everyone distanced and one-way systems in place and half the room capacity for meetings where nobody can sit next to each other and so on? Because it might prevent a vaccinated employee getting mildly ill?

The world has changed. We’ll always be more aware of germs and hand washing than we were before. We’ll probably retain the plastic screens and the hand sanitiser. We might continue to wear masks in the winter to prevent the spread of germs. WFH will be more widespread than it was before. Internet shopping will be more popular and town centres less popular. A lot of pubs will have closed permanently, but alcohol consumption was already declining among the younger generation. You can’t expect your kids to have the same life you had because the world always changes. Just as you don’t have the life your parents had. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.

@notrub

Pandemic is a media term. It has no scientific definition so you can call things what you will.

As I said above, the TB epidemic lasted over a century. Many other epidemics have been described as lasting decades.

With covid exactly what do you think will happen in 2 years. The tooth fairy step in and make it vanish?

Don’t be so utterly ridiculous of course pandemic is a medical definition, from the World Health organisation below - nothing to do with the media defining it at all

www.who.int/bulletin/volumes/89/7/11-088815/en/

@GoldenOmber

I’m not saying I agree with it - just reporting what I’m seeing and hearing on a daily basis.

Personally, I think all these measures are far more harmful than helpful at this point. They had a place in buying time for a vaccine to be created and helped prevent deaths and serious illness. But now we have a vaccine I would love to see them gone, sadly many big businesses are not thinking that way.

Also a surprisingly high number of office workers like the extra space and peace and some like to wfh. It’s a fact that business practice and models have rapidly changed and some will stay. Habits regarding new workplace rules have been formed. Those who do not like it, will become the ‘new smokers’ and either conform or suffer the consequences.

@JuneMoonstone

Thank you for all your replies. I'm struggling to come to terms with it all, even after all this time. What I don't understand is that there have been pandemics in the past such as Spanish Flu, but they lasted for a limited period of time and then they ended and life resumed as normal. What is it about Covid 19 that makes it different from all the other pandemics in the past, in that our way of living will be changed permanently? Why is there the liklihood that we will have to wear face coverings for many years to come when this wasn't the case for the Spanish flu? Is it because we are being prepped for another pandemic that is expected to arrive imminently, so that social distancing and face coverings become the norm? Do I need to just accept that from now on, whenever I go into a shop, any public space or when I take my child to school, that I need to wear a face covering? Do I need to give up the hope of ever going to the theatre again? Will I ever be able to shake someone's hand again, unless they are a member of my immediate family?

It’s not any different. It’s not even anywhere near as bad! Spanish flu went on longer than this. Look at smallpox too. It was endemic for centuries but life went on.

Covid won’t always present the dangers it does now. It won’t be a novel virus and there will be some immunity to it even if it doesn’t disappear altogether. It’s been so bad because it was new and everyone was susceptible.

Life is pretty much back to normal in some places, Australia/New Zealand, why is everyone convinced we can’t get there too when we’re so ahead on vaccinations too

We will be back to normal very shortly

It's over (but Europe really needs to get their shit together when it comes to vaccination)

I understand how you feel op. I live in Singapore at the moment where covid is under very good control. Nevertheless, the government are pretty keen to emphasise that where we are at is the 'new normal' until the rest of the world has it under control. The normal is masks everywhere out the house, no singing (this is a key part of my job!), small groups, no large audiences or events, endless reminders to social distance. It is not the life I once knew and not the one I want but it is what it is. We are moving back to the UK this summer because if we don't the chances of us seeing our families any time in the next few years is tiny and I can't live with that. I think fwiw there will be a return to the old way in the UK/Europe. Maybe not yet but I think those things will happen again, it might just be a longer wait. I just take things day by day and try not to think too far ahead.

People cite Singapore as a place where normal life is continuing. Much more so than the UK, yes, but this is with practically closed borders and a pretty strict internal approach. It is not 'normal' compared to just over a year ago.

At least the UK will be back to normal faster than Europe.