Who thinks Australia and NZ have got it right ?

[marilenagrace]

What do you think ? Do you think that keeping everyone out of the country is the right approach long term to deal with covid ? Do you wish we did that here in the UK ?

Jassy I agree re behavioural messaging.

It is one thing the U.K. has done well actually. Low enforcement but high rates of compliance.

@JassyRadlett

I have been pondering that myself actually as I do not know much about behavioural science and I agree it may be that there could be disbenefits to meddling with the slogan. They vagukely tagged on 'and air' recently I think.

But the slogan was criticised at the beginning for being the wrong way round - space face hands was the priority.

UK was so slow to adopt masks whilst other countroes just did it. We have waited for aaaagggggeeeessss to get evidence before adopting non-invasive/non-problematic interventions like masks - we could have easily done what e.g. Spain did and said masks and then ditched if evidence said they weren't needed.

In short, we have been too slow at every aspect - except vaccines. Thank goodness we haven;t been too slow at vaccines or who knows where we would be.

Is it mainly masks then you have an issue with?

Europe have far higher cases than us right now. The bigger impact is our recent lockdown.

Vaccination will help as we move out slowly but as a blunt tool to keep cases down keeping us apart is more effective.

But the slogan was criticised at the beginning for being the wrong way round - space face hands was the priority.

Yes - as I said in my post the hierarchy has always felt wrong to those who already have fairly high awareness of the issues. But that group isn’t the target audience - and as I also said it would be fascinating to see the testing.

One scenario I can imagine is that having had hand hygiene so drilled into them that if it wasn’t first, front and centre, then people got a bit flummoxed, wondered what had changed and were distracted from the overall message and so it didn’t have as much impact.

Whereas giving them something they’re expecting and already happy to do first, in can create a safer psychological pathway to the other actions. They are reassured by ‘hands’. That’s expected, that’s easy. So the barrier to other messages is lower.

As I say this is speculation as I’ve not seen the testing! But behavioural messaging is rarely as simple as ‘this one is the most important so it should go first.’ People don’t even realise they’re thinking these things half the time.

It always fascinates me how one small change in messaging - even just changing the order of some words - can absolutely transform its effectiveness. And as human brains are not (always) logical often we have to match the messaging to where they are, rather than where they logically should be.

Trish Greenhalgh has repeatedly argues that the Precautionary Principle not rigorous evidence evaluation should be used to decide what to do about the pandemic. She is obsessed with masks and has made a fool of herself in her blind enthusiasm.

Some wag on Twitter just generated this graphic.

Makes me laugh when anyone says "Follow the Science!" to decide what to do about covid. The people saying that loudest do not want science. They want Precaution as Only priority.

It’s quite reassuring to see Oliver Johnson in the centre of that graphic though I recognise it has no scientific basis! I know he’s taken a lot of shit from both extremes for refusing to follow a particular agenda.

For paediatric Covid facts I like Alasdair Munro and Don’t Forget The Bubbles.

@MedSchoolRat

Trish Greenhalgh has repeatedly argues that the Precautionary Principle not rigorous evidence evaluation should be used to decide what to do about the pandemic. She is obsessed with masks and has made a fool of herself in her blind enthusiasm.

Some wag on Twitter just generated this graphic.

Makes me laugh when anyone says "Follow the Science!" to decide what to do about covid. The people saying that loudest do not want science. They want Precaution as Only priority.

When we look at outcomes - those countries that took the precautionary principle have had far better outcomes.

The graphic is pretty spot on - an interesting question is would listening to the pessimists have saved a lot of lives in the UK? And with hindsight it looks like the answer is yes.

Pessimists are much-maligned, people don't like them because they don't make us feel happy. But there is evidence that they are very effective at handling crises and navigating life, more so than optimists (an experiment we have watched in real time in the UK has been an optimist at work). This is because they will prepare for the worst and crucially mitigate to avoid it.

The secret politically I guess is to be a pessimist but sell it as optimism. This is something I think Ardern has achieved in NZ.

I particularly like that Devi Sridhar appears at both ends of the scale - I think that is really evident when reading her feed!

I don’t do Twitter so it’s all noise to me.

People tend to get entrenched on SM to prove their position, and make string statements for airtime, much like on here.

Strong

I don't think they'll be so smug when they see us living a normal life and travelling on holidays etc over the summer while they are going through winter there. Give it a few months and they will seriously be questioning why they've been held captive for 2+ years. I lived in Asia for 16 years, all my friends there are stuck unable to see loved ones etc and no sign of things improving for a few years at least.

I think twitter has been a good source during covid. I am not on twitter myself - just read what others post. It has been interesting to me to have access to that scientific debate without it being filtered through news providers.

I have also learnt a lot reading direct accounts from front line medics, those are people I very rarely heard from before, especially from other countries.

Future historians are going to drown in resources on this I think.

But optimism and not following the precautionary principle is not the correct method when it comes to vaccines development and manufacture and roll out. Other countries should be following the U.K. lead on that. According to some, we are out of a pandemic in U.K. now ( not sure I entirely agree!)
People seem to dismiss the vaccines contribution. Imo they are all that matters and out of the two options “quick lockdown” v “ quick vaccines” you’d rather do both well of course but the most important to get right is the vaccines. I think we’ll see this play out more and more over 2021. So many countries lauded for “doing well” back in 2020 are having issues now including a lot of Europe.
It really is a marathon situation.
And the vaccines was part of the U.K. pandemic preparedness hence it was all ready to go immediately. We did not just expect other countries to come to the rescue. The Oxford AZ vaccine( despite all the attempts to sabotage it) is the most used vaccine in the world as it works, is cheap and easy to use logistically. U.K. should be proud of that. Countries that often get praised for doing “well” haven’t produced a effective and cheap vaccine like the U.K. has.

On optimism v pessimism I find Whitty and Valance very good at being neutral.

I have listened a lot to their words, particularly Whitty. He speaks in a measured calm way that would be not just him but output from everyone feeding into his approach.

There are a few others I have leaned on mostly on R4, plus graphs thread was always good with scientific links.

Sorry I meant optimism and ditching p principle IS the correct method for vaccines

Czech Rep & Slovenia both started ultra-cautious but see where they are now.

Precautionary Principle has sharply slowed down vaccine roll out in Germany & much of Europe.

Fine as long as the precautions mean you're not an Australian locked out of own country.

Sasha yes the vaccine task force approach has been a good one

I also don’t think the U.K. gov is obsessed with washing hands. That’s nonsense
And infections are dropping like a stone so I will be delighted with the dropping on face masks in May. Brilliant!
If we need to out them on again in November that’s fine.

Infections are low and slowly reducing would be the more accurate description of the current situation. Case rates have fallen across the UK but R is slightly up so the rate of fall has slowed.

Although as PHE says, R gets dicey at low rates of infection. I think the most recent release indicated that Yorkshire was the only region where the R should be interpreted with extreme care.

Case rate trends in my borough have been a bloody rollercoaster over the last month. I should stop looking, but....

Well given that they are now saying that it is possible their borders will remain closed for a time even with the population vaccinated...

Oh but @pennylane83 you have to remember that when the government says that it’s not what it really means, what it really means is x, y or z (where x, y and z are radically different positions based on the poster in question’s chosen narrative.)

@ragged

Czech Rep & Slovenia both started ultra-cautious but see where they are now.

Precautionary Principle has sharply slowed down vaccine roll out in Germany & much of Europe.

Fine as long as the precautions mean you're not an Australian locked out of own country.

This is a good point above. If you go hard early it’s better if you exit out. Valance made good points re timing and suppression early on.

@TheKeatingFive

Living in NI, I’ve often wondered if any consideration was ever given to the UK and ROI both agreeing to ban all non essential travel from other countries. If this had been done early on, things might have been very different.

ROI is getting into all sorts of trouble now, trying to apply hotel quarantine to EU countries. It’s politically very difficult. It would not have been countenanced last March.

I also find it ridiculous that you have to quarantine going into ROI from the UK and do pre travel tests yet no tests or quarantine is required travelling from the UK to NI, only self isolation for 10 days, yet you are also allowed to go out and shop for essentials. People can travel to Belfast and then just drive down to the ROI with no restrictions 🤷🏼‍♀️