Are we nearer the beginning, the middle, or the end of the covid pandemic?

[PrincessNutNuts]

They asked this on YouGov this week.

What do you think?

What sort of answers do you want? You haven't proved a point about Covid being irrelevant now with your cheep rhetoric, and I am not a public health body tasked with tackling sepsis, etc. Shall I go back and pluck up you post and engage in pointless 'discussion' with you? No. I find your diminishment of human life and your casual callousness revolting, as I have said. Me coming up with the cure for cancer in the next twenty minutes won't change that.

@milkyaqua

What sort of answers do you want? You haven't proved a point about Covid being irrelevant now with your cheep rhetoric, and I am not a public health body tasked with tackling sepsis, etc. Shall I go back and pluck up you post and engage in pointless 'discussion' with you? No. I find your diminishment of human life and your casual callousness revolting, as I have said. Me coming up with the cure for cancer in the next twenty minutes won't change that.

Restrictions in place last winter almost completely eliminated flu. Would you be prepared to have restrictions of that nature in place every winter in order to reduce or eliminate deaths from flu? If not, why not?

Just for context, in a bad flu season there are almost 100 deaths per day and 1000 daily hospitalisations as a result of flu.

I'm in Australia. This is a global pandemic. Our situation has been different. It's still a crisis situation for the entire world. All the governments across the globe haven't just gone silly for fun.

I don't need to read the same oft-repeated faux facts about flu to be suddenly 'enlightened'.

Here's a tip: Winter is coming (in the northern hemisphere). Thank god for the vaccines, of course. But this isn't just going away because you and your ilk are sick of it.

@milkyaqua

I'm in Australia. This is a global pandemic. Our situation has been different. It's still a crisis situation for the entire world. All the governments across the globe haven't just gone silly for fun.

I don't need to read the same oft-repeated faux facts about flu to be suddenly 'enlightened'.

Here's a tip: Winter is coming (in the northern hemisphere). Thank god for the vaccines, of course. But this isn't just going away because you and your ilk are sick of it.

The question still applies. Would you be prepared to maintain restrictions every Winter in order to reduce or eliminate deaths from flu?

@ImTellingTales

Interestingly, the prediction of 100,000 cases a day was accompanied by the prediction of 1,000 hospitalisations a day, which is where we are.

Yep. With hospitalisations and deaths up, I'd say we're still right in the middle of this.

Winter is on the way and we're getting warnings from our local primary and secondary schools that there has been a rise in cases and they will be making changes to reduce contact between year groups and masks in corridors for secondary.

You cannot equate flu with Covid-19.

This is the first major pandemic in a100 years and obviously no-one is thrilled about it, but bandying about false equations is pointless.

It's not up to us @Sunshinegirl82.

No one here has ever put the country into lockdown, tiers or restrictions.

I'm definitely up for cleaner air and protecting the vulnerable.

There's not much argument against improved ventilation everywhere, but particularly schools and other public buildings, masks in healthcare settings during respiratory virus season, and people who can, and who want to, working from home at least some of the time, is there?

People not going into work ill with something contagious would be good too.

I'm all in favour of not wilfully adding to the load of the health service during the winter pressures.

@milkyaqua

You cannot equate flu with Covid-19.

This is the first major pandemic in a100 years and obviously no-one is thrilled about it, but bandying about false equations is pointless.

I know that covid is not flu, I never said that it was. Nevertheless people are hospitalised and die from flu every winter. Usually 10,000 or so in the U.K., perhaps as many as 40,000 or 50,000 in a particularly bad flu year.

If we kept restrictions in place every Winter we would reduce those numbers. The last year has shown us that. The point I am making is that there has never been any suggestion of introducing restrictions on a regular basis to reduce the number of flu deaths despite the fact that 10, 20, 30, 40 thousand flu deaths every winter is objectively a lot of deaths.

If covid deaths are occurring at a similar rate now to those caused by flu and the health service is coping why would we bring in restrictions to reduce covid deaths when we have never chosen to do so for flu?

I am not against restrictions, I believe lockdown was necessary and was happy to wear a mask when required to do so. I can see an argument for keeping some restrictions for a few winters until the health service has a fighting chance to catch itself up provided that those restrictions have an actual impact and are not just theatre (which in my view masks as a lone measure are).

However, my point remains that the vast majority of people will accept 50,000 deaths a year from covid in order not to have restrictions imposed upon them in the same way as they have accepted the thousands of flu deaths that occur every year.

It is easy to congratulate yourself on being morally superior if you don't actually engage in thinking about the logic and practicality of what you are saying.

@PrincessNutNuts

It's not up to us *@Sunshinegirl82*.

No one here has ever put the country into lockdown, tiers or restrictions.

I'm definitely up for cleaner air and protecting the vulnerable.

There's not much argument against improved ventilation everywhere, but particularly schools and other public buildings, masks in healthcare settings during respiratory virus season, and people who can, and who want to, working from home at least some of the time, is there?

People not going into work ill with something contagious would be good too.

I'm all in favour of not wilfully adding to the load of the health service during the winter pressures.

I wouldn't consider ventilation or optional hybrid/home working to be "restrictions".

That said, improving ventilation in a meaningful way in all buildings, even just in all schools, is not something that will be achieved overnight so that is realistically a medium to long term aim.

However, my point remains that the vast majority of people will accept 50,000 deaths a year from covid in order not to have restrictions imposed upon them in the same way as they have accepted the thousands of flu deaths that occur every year.

I don't think the majority of people actually are that callous.

It is easy to congratulate yourself on being morally superior if you don't actually engage in thinking about the logic and practicality of what you are saying.

Oh, that's rich!

@milkyaqua

However, my point remains that the vast majority of people will accept 50,000 deaths a year from covid in order not to have restrictions imposed upon them in the same way as they have accepted the thousands of flu deaths that occur every year.

I don't think the majority of people actually are that callous.

It is easy to congratulate yourself on being morally superior if you don't actually engage in thinking about the logic and practicality of what you are saying.

Oh, that's rich!

You still haven't actually engaged with the point though have you? You just talk about callousness, lack of regard for human life, how terrible it all is etc, lots of emotive words that don't address the point.

People clearly are that callous when it comes to flu deaths aren't they? I'm not aware of widespread campaigns to impose restrictions in Winter to reduce flu deaths?

I'm assuming you either can't or won't give an answer.

Fuck me sideways! There isn't an answer as it is a moot point.

@milkyaqua

Fuck me sideways! There isn't an answer as it is a moot point.

How is it moot? Of course there is an answer.

You clearly think that 50,000 annual
deaths from covid is unacceptable and would support restrictions to reduce that number? Hence your apparent disgust at my suggestion that the majority of people would be willing to accept that number of deaths in order to avoid restrictions.

Do you think that 50,000 annual deaths from flu is also unacceptable? Would you support ongoing annual restrictions to reduce the number of flu deaths?

I think you’ve made some good points @Sunshinegirl82

Well, you would, wouldn't you bumbleymummy

Beginning of the middle. 2 years to go yet..

@milkyaqua

The vast majority are willing to accept really pretty high numbers of deaths in exchange for a restriction free life.

That is so foul.

sunshinegirl

You have extrapolated and segued and reiterated on and on and on since this exchange.

I do not accept the vast majority of people think like this. Perhaps you and the gaggle of similarly minded people on this board do, but not the vast majority of actual humans.

My opinion that this is a foul attitude will not change. The end.

I’ve changed my mind from the other day when I said we were at the end of the middle. Just in the last few days I have heard of a number of people infected for a second time with COVID, been double jabbed etc. The most unsettling thing for me was to hear that some of them (around age 60) have had it worse this time round. I wouldn’t have thought to put a healthy 60 year old in the “vulnerable” bracket but perhaps being infected multiple times with COVID DOES make you more at risk of more severe infection, rather than the other way round.

It’s just made me think once again that all bets are off. It’s an unknown.

@milkyaqua

Because you have done nothing but be personally insulting whilst not actually engaging with the point.

It is and always has been a straightforward question. You can't or won't answer, that is your choice.

Middle. www.newscientist.com/article/mg24933233-500-first-universal-coronavirus-vaccine-will-start-human-trials-this-year

In survey after survey @milkyaqua the vast majority of people say it's most important to try to save every life, and that they are prepared to do their share of what needs to be done.

This is the only place I go on the internet where there is a vocal minority who insist otherwise.

@PrincessNutNuts

In survey after survey *@milkyaqua* the vast majority of people say it's most important to try to save every life, and that they are prepared to do their share of what needs to be done.

This is the only place I go on the internet where there is a vocal minority who insist otherwise.

Thank you for that. It has been horrifying reading here, these last many months. My feeling is most people are really decent and will go out of their way to help others.

The coldness here has been a shock.

@Sunshinegirl82
“ Scotland and Wales have maintained compulsory masks and wfh throughout and there is no significance difference in case numbers in those countries compared to England.

On the basis that those restrictions alone don't appear to lower case numbers, what additional restrictions on top of masks and wfh do you think should be reintroduced?”

There are many variables, not least the actual levels of working from home, which may not be very different, or may even be lower, for Wales and Scotland than England. High levels of home working is the best explanation I’ve come across for London’s relatively low rates of Covid through most of the pandemic so I wouldn’t dismiss home working so easily. Plan B also includes Covid passes.
I notice you don’t dispute my point that most countries have low level restrictions that most people currently accept so people who reject all restrictions are the outliers.

Whether it’s caused by Covid or Flu, or a combination there is a level of chaos and death that most people and even this government won’t accept.
We accept curbs on our freedoms to reduce the spread of TB (no spitting rules), lung cancer and other smoking related deaths (no smoking rules), as well as a body of health and safety legislation that has been growing since at least the 1840s.

@PrincessNutNuts

In survey after survey *@milkyaqua* the vast majority of people say it's most important to try to save every life, and that they are prepared to do their share of what needs to be done.

This is the only place I go on the internet where there is a vocal minority who insist otherwise.

You’d have to look at more than YouGov polls to get full picture

Behaviour / MP constituents pressure / lobbying from sectors

It is true we have been excellent through out at making sacrifices for others but the picture is changing over time.

If you go to London on any day what you’ll see will feel different to this idea if every life. People are busy and behaving with high levels of normalcy. Some people still wear masks but that is the lightest touch v actual restrictions.

Chris Whitty also talked about notion of acceptable level so it’s built in to advice.

Plus there has been some caution voluntarily over last few months but it’s a spectrum

I don’t agree mn has a vocal minority re coldness etc - it might do but I’d put that more to the few advocating harsh restrictions still

If you look at the spectrum of behaviour the majority have embraced doing things as before - including events with no SD etc. Basically it’s busy as anything in many places.