Normal life is back

[ExmoorValley]

I don't know about you but life where I am is pretty much back to normal, masks in shops falling rapidly. People having a good time. Covid barely gets mentioned now. (and yes I know people are still catching it and a tiny proportion will die)

It feels great. So what happened to the 200,000 cases a day doom scenario peddlers on here? They seem rather quiet.......

Post for Marsha All credit to you for persevering with the positivity.

@stepupandbecounted that fills me with so much hope, thank you for sharing!

Completely agree Step.

We used daily case / death stats as a tool for compliance and behaviour change. We should be free of this now too.

It’s interesting that when we were under quite strict restrictions, anyone finding it tough was told on MN that things were ‘virtually normal,’ certainly not worth complaining about.
I’d regularly point out that we couldn’t go to see plays or gigs or sporting events. We couldn’t eat out or go for a pint. We couldnt attend weddings or our friends’ funerals. Women were birthing alone. People were dying alone.

Now that’s reversed and some of the same posters are saying things are definitely not normal now.

Yes exactly, we were supposed to be terrified each day into staying inside even after months of a lockdown, it was a tool that was probably used unethically at the time, and now it is continuation is only serving to keep those struggling with mental health, anxiety etc locked in a state of fear. It should stop. The only time we should hear about covid now, is if there is a genuine major development of some kind.

We don't report flu stats, despite tens of thousands dying from it. Yes we can count that in terms of airbuses crashing each week, but it has happened since time immortal. People die, it is what they do. It might be cancer, covid or a car crash but it is going to happen, this obsession with zero covid is a form of insanity.

There's a couple of peope I know irl who are having some kind of bizarre stand off regarding when they will return to normal life . One cancelled a Xmas meal out because she " doesn't feel comfortable " the other one saying she won't go anywhere because she tried the other week and someone was coughing . It's like a competition for who can stay in the restrictions the longest
Weird .

@stepupandbecounted

Its not about zero CV, its about having a health service that can function and treat all the other life limiting conditions we get.

Very high CV infections, lead to moderate increases in hospitalisations and staff sickness, which stop the NHS from functioning

5.5m on waiting lists, thought that will go to 13m by winter, doubtless an over exaggeration but still super high.

Now if we were doing something about this, then sure, left all restrictions etc but we are not, in fact we are doing nothing at all.

@jasjas1973

The ONS figures are that 680k to 770k people had CV last week, isn't that, on avg, around 100k per day.

Just because folk haven't come forward to be tested, doesn't mean infections are extremely high.

No it doesn't mean that at all, 680-770k were infectious at the same time, they were infectious every single day not newly infected every day. Cases are counted on new infections that day, cases who were identified the day before are not carried over to the day after and counted again as a new case. I don't think I'm explaining it very well here maybe someone else can word it better than I have.

@Wellbythebloodyhell Yes i get that but equally, people have recovered from Cv so drop off the infectious list over that week.

I was in London yesterday.
Much of our journey had covid controls in operation at any moment.
I've been reading lots Twitter posts about mask-wearing on underground -- I was surprised to see 10-30% not masked (at any one time). That was about 2 hours of using underground, 4 services.

The non-mask wearers ranged from little old white ladies to young very dark skinned Muslim mothers. There was no pattern or trend to it; they mirrored the general Underground-using population perfectly. (on those Tube lines)

I was grateful for 20% non-compliance when I joined the mask-free for a while due to trying to control nausea due to severe sleep deprivation.

The fact that I bothered to notice & track & feel twinges of guilt & read the Twitter posts... it's all part of what tells me that things are NOT normal. Not at all.

[quote jasjas1973]@stepupandbecounted

Its not about zero CV, its about having a health service that can function and treat all the other life limiting conditions we get.

Very high CV infections, lead to moderate increases in hospitalisations and staff sickness, which stop the NHS from functioning

5.5m on waiting lists, thought that will go to 13m by winter, doubtless an over exaggeration but still super high.

Now if we were doing something about this, then sure, left all restrictions etc but we are not, in fact we are doing nothing at all.[/quote]
Do we not think that the answer to this is not more restrictions but the government to actually put more money into the NHS? It shouldn't be the job of the general public to restrict their normal lives to protect the NHS, it should be the job of those in power to spend our tax money correctly.

The bulk of the NHS backlog is going to be moved over to the private sector, and this is already happening in my area.

The NHS waiting list has nothing to do with covid. We have had huge backlogs for decades.

jasjas You do not appear to be listening, there is NO scenario in which any scientist anywhere can see hospitalisations becoming so high as to overwhelm the hospitals. NONE. So your prophecy of NHS doom is not based in reality. No one thinks this apart from you, and your predictions are based on what?

@stepupandbecounted

It is worth noting that we could have 500,000 cases a day, as long as they don't require medical treatment and have mild illness, as is the case with most people then the infection rate per se is largely redundant, as a result many ministers and scientists are asking for mass testing to be scrapped. The important indicator from now on should be hospital admissions and deaths. We need to adjust to life with covid, and living side by side with a virus as have always done with the flu and other coronaviruses.

I think you've forgotten about Variants and Long Covid.

When 1 in 75 have Covid, chances are you'll come in direct contact with a positive person on just an average trip to the supermarket.

We're staying well away.

I’m sure the staff at Aldi are gutted.

Long covid is treatable and people are getting better and are in completely recovered in the vast majority of cases.

No new variant have caused any concern whatsoever, are we supposed to spend the rest of our lives second guessing when one might or might not pop up?

You do know that there is just as much chance that covid will just lose its strength and become just another common cold? Why is the most negative and dire possibility the most likely one in your mind?

That is question you need to ask yourself nanny because your mindset is locked on the worst outcome, rather than the most likely outcome. Which is we will continue to develop boosters rapidly deploying them that will respond to any new viruses/variants and continue to live comfortably?

Interesting article in FT today
Ferguson et al's predictions were based on (not unreasonable) assumption that, post "freedom day", public would increase daily contacts. Instead, the opposite occurred: people have become more cautious and reduced contacts. Or, put another way: things are not, yet, back to normal.

giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/actions/redeem/5be95578-37fc-4f23-99fa-834fe4e8c07c

crying I’m pretty sure that’s what the government were hoping for.
Lift restrictions - thus taking the pressure off certain industries, appease back benchers, and keep the exit wave to manageable numbers while we get more and more vaccinated.

Job done.
Restrictions not actually neeeed.

It wasn’t unknown.

Chris Whitty says we’ll be cautious and we were / are.

It’s built into the chosen response.

I remember his words and they were before I went out and saw what he said was happening. Another reason why he’s good imo he gets public behaviour - or his team does.

@NannyAndJohn

When 1 in 75 have Covid, chances are you'll come in direct contact with a positive person on just an average trip to the supermarket.

We're staying well away.

People do know this. And most people are happy to take that chance.

It is interesting isn't it that people have reduced contacts/maintained mitigations eg masks, despite having greater freedom. That certainly reflects my experience, though obvs the position must vary dependent on location.

Not sure whether the govt predicted this or not - it seems counter intuitive and has taken scientists by surprise!

@NannyAndJohn

When 1 in 75 have Covid, chances are you'll come in direct contact with a positive person on just an average trip to the supermarket.

We're staying well away.

And it’s fine for you to do that.

And everyone can make their own decision.

Hmm Marsha, I seem to remember CW encouraging people to be cautious but I dont recall him predicting a reduced level of contacts.

[quote jasjas1973]@stepupandbecounted

Its not about zero CV, its about having a health service that can function and treat all the other life limiting conditions we get.

Very high CV infections, lead to moderate increases in hospitalisations and staff sickness, which stop the NHS from functioning

5.5m on waiting lists, thought that will go to 13m by winter, doubtless an over exaggeration but still super high.

Now if we were doing something about this, then sure, left all restrictions etc but we are not, in fact we are doing nothing at all.[/quote]
Agreed- the worrying thing is we've got high infection rates during the school/Uni holidays, most office workers still WFH, restricted international travel, warm weather meaning more outside mixing etc.. The NHS is on a knife-edge at the moment and I'm dreading what will happen in September.

@vaxmeup a knife edge that suggests that are on the cusp of being overwhelmed....