1000+ in ventilator beds already & school return with no household isolation

[RumblyMumbly]

Number of people in ventilator beds 1,014 on 31/08/21

It has been a steady / manageable rise since restrictions lifted in mid May when there were 125 patients in ventilator beds & while obviously awful for the people affected and their families this means the NHS has coped while there has been a lot of Covid cases

Does anyone else feel we may be at the tipping point? Schools in England mostly return this week for Autumn term.

If we compare with last years school return there were only 71 ventilator beds occupied on 31/08/20. Yes, we now have 64% of the total population double vaccinated which puts us in a far better situation than last year when the population had no protection. However, we had household isolations this time last year for positive cases, this year other household members of a positive case will be attending school and workplaces alongside everyone else and generally people will begin meeting indoors much more over the next few months.

Purpose of my post - nervousness about what will happen next...I don't want schools to close at all, children have already had 2 years of disrupted education. But to give my own personal experience - obviously other peoples differ - secondary remote learning can work if absolutely necessary (full schedule of lessons / homework) but primary remote learning (1hr lesson per day) did not work AT ALL & the vast majority of primary aged children are not ready to become independent learners while parents are in an impossible situation as they can't work and moonlight as a teacher.

I hope SAGE / the Government are watching the figures very closely and if we need a circuit breaker in October to keep the NHS manageable they act fast.

Stopping the isolation is crazy in my opinion.

I’m NHS frontline staff, double vaccinated and recently had Covid, despite being 3 months after my second vaccine. I was flagged as a close contact and got tested and it came back positive. I wouldn’t have tested otherwise. I wasn’t ill with it so I certainly was protected from severe effects but I still managed to infect my child unfortunately who tested positive a week after me.

If that happened today I would be in work with vulnerable people possibly infecting them and contributing towards their death.

@Madwife123 it's terrifying isn't it?

It really is!

Bearing in mind I’m a midwife. In case my name doesn’t give it away.

ICU’s are FULL of pregnant women as they are so vulnerable to the Delta variant. Many of them are still unvaccinated as it’s only recently been recommended in pregnancy and that message hasn’t fully spread yet.

So the patients I see each day are very likely to become seriously unwell with covid and yet we are now told no need to isolate even if someone in your home has covid, just come to work and hope you don’t spread it.

The staff shortages due to isolation has become more important than the lives of those mothers and babies.

@Bakewellisntjustacake

Where I work all the patients in icu are unvaccinated. Sadly, a lot of them are also pregnant. In my old job on an ecmo unit in my last week 2 weeks ago we had 17 patients on ecmo 10 were pregnant. It is harrowing. The vaccines make such a difference

God, that's awful to read.

@Madwife123

It really is!

Bearing in mind I’m a midwife. In case my name doesn’t give it away.

ICU’s are FULL of pregnant women as they are so vulnerable to the Delta variant. Many of them are still unvaccinated as it’s only recently been recommended in pregnancy and that message hasn’t fully spread yet.

So the patients I see each day are very likely to become seriously unwell with covid and yet we are now told no need to isolate even if someone in your home has covid, just come to work and hope you don’t spread it.

The staff shortages due to isolation has become more important than the lives of those mothers and babies.

And that makes me furious.

disrupted food deliveries

Why on earth would food deliveries be disrupted?

64% of the UK population are vaccinated, and generously assuming that vaccines give 80% protection, the current R for the UK is

7.68 0.64 (1 - 0.80) + 7.68 (1 - 0.64) 1 = 3.75

@NannyAndJohn
Only according to the government website the r rate is currently 1-1.1 in England and thats with no (or at least very few) restrictions, so how are you explaining that?

ICU’s are FULL of pregnant women as they are so vulnerable to the Delta variant. Many are still unvaccinated…

How awful. That is so sad. I have noticed a few articles about women giving birth then dying shortly after.

There is another thread at the moment from an op, who is concerned about taking time of to isolate with her child. This has widened the discussion to the difficulty working parents are going to face as they don’t have to isolate but any positive children will. Especially if they have multiple children. The financial impact, especially if on a low income and the risk of loss of employment. Once again this is hitting mums disproportionately hard.

Long covid will also disproportionately affect working mums.

It’s not just people, who don’t want to protect themselves. I am already chronically ill and disabled. On top of this, I have had so many side effects from the second jab that if I have to have the vaccine every year, I may as well book a place at DIGNITAS as my life won’t be worth living.
What do you suggest is the answer for people in your situation though? The majority can't stay locked down for the foreseeable future to protect the chronically ill/vulnerable who struggle with having the vaccine. What is an ideal solution?

@Billandben444
I never said the country should lockdown. I don’t think it should. It’s just unfortunate that a few, who cannot have the vaccine for genuine reasons are being classed as selfish or anti-vaxxers. I am now at a point, where I would rather risk getting Covid (I presume for the second time) than have more vaccines. Flu included.

My trust has 136 Covid patients.. last spring they had 450. Not getting to
Worried!

@Onandoff

Where I work every single intubated patient is a vaccine refuser.

EVERY SINGLE ONE.

We can’t justify punishing children to protect adults who have chosen not to protect themselves.

I believe this is also the case here. The trust did a Facebook campaign on it.

Only according to the government website the r rate is currently 1-1.1 in England and thats with no (or at least very few) restrictions, so how are you explaining that?

Schools reopening is the big factor - Scotland's current R rate may be more useful to view.

I am not living a pre-covid life, neither are most of my friends and family. For example I have not yet been to a big party, the only large work meeting I have been invited to was in a covered outside space which the business has specifically built for such events, and mant of the shops I visit still have restrictions on numbers. This type of adjustment affects the r-rate.

People keep moaning about all the things not running precisely as they did pre-covid. Do you currently, for example:

• sit in a waiting room prior to your dentist appointment? Does your dentist greet you unmasked?
• go accompanied to outpatient appointments? Do the health professionals greet you unmasked?
• pop into your GP surgery when you want to?
• sit in the hairdressers with the door shut?
• travel extensively for conferences in your work?
• travel without testing for Covid?
• return from anywhere in the world without testinging or quarantine?
• have a cough and not get a covid test?
• enter all shops without any queueing?
• go to as many large parties as you did pre-covid?

When you see an elderly neighbour in the street who is wearing a mask - do you stand as near to them as you would have done in 2019?

Most people are actually still moderating behaviour a fair bit. This is affecting the r-rate.

UK is nowhere near 'normal'.

I just feel like I really don't know any more.
Our vaccination programme has been brilliant. We will never achieve herd immunity through vaccination though.
I feel like we've come to the end of the line with lockdowns and education disruptions though.
I feel desperately sorry and worried for people who can't have the vaccination or it's not effective, and for those who are waiting for NHS treatment.
It is completely beyond me, however, why mask wearing and social distancing where possible has been abandoned as policy while we are in this situation.

@Andrea87
This is from the Public Health England technical briefing report from the 6th August. It does show deaths within 28 days of a positive test result and if the number of people who had no injections, 1 injection, 2 injections etc

So roughly one-third of deaths unvaccinated, over half fully vaccinated.

As PP said, this is life now. COVID isn’t going away. The sooner people realise this the better. The majority of adults are vaccinated, we cannot have ongoing restrictions. Yes it’s sad that there are some people who are vulnerable even with vaccines but that’s the same for a lot of illnesses. I don’t feel particularly bad for those who’ve refused the vaccine. I agree we need to bump up our NHS resources to cope with the additional pressure every year, but that’s as much as we can do going forwards. People won’t lock down again or get on board with extra restrictions, that time has past.

@Overthebow

As PP said, this is life now. COVID isn’t going away. The sooner people realise this the better. The majority of adults are vaccinated, we cannot have ongoing restrictions. Yes it’s sad that there are some people who are vulnerable even with vaccines but that’s the same for a lot of illnesses. I don’t feel particularly bad for those who’ve refused the vaccine. I agree we need to bump up our NHS resources to cope with the additional pressure every year, but that’s as much as we can do going forwards. People won’t lock down again or get on board with extra restrictions, that time has past.

“Bump up” said no person who ran a hospital in a pandemic ever…..

@Mummyoflittledragon

I never said the country should lockdown. I don’t think it should. It’s just unfortunate that a few, who cannot have the vaccine for genuine reasons are being classed as selfish or anti-vaxxers. I am now at a point, where I would rather risk getting Covid (I presume for the second time) than have more vaccines. Flu included.
Which is your personal choice and I don't think anybody would lump you in with the anti-vaccers. Weren't you tested when you thought you had covid previously? I'm sorry having jabs makes you poorly but, as I asked before, what is a solution that suits all?

I'm in Scotland and from our numbers it doesn't feel like the extra mitigants are making much difference.

School is on a knife edge which numbers of infected pupils and teachers creeping up each day. Family has to have a negative PCR if someone tests positive, but due to Covid incubation period, not sure how useful that is. I desperately want DS in his Nat 5 year to get a normal education, but at the minute I don't see that as feasible unless pretty much everyone gets it and then there's no one left to infect and/or they roll out the vaccines to 12-15s.

The main thing I'm clinging on to is whilst hospitalisations are creeping up, there doesn't appear to be the same link between case numbers/hospitalisations and deaths as there was before.

@PepsiHoover

What is the alternative though? Public sympathy for another lockdown is slim to none. The county can't afford another round of furlough. Businesses can't afford to close again. Parents can't afford to take anymore time off work if the schools close.

I don't necessarily agree with just letting everyone catch covid. But, what more can realistically be done? We cannot sustain indefinite lockdowns.

And yet going into autumn without a single restriction or mitigation officially advised seems to be the other extreme to lockdown

Nobody at all who is discussing the worry about schools going back is talking about lockdown as an alternative, just that taking no precautions whatsoever risks the necessity for more stringent measures being unavoidable later

@Overthebow

As PP said, this is life now. COVID isn’t going away. The sooner people realise this the better. The majority of adults are vaccinated, we cannot have ongoing restrictions. Yes it’s sad that there are some people who are vulnerable even with vaccines but that’s the same for a lot of illnesses. I don’t feel particularly bad for those who’ve refused the vaccine. I agree we need to bump up our NHS resources to cope with the additional pressure every year, but that’s as much as we can do going forwards. People won’t lock down again or get on board with extra restrictions, that time has past.

If this is 'just how it is', why are cases, hospitalisations and deaths so much lower in other European countries?

This is just how our government have chosen it will be.

I’m in the keep on camp
Paying for more ventilators is still cheaper than another round of lockdown , furlough etc

It is remarkable, actually, how so much of the early data on COVID has held up. Kids barely at any risk at all. Old and vulnerable very much so. CFR of 1% (based on the number of cases detected early in the older and more vulnerable) and an IFR in the region on 0.2% across the whole population. Vaccines / endemicity seems to have reduced each risk bracket by a factor of around 10 (i.e. a double-vaxxeed 80 year old is now as vulnerable as an unvaxxed 50 year old) bringing COVID into the envelope of seasonal colds and flu.