Surely opening up now is the least worst option?

[Warhertisuff]

What's the point of continuing to suppress Covid at the moment. All it does it kick the can on the road..

Either we never, ever open up, or we have to accept that, when we do, cases will rise until we've acquired enough immunity through a combination of infection and vaccination.

At the moment, vaccines work pretty well against the current variants.... The more we suppress Covid now, the less immune as a society we'll be when a vaccine evasive variant (and it probably will whatever we do here), and if we can't relax restrictions now, we surely won't be able to over the autumn and winter.

Where we are is admittedly pretty shit, but continuing to suppress Covid now would just be counterproductive. "Letting it rip" sounds callous, but the alternatives seem worse or unworkable.

Yet many people seem determined to persist with the reflex to suppress Covid and continue with restrictions and measures to curtail spread. What's the point?

Alec - you can live with some measures over the winter and release them in spring. Wouldn’t it be better to add and release restrictions according to case number?

Very high number of cases in a partially vaccinated population sounds like a very risky mix for creating another Kent variant Mach 2.

@MrsRLynde

Jeremy Hunt this morning:

The warning light on the NHS dashboard is not flashing amber, it is flashing red. Covid hospital patients are doubling every two weeks. That means we are heading for 10,000 Covid hospital patients by the end of August, which is about 20 times higher than this time last year. It is a very serious situation. I think coming into September we are almost certainly going to see infections reach a new daily peak going above the 68,000 daily level, which was the previous daily record in January. If they are still going up as the schools are coming back I think we are going to have to reconsider some very difficult decisions. How we behave over the next few weeks will have a material difference

Given that Jeremy Hunt is a member of the current government (who are the ones making the decisions after all) did he have any suggestions for what he thinks should be done differently? Or just vague warnings?

Alec - you can live with some measures over the winter and release them in spring. Wouldn’t it be better to add and release restrictions according to case number?

What do you mean by 'some measures', though? Again, what we have now isn't working to control numbers so sticking with that is pointless - what additional numbers would you reimpose? And numbers will always rise as restrictions are lifted so is what you're suggesting a constant rolling programme of lifting and then reimposing lockdown? At what point would you be done with that, or wouldn't you ever be?

@Namenic

Alec - you can live with some measures over the winter and release them in spring. Wouldn’t it be better to add and release restrictions according to case number?

Very high number of cases in a partially vaccinated population sounds like a very risky mix for creating another Kent variant Mach 2.

I can see the logic behind a decision to reintroduce restrictions to drive cases down, with delta that means pretty much going back into full lockdown (nothing else seems to work). With case numbers as they are I'd have thought it would take two to three months of lockdown to get cases really low (give or take).

The current/moderate restrictions aren't enough to stop cases rising so just staying with current levels of restrictions won't work.

My personal view is that we've got this far and to change tack now is probably counterproductive in light of our vaccination/antibody levels but I can see the argument for increasing restrictions.

I've just watched the Independent Sage Broadcast from yesterday on Twitter There was a very interesting take on Herd Immunity.
Apparently transmissibility post vaccine is reduced by 50%. Therefore to develop herd immunity we would have to vaccinate over 90% of the population.
That's impossible by any stretch of the imagination. Why are we then trying to achieve herd immunity by opening up further?

Secondly how is fully opening up going to benefit business? Businesses in the NorthWest & Northeast are increasingly paralysed under the weight of isolation, track & trace and are operating with 30 - 50% less staff. Come Monday that's likely to only become worse.

Apparently transmissibility post vaccine is reduced by 50%. Therefore to develop herd immunity we would have to vaccinate over 90% of the population.
That's impossible by any stretch of the imagination. Why are we then trying to achieve herd immunity by opening up further?

So what is the end goal, then? As someone said upthread I haven't heard any answer to this from an Ind Sage member that isn't 'go back in time and do what New Zealand did' or - and this is always implied, it's never fully spelt out for obvious reasons - 'go back into full lockdown for around 6 months'. I'm really open to hearing other options but one of those is impossible and the other one is so unpalatable it's essentially impossible in a democracy.

That's impossible by any stretch of the imagination. Why are we then trying to achieve herd immunity by opening up further?

Why is that impossible? Did independent SAGE provide an alternative solution?

@Fferny1

I've just watched the Independent Sage Broadcast from yesterday on Twitter There was a very interesting take on Herd Immunity. Apparently transmissibility post vaccine is reduced by 50%. Therefore to develop herd immunity we would have to vaccinate over 90% of the population. That's impossible by any stretch of the imagination. Why are we then trying to achieve herd immunity by opening up further?

Secondly how is fully opening up going to benefit business? Businesses in the NorthWest & Northeast are increasingly paralysed under the weight of isolation, track & trace and are operating with 30 - 50% less staff. Come Monday that's likely to only become worse.

People shouldn’t have to isolate unless they are symptomatic- imho

@Sunshinegirl82

That's impossible by any stretch of the imagination. Why are we then trying to achieve herd immunity by opening up further?

Why is that impossible? Did independent SAGE provide an alternative solution?

I'm amazed these are real scientists saying these things.

I think they're just professionally embarrassed that, having pinned us all to vaccines, it's a giant climb down to acknowledge that, actually, no, we're still going to have to muddle through anyway.

But good grief —get a grip!

If we do open up, it'll be messy and uncomfortable. But we really won't all die. But we might need to protect those that are especially vulnerable. (Cue the Barrington haters...) Good thing is, with Hancock gone, we might even be able to avoid discharging people back into care homes.

Keep calm. Carry on.

I'm hoping the removal of the requirement to isolate as a close contact once you're double jabbed in August will help.

@Puppeteer well they're definitely not 'pretend' scientists 😄.
For a start they are not professionally responsible for the success of the vaccine. They didn't make it.
It's a constantly changing virus like Flu. This is why we need a new different flu virus each year.
Secondly delta is a far more transmissible variant. The vaccines are still working ... but not as efficiently against delta or apparently against beta.

So you go back in to Lowdown to get cases down? That’s the argument. Can you explain what happens when we open up again?

@Hardbackwriter

Apparently transmissibility post vaccine is reduced by 50%. Therefore to develop herd immunity we would have to vaccinate over 90% of the population. That's impossible by any stretch of the imagination. Why are we then trying to achieve herd immunity by opening up further?

So what is the end goal, then? As someone said upthread I haven't heard any answer to this from an Ind Sage member that isn't 'go back in time and do what New Zealand did' or - and this is always implied, it's never fully spelt out for obvious reasons - 'go back into full lockdown for around 6 months'. I'm really open to hearing other options but one of those is impossible and the other one is so unpalatable it's essentially impossible in a democracy.

And also quite likely impossible at this point, even if we were able to fund it. The state has nothing like the ability to actually enforce a lockdown on a population not wanting to comply. With our ratio of police to people, the maximum that can be achieved is picking off a few unlucky ones. It simply isn't possible to stop people from meeting in private homes if they want to. The reason the first lockdown worked is because people wanted to do it.

I don’t think we would need a lockdown to reduce case numbers. I think holding at our current restrictions, reducing indoor mixing, school holidays, strict border control and quarantine, improving ventilation, keeping masks plus increased numbers of double vaccinated; plus considering vaccines for 16-17 year olds could help. Certainly not opening up further with case rates AND hospitalizations going up. Keep it steady and sensible and we won’t have a repeat of 2nd wave when govt refused to introduce more restrictions, resulting in a bigger longer wave with more impact on health system, education and economy.

How would we reduce indoor mixing?

@Namenic

I don’t think we would need a lockdown to reduce case numbers. I think holding at our current restrictions, reducing indoor mixing, school holidays, strict border control and quarantine, improving ventilation, keeping masks plus increased numbers of double vaccinated; plus considering vaccines for 16-17 year olds could help. Certainly not opening up further with case rates AND hospitalizations going up. Keep it steady and sensible and we won’t have a repeat of 2nd wave when govt refused to introduce more restrictions, resulting in a bigger longer wave with more impact on health system, education and economy.

You're not going to reduce indoor mixing without bringing back pretty severe restrictions, i.e. closing pubs, restaurants, indoor events, etc etc. As for stopping mixing in people's own homes, no, that's not going to happen again, people just won't do it.

The choice we have is stark. It's EITHER no restrictions OR proper lockdown again. There's no longer any useful "inbetween" that would bring down infection rates.

To be honest, @Kazzyhoward, it’s always been that choice. Just that up until now, the government has been able to fudge it, and the opposition has been too weak (unwilling?) to really hold it to account.

But I agree, it’s still one or the other in principle.

But if it’s lockdown we pick, it has to be hard, and probably quite prolonged. And we have to also expect it to be repeated time after time, and especially over the winter months. (Remember, there’s to be no “just until the vaccines” carrot this time.)

In practice, I’m not actually sure lockdown is even an option anymore.

Fun times.

Lock down isn’t going to work like it did before.
It was seen as a one off emergency and then a second off because we had vaccines coming very shortly.
Shutting stuff won’t stop people mixing in large numbers at home and not seeing their parents / family / friends.
Shutting most kids out of school for another long period (and more lockdowns after that) is going to be heading down the route of long term issues worse than covid.
Also, no one seems to be able to answer, what happens after we lift the next lockdown? And the one after that? Just the same thing over and over

'what happens after we lift the next lockdown? And the one after that? Just the same thing over and over'

There are essentially 3 choices:

1. Zero covid - closed border approach
2. Middle ground Singapore style model with some restrictions including mask wearing whilst targeting as high a level of vaccination as possible
3. Endless cycle of lockdowns and reopenings until we run out of money as (at least with the current batch of vaccines) we will not get sufficient immunity to fully reopen.

I accept one will never work in the UK so vote for the second option. I wonder how many more rounds of 3 it will take before our government gets there too?

I wonder how many more cycles of 3. it will take until

@Indigopearl

'what happens after we lift the next lockdown? And the one after that? Just the same thing over and over'

There are essentially 3 choices:

1. Zero covid - closed border approach
2. Middle ground Singapore style model with some restrictions including mask wearing whilst targeting as high a level of vaccination as possible
3. Endless cycle of lockdowns and reopenings until we run out of money as (at least with the current batch of vaccines) we will not get sufficient immunity to fully reopen.

I accept one will never work in the UK so vote for the second option. I wonder how many more rounds of 3 it will take before our government gets there too?

I wonder how many more cycles of 3. it will take until

I agree with that.

Any subsequent lockdowns will lack both the 'stick' of the initial fear of the virus, and the 'carrot' of the vaccines. If we have not one but several vaccines - all of which work better than had been expected - but we still need to lock down, then what really is the point?

And while I guess they could legally shut down businesses, there's no way people will tolerate being told not to vist family again. So 'mixing' will go on in people's homes, entirely unregulated and contributing little to the economy.

Sorry, that reply was meant to have been to @OnTheBrink1

Indoor mixing can be reduced by capacity limits on venues. Guidance to wfh. Masks on public transport and enclosed spaces like lifts. As pp have said - Singapore has done a pretty mixed approach - has had only relatively short total lockdown. Increases and decreases restrictions dependent on case rate. Summer is the right time to have more meetings outside - can see relatives outside.

There was a good article about the Swiss cheese model by bbc. www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-40ac92b1-1750-4e86-9936-2cda6b0acb3f

The fact that many infected are younger, non- or partially vaccinated suggests that holding on with current restrictions - until more are fully vaccinated would help.

2. Middle ground Singapore style model with some restrictions including mask wearing whilst targeting as high a level of vaccination as possible

I agree with this. But I’m not sure it’s possible here as people seem determined for ‘normal’ even if it’s just pretend normal.

@Indigopearl

'what happens after we lift the next lockdown? And the one after that? Just the same thing over and over'

There are essentially 3 choices:

1. Zero covid - closed border approach
2. Middle ground Singapore style model with some restrictions including mask wearing whilst targeting as high a level of vaccination as possible
3. Endless cycle of lockdowns and reopenings until we run out of money as (at least with the current batch of vaccines) we will not get sufficient immunity to fully reopen.

I accept one will never work in the UK so vote for the second option. I wonder how many more rounds of 3 it will take before our government gets there too?

I wonder how many more cycles of 3. it will take until

We’re not that far off?

We’re going for high vaccine uptake. What is Singapore compared to here

Plus mask wearing will be kept by some companies

All may not do it as not legal but it’s not being dropped

@neveradullmoment99

This is the WORST of all options. Open up when there are 50 000 cases. Absolute madness. This and a population that hasn't been vaccinated enough. Add to this the more infectious delta variant. Absolute lunacy.

This. With bells on.