Local lockdowns!

[november90]

Hi all,
Just read a concerning article about the top ten places likely to fall into a local lockdown, all concerningly in the north west and very close to my hometown Lancaster and I'm feeling absolutely gutted. We were in local lockdown since September last year, cafes never reopened since they closed for the November lockdown until last week... we cannot keep doing this! How likely is this actually going to be? Is the north west just always going to be majorly locked down even when vaccinated :(

Now on bbc

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-57232728

@everythingthelighttouches

But where was the announcement that this was new guidance for these areas????

Seems to have been very quietly published, wtf are they doing? If it is serious enough to need to do this, presumably it is serious enough to need people to know.

Feel awful for those areas where they've been locked down for a very long time.

I'm really nervous about where we will be in a month!

This is the weirdest thing.

Changing the rules without telling people isn't going to change behaviour much is it?

The ideological need to pretend the pandemic is over, is really clashing with being employed to govern a country where the pandemic is gearing up again.

I have family in the bit if Hampshire that's gone into surge testing for the Indian variant so I expect they (and West London) will be next for the "Unofficial local lockdown. But with pubs open, announced in secret" treatment.

What a bloody shambles.

@everythingthelighttouches

But where was the announcement that this was new guidance for these areas????

There wasn't one.

It's a secret squirrel sort of lockdown lite.

I imagine it's going to be highly effective, don't you?

Blx is all I can say.
Kirklees restricted again. Super.
🤬😢

@BikeRunSki

Blx is all I can say. Kirklees restricted again. Super. 🤬😢

Some areas seem to have hardly been out of restrictions at all.

It must be really weird being on the sharp end of the current mixed messages.

On the one hand the papers and the Prime Minister all say the roadmap is on course for normal life to return on June 21st and the pubs are open - but there's surge testing and surge vaxxing and the guidance for some areas says stay local and is edging closer to lockdown restrictions.

@PrincessNutNuts

This is the weirdest thing.

Changing the rules without telling people isn't going to change behaviour much is it?

The ideological need to pretend the pandemic is over, is really clashing with being employed to govern a country where the pandemic is gearing up again.

I have family in the bit if Hampshire that's gone into surge testing for the Indian variant so I expect they (and West London) will be next for the "Unofficial local lockdown. But with pubs open, announced in secret" treatment.

What a bloody shambles.

Agree with you totally. I don't live in these areas however does make you think why is government being so dishonest. I feel they downplaying the Indian variemt where these new restrictions make me think think they more worried than they letting on.

I agree they must be more worried than they are admitting publically if they have done this.

Also local lockdowns didn't work. How long until e.g. Leeds is affected by Kirklees - how many travel every day to work/college/school across council boundaries.

It's obvious it has been very quietly slipped in as it has only just appeared in the Daily Mail, they are usually one of the first with anything like this.

@PrincessNutNuts - weird, confusing, depressing, half term plans to see parents now brought into question. This happened last summer too. Frustratingly, we’re right in the bottom corner of Kirklees and I can see the boundaries with Barnsley and Wakefield from my village. The “hotspot” is not nearby.

Well it'll be spreading to neighbouring councils probably, as we know local lockdowns don't work (and this isn't even a lockdown).

We are on the Beds border, the villages adjoining us will be affected as they are part of Bedford Borough council area, though no nearer Bedford than us 🙁

Was supposed to be going camping in 2 weeks in a rural bit of one of the “not a lockdown, lockdown” areas.

Assuming that won’t be a go now. Really fee for the businesses there.

Question- as it’s only guidance will you get refunds/ amendments on UK holidays booked for half term if you live in these areas.
We don’t but I can see our area being added before long and unless my UK holidays are refunded I will be going.
This nonsense has gone on long enough.

Are their airports within these 8 areas that stops people flying?

@3asAbird

Are their airports within these 8 areas that stops people flying?

Hounslow is pretty close to heathrow- possibly includes. You can’t get to Heathrow without going through Hounslow! Bonkers

Why do these areas even need these "rules".

NHS isnt overwhelmed, deaths havent risen, hospitalizations hasnt risen and apparently vaccines are effective against the indian variant.

If vaccines arent important, arent the supposed "fix" to this entire sham then why bother even getting vaccinated?

Totally agree @SpnBaby1967 - there are 908 people in hospital and less than 10 deaths a day - wtaf!

Hounslow is pretty close to heathrow- possibly includes. You can’t get to Heathrow without going through Hounslow! Bonkers

I'm pretty sure Heathrow is actually in Hillingdon borough, but Hounslow borders it to the immediate east and south.

As a result you can get to Heathrow without going through Hounslow if you travel by car bus but those using the Piccadilly tube line go through Hounslow ( and it's three stations) immediately before getting to the airport boundary at Hatton Cross.

@SpnBaby1967

Why do these areas even need these "rules".

NHS isnt overwhelmed, deaths havent risen, hospitalizations hasnt risen and apparently vaccines are effective against the indian variant.

If vaccines arent important, arent the supposed "fix" to this entire sham then why bother even getting vaccinated?

You remember in March when the Prime Minister told us to carry on as normal and just wash our hands?

Then 10 days later put the country into lockdown?

Then 10 days after that the hospitals were cancelling everything but covid and 1000 people a day were dying of it?

And it has dominated our lives ever since?

Well we're in "February 2020" right now. When it didn't look like much, but it was just getting going, and we could have prevented the first wave.

Or August 2020, when it didn't look like much, but it was just getting going, and we could have prevented the second wave.

Vaccines make things easier but they're not a magic wand. They can't fix it on their own.

Particularly when only about 34% of the country is fully vaccinated, and about 43% of the country isn't vaccinated at all.

[quote BikeRunSki]@PrincessNutNuts - weird, confusing, depressing, half term plans to see parents now brought into question. This happened last summer too. Frustratingly, we’re right in the bottom corner of Kirklees and I can see the boundaries with Barnsley and Wakefield from my village. The “hotspot” is not nearby.[/quote]
It's so stressful having to weigh it all up isn't it? In some ways it's easier if it's just against the rules. This "no man's land" where we don't know what they know but are expected to make decisions about it just makes everything harder.

I agree that they must be more worried than they let on @3asAbird

The government seem to want most of the country to think it's a local problem so they're playing it down.

But pandemics don't work like that.

Particularly with a variant that's more transmissible than the last one, which was more transmissible than the original. That's already in dozens of locations all across the country.

Most of which don't even have un-announced secret guidance, let alone surge testing and vaccination.

@3asAbird It is 13:38 now and Newcastle Airport has 6 flights left for today, out of which 3 are domestic. So airport is basically closed.

@LucilleTheVampireBat

Ah look who it is, still banging the lockdown drum! Quite amusing that you think anyone listens to you!

You are really going to have to look into some sort of hobby when this is over.

Nobody does.

As you were everyone, it seems it was officially a mistake.