Will you feel more or less confident to 'go back to normal' on the 19th July?

[User135644]

Take holidays out the equation for the purpose of the thread. It's more in terms of day-to-day life and socialising etc.

Personally, i've enjoyed going to pubs and restaurants etc recently and catching up with friends again. Any socialising will run the risk with the virus, but there's measures in place to mitigate that risk.

Now, I know we need to go back to normal and businesses need to operate properly. However, the way the government have gone about it with letting the variant run riot in the build up. Dropping masks in schools and now altogether from the 19th, an end to social distancing altogether. It's basically eat out to help out on steroids in terms of spreading Covid and could be counter productive for hospitality by autumn.

Basically, are you thinking sod it, i'm going to catch it I might as well get on with things, or 'i'm going to roll back on what i'm doing now' (pubs/restaurants etc)? . We're paying the price for just how badly this whole thing has been handled. Neither are ideal.

I will continue to wear a mask at work and in shops, so I don’t see that my life is going to change.

No we are being very wary about indoor things, DH is T1 diabetic.
DD (early 20’s )has just been diagnosed as vitamin D deficient and sounding quite wary now seeing the numbers go up and restrictions going and that was without me saying anything.

A few people I have spoken to are saying they don’t want to ditch masks. General conversations are giving the impression my friendship group still quite cautious.

I’ll probably continue on the same kind of level I am now tbh, making the most of outdoors with the odd ‘riskier’ indoor activity thrown in here and there so long as it’s not crowded (no soft play for us!). I’m happy to continue seeing friends/family indoors in smaller groups but that’s mostly because I trust them to speak up if they’re not feeling quite right. I curtail our activities quite severely when we’re due to see CEV family or friends which pretty much means term time visits are out for now and will continue to do so.

My main worry right now is dd getting through to the end of term (22/06) without an abrupt end. It’s her first year of school and she’s already had one massively disturbed ending to preschool and her first school year. I just want the end of term to go as it’s meant to.

I am anxious about the rising prevalence of covid and although I would be as upset as anybody at further restrictions think that they’re probably needed right now. I’d envisaged a reopening with much lower case numbers than we’re seeing right now.

We've got it wrong at every turn, except on vaccines. I think this is how everyone I know feels , hence not a lot of confidence this will go well. Half our local sixth form are isolating and teachers struggling to cope with teaching small group in and the rest online when often teaching from home themselves.

Plus it’s doing the rounds here and some double vaccinated people who are very fit been quite ill so that not helping .

I don’t have the answer to any of this, just commenting on what I am seeing and hearing here.

All around us here people are going down with covid, or kids classes are isolating, swimming groups cancelled, restaurants closed due to an outbreak.

I don’t think this is a time to be complacent at all. I have no desire to go out and pick up / spread an infection. Even if it’s not that bad after getting the vaccine, I’d prefer to avoid missing work etc in bed with a virus.

@ZingDramaQueenOfSheeba

I'm happy to go back to normal but we are not going back to normal, are we? can't travel abroad, vaccine passports, have to book everything etc

it will never be "back to normal". ever

I'm abroad right now. So it's not true that you can't travel abroad.

I'm very much up for carrying on as normal. Altho I have been doing for a while anyway pretty much.

I’m not changing anything

I haven’t worried about it for a while now, more so as am double vaccinated

I also can’t see many doing the same as pp looking at Wimbledon / football celebrations recently higher proportion are ready to get back to participating

The picture on here is different though

I'm all for normality but I don't think it'll happen in a 'snap' binary fashion on the 19th. People are herd creatures but there is a range of different views out there. I think the normality and the broader feeling of normality will come back incrementally over the next few weeks and months. Confidence will grow as people see other people behaving in a more normal fashion.

I'm doing everything I always have been.

Having friends and family in my house or going to theirs.
Going to the gym several times a week including swimming the sauna and steam room.
Taking the kids to soft play
Getting my hair and nails done
Having a party for my eldest
Going on a UK mini break
Not wearing a mask unless it's compulsory

Some people enjoy living a restricted life but I don't so if I can do it I'm doing it. I'll be fully vaccinated soon enough anyway as will my friends and family. Kids are too young and not really at risk. I refuse to lock myself away, it's not healthy physically or mentally.

Most people I know are very keen to get back to normal. I have several things booked over the next few weeks and I have no intention to wear a mask etc. at any of them. I don't go on public transport much (can walk/cycle most places) but won't hesitate to use it, if I need to. Can't wait to get another holiday booked too!

@MarshaBradyo

I’m not changing anything

I haven’t worried about it for a while now, more so as am double vaccinated

I also can’t see many doing the same as pp looking at Wimbledon / football celebrations recently higher proportion are ready to get back to participating

The picture on here is different though

Everybody I've spoken to in person is fed up with restrictions and planning on getting on with normal life when it's allowed. I have spoken to a few people who will still wear masks but nobody has told me they will be avoiding anywhere. I work in a pub so I speak to a lot of people although probably the people who are putting themselves on a restricted life wouldn't be in the pub...

I haven't seen my mother or my daughter for a year and no hope of seeing them anytime soon- they are in a red list country- so no normal for me!

Other than that, I am normal-ish. By which I mean I will continue to wear masks in crowded places and on public transport, avoid large gatherings and we are not travelling out of the UK any time soon.

I’ll be pulling back on what I’m doing. I’ve been feeling comfortable going into restaurants for meals, shopping etc recently but I feel removing all restrictions while cases are exponentially rising without keeping some that might help mitigate is idiotic at best and I don’t want to be part of that experiment. I’ll be going back to only meeting people outside etc for the foreseeable.

Our lives didn’t really change much during lockdown apart from no school, I still worked all through lockdown.

When everything reopened last summer we didn’t do hardly anything like we normally do big days out/holidays etc. This year so far we have been on uk holiday, theme parks/zoo and restaurants. We have much more planned in the next few weeks and are not worried at all. We shall try and keep our distance from people if possible and we will still be washing our hands regularly (we have always done this before covid anyway).

Can understand why some people are worried but we really do need to get back to the normal lives we had before for the good of everyone.

Got a late primary and a secondary child in the house, sitting at a table in a cafe is the least of our concerns!

Plus it’s doing the rounds here and some double vaccinated people who are very fit been quite ill so that not helping

I've got my second jab next week. Looked forward to it for a while, hoping things would be more normal by August and i'd have that protection. Now I can barely muster the enthusiasm to go for it (although I will). I'll feel like crap for a few days, only to get Covid anyway within weeks once forced back on public transport every day, or if I choose to continue to socialise.

A mix - I'll wear a mask on the tube/bus and maybe in shops, but that's more to make others feel more comfortable - I'm doubled-vaxxed, healthy, under 50, and have no great worry about myself. My great love is live music, so I'll definitely resume gig-going next month - and I doubt very much I'll wear a mask for that. I can't wait to stand in a packed sweaty room watching a band again!

I've invested in a couple of all-bells-and-whistles masks, so that I can feel more confident taking the kids out and about.

I'm CEV, & one of the people with big question-mark over my level of protection (although I'm double-vaccinated). The kids are obviously not vaccinated, and therefore potential vectors. The opening up on July 19th is going to make us feel less secure and protected.

No indoor stuff for us at all, but will still be making the most of the summer. Outdoor bars with friends (but only the ones that are very strict with their covid policies), self-catering holiday, pub gardens, beaches.

We're much less scared than last year, though! This feels like a libertarian paradise compared to last July!

I'm not in England yet unfortunately but pretending that I am, then yes. Absolutely. I'm more than happy to eat out, not wear masks and generally continue to do everything that I have been doing when it's been an option. I've had Covid. I have long Covid and have had my first vaccine. It doesn't worry me at all.

I will continue to be cautious. I am not going to get swept up in the government's recklessness and abandon all precautions just because Boris says it's okay. He is conducting a very dangerous experiment that I don't want to be part of.

I have had 2 doses of the vaccine, so I am going to karate classes. I know this is taking on a risk, but everyone in the class is pretty careful (and those old enough to be jabbed have been) and we have all doors and windows open. If the weather is nice we do it outdoors. DD also does karate and Brownies (Brownies is outdoors).

Other than that, I will be cautious. Don't fancy cinemas or restaurants indoors but I would perhaps go to have a meal in a pub garden. We have tickets for a music festival in the summer that hasn't yet been cancelled. I don't want to go.

@lughnasadh

It's pretty normal here already.

Loads of people not wearing masks, the cinemas are as full as they can be (no masks once seated), public transport is packed with very few wearing masks.

It's fine. No one is dropping dead. the NHS is in much the same state it always was.

Apart from all the dead people you mean? 🤨

www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/latest-covid-deaths-cases-uk-2021-b944825.html

Not everyone can get the vaccine, there is an invisible mass of very clinically vulnerable people out there who can’t have it, or for which it would be ineffective. It seems a common assumption that all vulnerable have been double jabbed, but this is just not the case. Scrapping all measures puts them (and babies/children too young to be jabbed) in the firing line. I wonder how those who state they don’t care would feel if they or a close family member were among these number?

It’s madness, the government could easily have opened up but left masks and SD measures in place to continue affording some level of protection, but scrapping everything is like giving Covid free reign to burn through like a forrest fire (and destroy aka those unprotected)

Less, but I am CEV and my vaccine protection isn’t great.

I’ve been pretty much back to normal since mid-May. Looking forward to choir singing, theatre, cinema and no masks unless I have to!

Yes, will be comfortable to act normal. Which I have been all along!

I’m in Scotland, which has six of the ten worst Covid hotspots in the whole of Europe.
We are not included in the July 19th release, for obvious reasons.
The vaccine rollout here has been shambolic compared to England.
Delay in opening mass vaccination hubs, stupidly sending fixed appointments at times/venues people couldn’t get to, where England allowed book your own time/place, sending appointments by post to addresses people had left years ago, late to introduce online booking, late to introduce drop in venues.
We’ve been weeks behind England all the way, despite Sturgeon trying to claim credit for managing the pandemic better than Boris. She’s been noticeably quieter since we became the Covid capital of Europe!
It will be August before we have any hope of abandoning all restrictions up here.