What's the end game?

[UndertonesOfCake]

Lockdowns were always said to be a thing "until we have a vaccine"

Except now we have a vaccine, and most eligible people are double jabbed.

... and now there's talk of reintroducing restrictions - plan B, plan C... full lockdown again?

I'm not prepared to live in a state of perpetual restrictions - I'll take the (relatively small) risk of dying.

I don't understand how they think this is all going to end, if vaccines have been insufficient? What else are we waiting for?

Norugratsatall I would suggest there are 2 factors at play.

1. Cases have been highest in schoolchildren because they are the group that has the lowest level of immunity. Now that the number of under 18s with immunity is rapidly increasing (from vaccination of teens and infection), you would expect cases to start to slow then drop.

1. I would suggest half term might be responsible for a drop in testing rather than a drop in cases... People avoiding testing in case they have to cancel holidays or spend the week stuck inside.

Even if we live with it the knock on continues to affect our services. Our local hospital had 15 ambulances in a queue last night as no beds. Friend who works there said it is due to poorly Covid people filling any spare capacity they may have had so literally no beds to be had. This isn’t being reported on it’s happening everywhere.
Yes we can live with Covid and just move forward but it will continue to affect people who need Care or NHS services even with vaccinations some still need hospital.
So we can blithely skip along and ignore that there is still a high level circulating until we need an ambulance for our baby or whatever and it doesn’t come for 4 hours (another friend)
I don’t want lock downs etc but I feel we should bring back mandatory masks and some sensible mitigation ideas.

@Norugratsatall

To the poster who said half term is responsible for the current drop in daily infections, surely this can't be the whole picture? Those who are testing positive NOW will have been infected c.7 days ago, when children were in school. A drop due to no mixing in schools would take 7-10 days to filter through.

Most English and Welsh schools are only midweek of half term and the drop was noticeable from Sunday.

We'll just take them out with a firing squad, shall we? What do you reckon - anyone over 65 or with any of the co-morbidities for Covid, up against the wall? How dare they want to live. I mean, my 37 year old diabetic friend with a 1 year old baby might like to see her daughter grow up and maybe have another child, but clearly she's being selfish because you've had enough.

Bit melodramatic. Your friend isn't at much of a higher risk than any other 37 year old. I'm a type 1 myself and have a type 1 friend who has had covid. She has diabetic complications and is generally in quite poor health and was in hospital for a couple of days with Covid but was ultimately fine.

[quote Thewiseoneincognito]@Sunshinegirl82 I’m not suggesting zero Covid, I know that’s an impossibility. My point was unless it’s a total cure where we can eradicate it completely with a single pill or needle we are forever stuck in this never ending cycle of booster jabs, restrictions and social distancing.

Covid will continue mutating, how that looks after another year or two is anyone’s guess. I’m just waiting for the news that it’s adapted to reinfect those who have already had it with a greater severity than the first time or something to that effect because it seems to throw a curveball when we least expect it.[/quote]
I don't see why that is a certain, or even likely, outcome - no other disease in the history of mankind has resulted in that outcome.

It may well be the reality for a few years but the idea that we will be stuck in a perpetual cycle of social distancing etc seems unnecessarily pessimistic.

We are at Center Parcs at the moment, no SD whatsoever and very few masks, seems entirely like the last time we came in 2019. I think that's the reality for most now - pretty much just operating as normal.

Vaccines are the way out, but the government dropped the ball by not starting vaccinating 12-15 year olds when the vaccine was approved for them as safe and effective by the regulatory authority (experts, more expert than the JCVI as a collective group) in June.
Only really starting in earnest now, late October. In meantime, massive transmission within and out of this age group.

Add in several million anti-vaxxers who are still catching and transmitting the virus, as well as being a massive burden on the NHS right now.

So, the government needs to be more like Israel, where vaccines (and vaccine passports) have been the way out. Plus boosters every 6-12 months (just like flu boosters every 12 months, which no-one objects to) and perhaps a bit of mask wearing (just like many countries in Asia with longer life expectancy than the UK have always done).

TLDR: the government said vaccines were the way out, but didn't finish the job.

perhaps a bit of mask wearing

That will never shut them up.

@Lavender24 it’s not at our local hospital.

I’m just waiting for the news that it’s adapted to reinfect those who have already had it with a greater severity than the first time or something to that effect because it seems to throw a curveball when we least expect it.

I don't see why that is a certain, or even likely, outcome - no other disease in the history of mankind has resulted in that outcome.

That's not strictly true, @Sunshinegirl82. Ebola, West Nile virus and Spanish flu are all examples of viruses that have evolved to be more virulent - deadly. Also, usually novel viruses evolve to be more transmissible and virulent at first as they adapt to their new host.

Don't take that to be doom mongering, often viruses do evolve to become less virulent in the long term. However, it is a myth that often gets toted around that all viruses evolve to become milder. That, and the "fact" that all pandemics last 2 years then burn out

@chesirecat99

I’m just waiting for the news that it’s adapted to reinfect those who have already had it with a greater severity than the first time or something to that effect because it seems to throw a curveball when we least expect it.

I don't see why that is a certain, or even likely, outcome - no other disease in the history of mankind has resulted in that outcome.

That's not strictly true, @Sunshinegirl82. Ebola, West Nile virus and Spanish flu are all examples of viruses that have evolved to be more virulent - deadly. Also, usually novel viruses evolve to be more transmissible and virulent at first as they adapt to their new host.

Don't take that to be doom mongering, often viruses do evolve to become less virulent in the long term. However, it is a myth that often gets toted around that all viruses evolve to become milder. That, and the "fact" that all pandemics last 2 years then burn out

I'm not suggesting that it's impossible for it to evolve into something more deadly (although it's by no means a certainty (or even particularly likely) and coronaviruses are generally fairly "stable" compared to something like flu) I mean that no illness in the history of mankind has resulted in a perpetual state of restrictions etc.

Once it ceases to be novel, it's impact will lessen.

@Sunshinegirl82 my gut instinct tells me Covid may turn out to be very different to other illnesses in the history of mankind, for a start it could be the first one we brought upon ourselves…

I mean that no illness in the history of mankind has resulted in a perpetual state of restrictions etc.

True, and I'm not suggesting that there will be a perpetual state of restrictions, but, in the history of modern medicine, I don't think there is any other disease that you can draw a direct comparison with. If you consider the pandemics in modern history, HIV is entirely different because transmission is easily preventable, flu is different because of rate of mutation/recombination/existing immunity. If you consider novel viruses, SARS-CoV-1 and MERS are much less easily transmissible and outbreaks have been contained.

Flu is less stable than SARS-CoV-2 but that also means that there is a higher probability that a less virulent variant will quickly come along to outcompete it...

I wouldn't be surprised if local restrictions or other mitigating factors become necessary in the future if there are outbreaks. It's that or invest money so the NHS can cope. I would put money on masks over investment in the NHS!

The 1889-90 "Russian flu" pandemic is believed to have been due to a coronavirus introduced from cows.... (having previously thought to have been a strain of influenza) and perhaps provides an indication of how things will progress.

We still have it today and is one of the coronavirus that cause the common cold. By the time we get to an age when we would be at higher risk from it, we've likely had it 10-20 times.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1889–1890_pandemic

@chesirecat99 - thank you so much for your contributions to this thread.

@SeasonalNamechange - Would it be correct to assume that you don't have any "sick" family members? No kids that have been told that they're particularly at risk?

1. You're using the term 'survival of the fittest' incorrectly.

1. We have sufficient scientific knowledge to have been able to identify how the virus is transmitted (through the air), and how to lessen transmission (ventilation, distancing, masks etc).

Are you honestly saying that the lives of other people, many of whom would otherwise live for decades longer, are worth nothing because you'd rather not have to pop on a mask or open a window?

The view you have expressed is selfish and cold, and I sincerely hope you're a troll.

@chesirecat99

I mean that no illness in the history of mankind has resulted in a perpetual state of restrictions etc.

True, and I'm not suggesting that there will be a perpetual state of restrictions, but, in the history of modern medicine, I don't think there is any other disease that you can draw a direct comparison with. If you consider the pandemics in modern history, HIV is entirely different because transmission is easily preventable, flu is different because of rate of mutation/recombination/existing immunity. If you consider novel viruses, SARS-CoV-1 and MERS are much less easily transmissible and outbreaks have been contained.

Flu is less stable than SARS-CoV-2 but that also means that there is a higher probability that a less virulent variant will quickly come along to outcompete it...

I wouldn't be surprised if local restrictions or other mitigating factors become necessary in the future if there are outbreaks. It's that or invest money so the NHS can cope. I would put money on masks over investment in the NHS!

The flip side of the stability argument is that the vaccines are likely to hold up much better against Covid than they do against flu (which is exactly what we're seeing). Plus SARS and MERS both have very long lasting immunity (SARS patients demonstrated continued immunity 17 years after infection).

I think it unlikely there will be very much at all in the way of restrictions after this year and short of a full scale healthcare collapse nothing at all from Spring 2022. There really just isn't the appetite for restrictions (including masks) in the U.K. except for in real extremis.

[quote Thewiseoneincognito]@Sunshinegirl82 my gut instinct tells me Covid may turn out to be very different to other illnesses in the history of mankind, for a start it could be the first one we brought upon ourselves…[/quote]
Ok but it's still a coronavirus, and is behaving as you'd expect a coronavirus to behave. I think you're catastrophising a bit. This isn't some humanity ending super virus, it's a very transmissible, novel virus. It won't stay novel.

Mankind (as a whole) has survived every other virus on earth (a lot of them without the benefit of modern medicine) I think we've got a pretty good chance with this one too.

Have people not noticed the number of cases starting to nosedive?

Not today though.

Even so can't see a full lockdown happening again.

@Backofbeyond50

Have people not noticed the number of cases starting to nosedive?

Not today though.

Even so can't see a full lockdown happening again.

Down 11% on this time last week though. We'll have to wait and see if it's a trend or a blip.

True. Tok soon to say.

[quote Hopeisallineed]@Oldgoat2021 when posters, such as you, post statements that sound unequivocal, it would be helpful to back them up with some science, referring to your ‘this is the final variant’ line. Can you tell me where you got this information from?[/quote]
Here! Posts 15 to 19:

mobile.twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1454038382678528007

I don’t see where it says it’s the final variant. Sorry. Am I missing something? All seems speculative to me.

@SeasonalNamechange

i think we've all had enough!! but thats what pandemics do....kill off the weak

we are fighting against it, or trying to

Well that is not entirely true is it? Perhaps you have not heard of the Spanish Flu.

I think the endgame will be different for different people, depending on age, health, where you live in the world, etc.

I went to swimming and soft play with loads of people 30 and under this week. Saw about 9 masks in total amongst say 250 people?

Younger people seem to me to be living their life. Great.

Older people however, and those who are vulnerable - I see a mixture. Some are trying to live life. Others have become so cowed, they are not quite themselves any more.

Other countries - mixture isnt it? There is not the same "problem" with covid, in some 3rd world countries[apart from South America] that was generally expected.

I wholeheartedly recommend avoiding the news/media relating to covid, or talking about it with people. I was beginning to struggle with the ongoing uncertainty and restrictions, and seriously worrying about the long term implications for my DC of all the obsessing about it etc. Then I had a light bulb moment that I could just not join in anymore. I don't give it headspace, I don't wear a mmask unless it's compolsory, we don't test ourselves as a family, we make plans as normal. When we catch it (as pp have said, it's not going anywhere so it's when not if) we'll likely be mildly affected if at all, if not we'll deal with it when it comes, but until then I'm not thinking about it.