We can’t achieve herd immunity by letting Covid spread (or with the current vaccines)

[Turquoisesol]

It isn’t really possible to reach herd immunity and Britain will not do this by deliberately infecting large numbers of people. Many people seem to be under the impression that by letting it rip we will eventually reach herd immunity but it almost certainly won’t happen.

www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00728-2

[quote NotSonicTheHedgehog]@NannyAndJohn you sound like you’re loving this. It’s grim. Try reading the room a bit. By all means make your own posts, make as many as you want. But maybe stop jumping on EVERY post where it’s clear people are really struggling mentally and bleating on making the same statements over and over again. Just because you can say something doesn’t mean you should.[/quote]
I do honestly believe it's not what is said particularly it's the way that it's said too.
Too much of it and it just becomes white noise and nobody is going to take it seriously anyway.

But 100,000 and 16000 are hugely out

I don’t get it why gloating I’m right

I think people are struggling with the fact we may very well not be in control of this. It is here to stay. People will catch it. Most people will recover. Some people will suffer long covid and some will die.

I'm cev. If I get it I'm fucked.

Diseases kill people. Always have, always will. And it's scary.
It was bloody scary at first because we didn't know if it was going to wipe half of us out! But now we know most people are ok. At some point we just have to accept it is what it is. Do what we realistically can do re handwashing, vaccines etc and support the vulnerable. Hope that we build up resilience to it.
Long term, what other choice is there?

And deaths aren't rising at the same rate they were in previous wave, because of vaccinations. Which is the whole premise of the "deaths aren't rising" thread.

Diseases kill people. Always have, always will. And it's scary.

Absolutely. We've been fairly insulated from this in "the west" as we have vaccinations or treatments for the majority of illnesses we are likely to encounter.

Its would be unusual if people weren't afraid ' which is why actual facts should be given out now, not sensationalism or selective reporting.

@NannyAndJohn Quite honestly, you are the only person who truly understands and appreciates the dire and unprecedented situation we are in. Exponential growth and deaths already baked in. Not to mention the risk of Long Covid, which will disable millions of adults and children. Please tell us what we should be doing! Or must we just accept, is life as we know it over for good?

@CeeceeBloomingdale

I thought the idea was to force a peak in August rather than later when schools are. back and winter pressures have begun. I don't think they have claimed it is anything to do with herd immunity recently. I also think they are regretting not opening up in June when figures where lower and the peak would have been earlier. I'm in a area that was one of the first noted for having the delta variant and has one of the highest rates in the country. Although cases are still rising they aren't actually increasing that much so I think we are probably nearing the top of the peak now, although the rest of the country may be up to a month behind us. Deaths are almost non existent and although local hospitals have recently cancelled elective surgery this is due to the self isolation rules, so there are plenty of empty beds but too many staff off as their kids are isolating to man them.

It is.

I think the week of the 4th August is where I've seen in pinned.

I still think thats realistic.

If we STILL have cases rising at an exponential rate a week or so after that, thats when I will start to get worried. (Note here, I stress the exponential point - even if things still rise as long as there is a marked slow down, I will be reasonably reassured)

The figures for parts of the North West are definitely encouraging, and do suggest we will peak soon.

I do however think there are rising concerns about what will happen in September when the schools reopen and I'm personally not in the camp of thinking we should mass vaccinate children at this stage either at the moment. My thoughts on this may change.

The issue is that we are not going to be able to manage zero covid in the UK. Its an unrealistic pipe dream. And since thats the case there has to be a shift away from lockdowns going forward. Somehow.

Diseases kill people. Always have, always will. And it's scary

Absolutely, even diseases for which there is a vaccine for will still kill a small percentage of those who have been vaccinated against it. Vaccines aren't 100% effective, we all know that so what choice do we have other than to learn to live with it? We can't wait for the entire UK population to get the vaccine because that would be impossible, so at what point do we say enough is enough? Covid is never going to go away any more than the Spanish Flu has. We just do what we can to protect ourselves and our loved ones and let life carry on.

"I do however think there are rising concerns about what will happen in September when the schools reopen and I'm personally not in the camp of thinking we should mass vaccinate children at this stage either at the moment. My thoughts on this may change"

Today's leak is that it is only vulnerable 12+ who will be offered the jab

Right at the start, the experts were saying we'd have 600,000 deaths without any precautions/restrictions, i.e. 1% of the population will die, 99% will survive.

We're already had circa 130,000 deaths, mostly before people were double jabbed.

Now, the vast majority of adults have at least 1 jab, most elderly/vulnerable have had both.

Just do the maths. Even if 10/20% of thos double jabbed still catch it, most won't need hospitalisation, nor die.

Yes, some people WILL die, from all age groups, etc., but rather than 2,000 deaths per day (at the peak), I really double we'll see more than 100 deaths per day at the worst of the peak. It's a tragedy for every death, of course, but people die of all kinds of thing every day. We don't ban road transport because a couple of thousand people die on the roads every year. We can't cure cancer. We don't ban sugary food and alcohol to stop people dying of heart attacks or liver disease.

We'll have gone from estimates of 600,000 deaths down to maybe 150,000 deaths, 130,000 of which have already happened. There was a time and a place for the lockdowns (i.e. when there were 2,000 deaths per day). But with the success of the vaccine, it's time to open up again.

Yes, it's common sense to keep a level of precautions, but we should have been doing that anyway, for all the other infectious diseases, such as norovirus, flu, etc etc. It makes sense for people not to get too close if they can avoid, wash their hands often, avoid crowded places, etc. It also makes sense for the likes of GP surgeries, hospitals, etc to make better use of their rooms and waiting areas to spread patients around instead of cramming them into small waiting areas, and it makes sense for them to use proper appointment times rather than giving everyone the same 9.30 am, thus crowding the waiting room for 2/3 hours until everyone is seen.

Lots of things can be done to mitigate ALL diseases that are caught by close contact, but knackering the economy, forcing people to lose their jobs, businesses, homes, savings, etc., is not a viable option anymore. We need more intelligent ways of spreading people out not knee jerk reactions to close everything down time and time again.

We just need to accept as a country that we have to live with the virus, we did not adopt zero tolerance as in Asia we did not go for heard immunity at the start but for limited lockdown. We now need to stop putting lives on hold and get back to living with this virus and treat it as any other infectious disease such as flu. We risk letting down children and you s people, those who are healthy but who will get sick either in physically or suffer mental health issues . We cannot go on prioritising Covid

@chantico

"I do however think there are rising concerns about what will happen in September when the schools reopen and I'm personally not in the camp of thinking we should mass vaccinate children at this stage either at the moment. My thoughts on this may change"

Today's leak is that it is only vulnerable 12+ who will be offered the jab

I know. And I think its currently the right call.

Long term, what other choice is there?

mRNA vaccines for majority of the population. Worldwide vaccination coverage (like President Biden says, this is best achieved by temporary vaccine patent waiver).

In America, where the majority have had mRNA vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna) almost 100% of the deaths are in the unvaccinated.

What you don't do is what England is doing. Taking action that will kill and disable huge numbers. And massively increasing the risk of creating a vaccine resistant variant. Small measures such as masks are easy and simple mitigation measures.

The rest of the world - experts, scientists worldwide - is right to warn against the Westminster government's choices.

It would be better to do all over 12s but we don't currently have enough supply.

Good news though they they're finally doing vulnerable 12+.

We risk letting down children and you s people, those who are healthy but who will get sick either in physically or suffer mental health issues

What, like Long Covid?

@Tealightsandd

Long term, what other choice is there?

mRNA vaccines for majority of the population. Worldwide vaccination coverage (like President Biden says, this is best achieved by temporary vaccine patent waiver).

In America, where the majority have had mRNA vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna) almost 100% of the deaths are in the unvaccinated.

What you don't do is what England is doing. Taking action that will kill and disable huge numbers. And massively increasing the risk of creating a vaccine resistant variant. Small measures such as masks are easy and simple mitigation measures.

The rest of the world - experts, scientists worldwide - is right to warn against the Westminster government's choices.

You mean the things I gave as examples right before your selective quoting?

Where I said "Do what we realistically can do re handwashing, vaccines etc and support the vulnerable. Hope that we build up resilience to it."

You didn't specify which vaccines.

You also didn't mention President Biden's call for vaccine patent waiver.

You mentioned some good mitigation measures. I wasn't criticising. Simply adding to the list.

Sorry to be more accurate. I was criticising but not you. Unless you are a member of the Westminster government.

@Tealightsandd

Long term, what other choice is there?

mRNA vaccines for majority of the population. Worldwide vaccination coverage (like President Biden says, this is best achieved by temporary vaccine patent waiver).

In America, where the majority have had mRNA vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna) almost 100% of the deaths are in the unvaccinated.

What you don't do is what England is doing. Taking action that will kill and disable huge numbers. And massively increasing the risk of creating a vaccine resistant variant. Small measures such as masks are easy and simple mitigation measures.

The rest of the world - experts, scientists worldwide - is right to warn against the Westminster government's choices.

Yeah, this.

DH has family in the US. In their state (not all states are like this, but some are) - they had ONE lockdown. Since then they've suppressed using mitigation - and they've upped or reduced mitigation as needed but no complete lockdown, and schools open the whole time. They put money into schools to ventilate, smaller class sizes, blended learning etc. They've had NO MORE lockdowns and they are living with it.

Their kids are growing up to see that if everyone in a community cares about each other and works together, wonderful things are possible. Their lives have been far better and more 'normal' than my DC. Less death, less disability, less disruption.

They can get a PCR test for any reason - no '3 symptoms'- and it's returned within 24 hours.

It's not rocket science.

But we're fucked here. They've just recently appointed some mate of Boris's from the Bullingdon club to an ethics body. They're trolling us. It's clear, they are only for the 1% and they are enjoying the fact there's nothing we can do about it and watching us turn on each other.

We've only avoided an even greater death toll because our brilliant and selfless healthcare workers have kept going under conditions and kicks in the teeth (the 1% pay 'rise' for nurses) that they shouldn't have to put up with and that most people (particularly those who can't cope with wearing a mask occasionally) clearly wouldn't accept. The nurse who looked after Boris has quite the NHS and left the country - it says it all.