The outcome of the government's terrible messaging re Xmas mixing.

[dangermouselovespeanutbutter]

I read this article this morning. It's really sad. I was so angry at the government's approach to Xmas. Indoor mixing was always going to be a huge risk. There was no way to make it safe. BoJo flipped and flopped anc just confused people.
Unfortunately there are lots of people out there, like the family in this article, who take the view that if the government say it's safe then it must be safe.
It's hard to understand how a family could go from shielding to mixing with several households in one fell swoop. But I do believe that they thought it would be ok because they'd been told that it would be (and it's interesting that his wife said she missed the updates. Not everyone reads / watches the news each day).
So so sad.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/apr/06/james-mcallister-was-a-much-loved-family-man-did-the-christmas-mixing-confusion-cause-his-death?CMP=ShareiOSAppp_Other

This is very sad but plenty of people took risks and the post Christmas data didn’t really show a Christmas effect on cases- the damage was already done in early December. The rules once changed were clear, and it was also clear we were in a peak, people needed to be responsible.

It’s legal to drink alcohol, but the government won’t prevent you drinking until you kill yourself. That’s your decision. Similarly it was legal to mix at Xmas, but you still have to make your own decision about what’s safe for you personally. Also I read the article and it’s obvious that they broke the rules, and the result was that sadly this man died. But they chose to break the rules - I don’t believe for a second they didn’t know.

All this victim blaming. Johnson should have put his big girl pants on and said no mixing at all. He can't escape blame for this. More than half the people who died of covid, died since Xmas.

It’s very sad but they have to take responsibility for their own actions

We knew from months before that household mixing indoors was one of the riskiest things you can do as far as COVID is concerned. So everyone who met up at Christmas was taking a risk. They can’t blame the Government, anyone with more than one brain cell would know there was a risk. That’s why many people didn’t mix and others took mitigating measures before, like staying indoors for 2 weeks before.

So why did Gavin Williamson threaten schools with legal action when they wanted to close early. Cant wait to see how this is spun to be the publics fault.

I don't think it's victim blaming, we've been treated like idiots for a year to compensate for some individuals lacking common sense. For example, vaccinated individuals could meet quite safely indoors now but they won't say that because some people will take it as 100% safe and not consider 1st/2nd doses etc. It's sad she lost her husband but come on, they'd been shielding, but suddenly she thought CV-19 had magically disappeared for 5 days over Xmas. By the sounds of it even if they had banned meeting on Xmas day she still would have seen other people as apparently she didn't see the huge announcement that devastated loads just days before Xmas. And neither did any of her family, convenient that really. We decided before the Boris announcement that regardless of it it was allowed we wouldn't be visiting vulnerable family members over the Xmas period. Such a waste to be careful so long and then risk it like that.

@RuleWithAWoodenFoot

All this victim blaming. Johnson should have put his big girl pants on and said no mixing at all. He can't escape blame for this. More than half the people who died of covid, died since Xmas.

It’s not victim blaming. Sad as it is this family didn’t even follow the rules. Sadly they are now facing the consequences.

@99victoria

We did mix for christmas day as was allowed - 2 households indoors - and none of us got covid

Same here, plus we had other family round Boxing Day as well and new year, everyone All fine.

I thought the announcement on 19Dec meant we could not mix. We cancelled all our plans and I just had my daughter over who I bubble with...I guess if we had all been together it would have been 4 diff households though.

To be fair, he wasn’t really shielding the whole time. We were shielding an elderly grandparent with cancer. This meant none of us going anywhere and, if they did, they isolated from the rest of us for 10 days. We had shopping delivered and wiped it down, children here to home school and my husband lived in the summerhouse for a month when he had to go into work to supervise stupid exams at the height of the wave before Xmas. As sad as that story is, he could have caught it at any time from any of his family. We spent Xmas together because my sister and her family completely isolated for 14 days before so we knew we were pretty much 100% safe. That is proper shielding. You have to take responsibility yourself. Anyone who trusts the government to give them good advice is insane.

@Waxonwaxoff0

It's very sad, but people need to take personal responsibility sometimes. You can't just blame the government for everything. I certainly don't blindly follow everything Boris says.

Totally agree with this. My dh has been shielding throughout and we have been as careful as we can be. There would be no way we would have mixed at Xmas .

The Government were completely reckless/stupid to ever announce the plan for 3 households to mix indoors for 5days! We were in lockdown in November, cases were rising, but Johnson stuck to his plan until the last minute, it really was madness, but unfortunately people took him at his word.

Indeed, Johnson hadn't finished ploughing ahead with misjudged actions as he then encouraged mixing in primary schools for a single day in January (at the point there were over 60,000 new cases per day in the country). Only to call a national lockdown the following day.

The Government's legacy for 2020 was the highest death rate from Covid in Europe - yes people have to take personal responsibilty - but that needs to be coupled with strong, straight-talking leadership & we didn't have that last year.

Christmas will always be tainted for those poor people who lost someone due to Christmas mixing.

Yes the Government ordered some vaccines but that is the only saving grace of a diabolical year of policy decisions.

Can't blame the UK government for what's happening in the EU right now. The entire world is suffering and leaders everywhere are struggling. Blame the virus.

There are a lot people who don't follow the news closely. Some of them will be less able to digest the conflicting information presented to form sound personal risk assessments.

It's pretty easy to say that you wouldn't have made those choices, but perhaps they don't have the same analytical skills that you have.

It is beholden on the government to communicate clearly, consistently and with enough force to help people who struggle with personal analysis to make good decisions. Did the government do that at Christmas? No it was a shit show.

It is beholden on the government to communicate clearly, consistently and with enough force to help people who struggle with personal analysis to make good decisions. Did the government do that at Christmas? No it was a shit show

It’s not the government’s fault that apparently no one in this family watched the news or read any newspapers or news updates (or quite honestly looked at social media) for a week. Perhaps I can believe that one person hadn’t heard about the Christmas backtrack, but the whole family? Not a chance.

People struggle with personal analysis over lots of things. Eating too much junk food, drinking too much alcohol, smoking. The government isn't responsible for every bad decision that everyone makes.

I hate the Government but there does have to come a point where we have to apply our own critical thinking.

I’m a teacher. My school had to close 3 days early as we had so many cases we couldn’t physically open due to staff numbers and my head was getting multiple notifications every day and was worried for our school community as a whole. Yes we could have mixed with another household but we chose to have Christmas at home (DH also a teacher). Number didn’t miraculously drop on Christmas Eve.

@poshme

Yes sad.

But they were shielding. Why on earth did they think mixing would be ok?

They mixed on a day they weren't supposed to, having not taken extra care (we mixed on Xmas day with 1 other family having stayed at home for 10 days first- and we weren't shielding)

People have to take some personal responsibility.

Around Christmas, we too mixed with another household.Legally, we could have done beforehand too, but hadn't for the 9 months beforehand. Both households were shielding and hadn't stopped during the supposed pausing either. Neither were going to the shops or leaving the homes (one had a child who had been attending school and the school closed early to allow sufficient time to fully isolate beforehand). One household had also been tested negative in the run up.

On that basis that every precaution had been taken, it felt as safe it could to mix. We were fully aware of the Christmas changes (though this didn't impact us per seas could form a bubble regardless).

Any shielding family, who still chose to go to the shops etc, regardless of precautions and then mix with 3 households who had not been taking such extensive precautions really chose to play Russian Roulette with their shielders life. I don't believe that the family in the article were unaware. I believe that like many they'd had enough and wanted some normality and that they were sort of egged on by the promotion of Christmas mixing. Blaming Boris/the government is removing the accountability that we all have as adults. We all make choices. Many thousands will have not been impacted as a result, some will. Some will now kick themselves for not having taken more precautions. Hindsight is great.

I’m guessing that there are people out there with MH problems who are alive today because they were allowed to see their families at Christmas.

It was a gamble, it is very sad but they weighed the odds and lost!

It's a long drawn out article set for maximum emotional impact and maximum criticism of the govt, so I struggled to figure out the timeline but I'm not sure the timeline fits the incubation period.

They visited her mum on 23rd December and a day and a half later he was too ill to come out for Christmas Day. That fast!
I think the possibility is that he contracted it elsewhere.

Anyway, regardless. They went to see her mum and they were desperately unlucky. I can understand that with hindsight they wish theyd made different choices, but i dont think guilt and blame is helpful.

We mixed with family on Christmas Day,after careful consideration of the risks and a bit of self imposed isolation .It was lovely,and has sustained me through the winter.
None of us got Covid

Here, the government was saying: it’s safe to mix among families. So people thought it was safe.”

Above was from the article which was never said by the government. I got the impression all along that it’s ‘allowed’ but I advised!! Also, as if no one in the family knew the rules had changed.

Still extremely sad, a son, husband, dad, etc has passed too early. He sounded like a real character.

I think the government message was clear, the problem was that the situation changed and they responded by changing the message. However at no point did anyone say that mixing at Christmas was safe, you weighed the odds and took the risk