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To feel pissed off at PCR testing and travel restrictions...

56 replies

JollyJoon · 05/12/2021 11:13

...when double vaccinated?

Soon to be triple vaccinated.

So if a triple jab isnt enough to protect ourselves and others from spreading, why have we bothered?

I think governments should realise that once people have been double vaxxed they're going to need a bit of an incentive to keep going back for more...

OP posts:
icedcoffees · 05/12/2021 12:53

YANBU.

People are (rightly) getting incredibly pissed off with this, but half of MN seems to think you're selfish for wanting to do anything outside of your own home at the moment Hmm

MatildaIThink · 05/12/2021 12:59

From the perspective of reducing importation of variants the restrictions on travel should have never gone, it should have remained pre-departure and 2+8 day testing. It would have never kept the variants out, the only way to do that would be to permanently close the borders, but it would have given more visibility of the variants in circulation, as well as changes in transmission patterns from different countries.

The reality is that some people's desire to go on holidays without proper testing is going to impact the whole country, economically and socially. Note that I am not saying that people should not be allowed to travel, but that there should be restrictions on that which enable us to better manage a still ongoing global pandemic.

DressingPafe · 05/12/2021 13:05

Well I think you have a point OP. As I am someone who got the vaccines purely because I knew they’d be needed for travel. I won’t be getting the booster. Not until the day actually comes when I am ready to book a trip, and I’ll then see if it’s a requirement. People may disagree but I won’t be the only one. So yes I think with every booster that comes out, the uptake will be less.

Booklover3 · 05/12/2021 13:10

@DressingPafe

Well I think you have a point OP. As I am someone who got the vaccines purely because I knew they’d be needed for travel. I won’t be getting the booster. Not until the day actually comes when I am ready to book a trip, and I’ll then see if it’s a requirement. People may disagree but I won’t be the only one. So yes I think with every booster that comes out, the uptake will be less.
You’re not the only one. I’ve had the two initial vaccines and am also putting the booster on hold.
MatildaIThink · 05/12/2021 13:15

@DressingPafe

Well I think you have a point OP. As I am someone who got the vaccines purely because I knew they’d be needed for travel. I won’t be getting the booster. Not until the day actually comes when I am ready to book a trip, and I’ll then see if it’s a requirement. People may disagree but I won’t be the only one. So yes I think with every booster that comes out, the uptake will be less.
What is your actual reason for delaying though? What benefit do you feel you gain by not waiting until you are in a situation where having had a booster is compulsory for travel?
zafferana · 05/12/2021 13:16

I agree with your sentiment OP, which is that we were all told to get vaccinated so we could protect ourselves/others and get back to normal inc. travel. So we all went off and got vaccinated and many of us who were prepared to do that are also prepared to/have already got a 3rd dose, but travel has got no easier, in fact it's harder than it was last summer when no one was vaccinated.

Covid isn't going anywhere, so is all this endless panicking about variants and knee jerk travel restrictions the way life is now going to be forever? And, if that's the case, will people keep coming back for more and more vaccine top-ups when actually it doesn't make their lives easier at all?

Electricdreams22 · 05/12/2021 13:18

This time in a month or two, “You’re selfish for wanting to go and see your parents in the middle of the pandemic”

HotPenguin · 05/12/2021 13:21

You're allowed to be pissed off, but did you think the government could predict when a vaccine escaping variant would emerge? They haven't done this just to annoy you.

Choccyp1g · 05/12/2021 13:23

I'd be interested to know how many cases have been detected by the pre-travel tests.
If there's an empty seat next to you on the plane because that passenger tested positive and was stopped from boarding, then it must be worth all the hassle.

JollyJoon · 05/12/2021 13:29

I think it's totally normal to be selfish beyond a certain point (and the certain point here could be after coming up to two years). We're all selfish, no? You could argue it's selfish to find legal ways of minimising your tax bill. It could be selfish to make arrangements so that when you die your kids inherit more. It could also be selfish to have a spare room when there's a housing crisis. The list goes on.

Of course people who are low-risk are right to think about their own lives, two years down the road.

For some countries, there's been a pass in place to get in and out, where you show you're either fully vaccinated OR have a negative test result. If the tests are going to be mandatory anyway, and if double/triple vaccination drastically lowers your chances of severe health problems and spreading, then what's the incentive for getting more boosters? You might as well just do the compulsory testing and skip the boosters.

By the way, this is straying a little from the OP, but I'd also like the private testing companies to be held to task over the amount of data they collect from me every time I do a test. My most recent one asked for my passport number, date of birth, ethnicity, where I'd been over the past X days, my address, where I was going, what transport service and train number I was on, etc. etc. etc. I don't like that at all. Your job is to test me and give me my results...

OP posts:
WonderfulYou · 05/12/2021 13:35

I completely get what you’re saying but a PCR test should be mandatory.

If you are positive you are at risk of spreading it to every person you come into contact with.
If those people are flight attendants they will need to be off sick, they could also pass it to the pilots etc so no one can go anywhere. Not to mention bringing new strains into different countries etc.

Beachcomber · 05/12/2021 13:38

@HotPenguin

You're allowed to be pissed off, but did you think the government could predict when a vaccine escaping variant would emerge? They haven't done this just to annoy you.
It was probably difficult to predict exactly when that would happen but surely information on waning would have been available from the clinical trials.

That plus general knowledge that corona viruses mutate surely meant that it wasn't very difficult to predict that lessening vaccine effectiveness would happen.

Personally I'm for testing before travel but I can see that it is an inconvenience and a disincentive to keep on with boosters.

JollyJoon · 05/12/2021 13:40

I think they need to find an easier and faster way of completing these tests. They need to work on the lateral flows so they are ultra precise and do away with the PCRs. The travel companies should then dish them out and it should be a part of the check in/security process, do the test there and then and flash the stick

OP posts:
MatildaIThink · 05/12/2021 13:40

I think it's totally normal to be selfish beyond a certain point (and the certain point here could be after coming up to two years). We're all selfish, no? You could argue it's selfish to find legal ways of minimising your tax bill. It could be selfish to make arrangements so that when you die your kids inherit more. It could also be selfish to have a spare room when there's a housing crisis. The list goes on.
Selfishness is a part of human nature and as much as many people will deny it, it does present certain evolutionary advantages in small doses (in large doses it tends to get people shunned by wider society). There is also a cost/benefit basis to it as well though, sure people don't generally pay more tax than they need to, but they generally do still pay tax. They tend to plan inheritance to a level, but that is as much about being a good/helpful parent than anything else.

Of course people who are low-risk are right to think about their own lives, two years down the road.
People do have a right to think about their own lives, but getting a vaccine booster or having to take a PCR test is at best a marginal impact on their lives. I am sure the majority of rational people would happy make the trade for annual Covid boosters and PCR tests before travel if it meant things got back to normal, children went to school without disruption, the economy was not being trashed etc.

For some countries, there's been a pass in place to get in and out, where you show you're either fully vaccinated OR have a negative test result. If the tests are going to be mandatory anyway, and if double/triple vaccination drastically lowers your chances of severe health problems and spreading, then what's the incentive for getting more boosters? You might as well just do the compulsory testing and skip the boosters.
The boosters will reduce transmission, the chance of variants forming in the population, the risk of infection and of severe disease. Some countries (Israel, Singapore and others) are looking to move to mandatory vaccination AND testing.

By the way, this is straying a little from the OP, but I'd also like the private testing companies to be held to task over the amount of data they collect from me every time I do a test. My most recent one asked for my passport number, date of birth, ethnicity, where I'd been over the past X days, my address, where I was going, what transport service and train number I was on, etc. etc. etc. I don't like that at all. Your job is to test me and give me my results...
Actually their job is to collect the data required and specified by the government, in addition to processing the test. That data collection is also regulated by the ICO.

MatildaIThink · 05/12/2021 13:44

@JollyJoon

I think they need to find an easier and faster way of completing these tests. They need to work on the lateral flows so they are ultra precise and do away with the PCRs. The travel companies should then dish them out and it should be a part of the check in/security process, do the test there and then and flash the stick
PCR is the ultra precise test, Lateral Flow is the rough and ready test. PCR requires lab processing and even once started can take several hours. Lateral flow test gives a result in 5-15 minutes, but the results cannot detect the virus at very low levels, nor can they differentiate between variants. This is down to the different scientific methods used in teach test.

Part of the time delay in PCR testing is the need for it to be done in a lab. They could build labs at airports and have everyone arrive 6-8 hours before their flight, then process the tests at the airport, but people would probably regard that as more inconvenient than posting off a swab a day or two before they travel.

DressingPafe · 05/12/2021 13:57

What is your actual reason for delaying though

I’m delaying because I don’t feel I need a booster. I wfh. I’m spending Christmas with just the people I live with. No one’s interested in doing anything social right now due to the new variant, approaching festive season etc. The chances of me catching covid are a tiny %

By the time “something” comes around that I would may be then mixing more, you can bet there will be another booster out.

I was already wary of having the first 2 vaccines. I’m not an anti vaxxer, I don’t believe the conspiracies, but no vaccine is risk free. However, I did have them believing they would ease travel. They haven’t. I’m not going to get booster after booster. I just don’t want to.

I acknowledge I’ll probably need one later on but, as I say, by then there will at least be one new one, maybe more.

Krakenchorus · 05/12/2021 14:05

Until everyone can be vaccinated, even those of us fortunate enough to have had 3 jabs will need to keep testing to travel. At the moment, children as a whole group cannot be fully vaccinated. So it's important to keep them safe as new variants arise. Ditto people in countries with limited access to vaccines.

Sirzy · 05/12/2021 14:06

But they have eased travel. People who aren’t vaccinated have many more countries where they have to isolate on arrival or wouldn’t be welcome!

FlamingVictoria · 05/12/2021 14:09

I’m stressing somewhat about Covid testing for travel as these rule changes were announced yesterday- a fucking weekend day- and my husband and son are leaving at 5pm from where we live in Canada on Monday night but will land in the UK at 7.30am on Tuesday so landing after the rule change. A lateral flow test is apparently acceptable but our province doesn’t offer that for travel, it needs to be a pcr. A pcr test will not get the results back in time and while a lateral flow is acceptable, I don’t think it can be an at home one (our province has given loads out, free) so I have to pay for them to be done privately at the airport. $300. When we booked just a week and a half ago, there was no additional testing and isolation required. Now they have to have pre travel and arrival tests and isolate at both ends. Stress levels pretty high in the my household right now.

JollyJoon · 05/12/2021 14:14

The reason I'm wary of the boosters is because I'm not anti vax but I was a bit nervous of getting the first two. I'm just disappointed at having to get boosters as it made me feel uneasy getting the first two. I'll continue doing it but I do feel nervous. I guess that's normal.

OP posts:
sunshinelover69 · 05/12/2021 14:17

Agree with you OP. It's just the useless government being seen to do something. Completely pointless. Even a scientist has said this morning that there's no point to this. And it's screwing over the travel industry yet again.

amylou8 · 05/12/2021 14:31

Yes me too. My (informed) opinion is that a potential long term risk of the vaccine is greater to MY health than covid. I'm 2 x AZ because I enjoy traveling. I won't be taking anymore right now.

MatildaIThink · 05/12/2021 14:35

@JollyJoon

The reason I'm wary of the boosters is because I'm not anti vax but I was a bit nervous of getting the first two. I'm just disappointed at having to get boosters as it made me feel uneasy getting the first two. I'll continue doing it but I do feel nervous. I guess that's normal.
Why do you feel uneasy/nervous though? I don't think it is normal, no one I know in real life apart from the anti-vax loon at my daughter's school seems to be bothered by the vaccines or boosters.
cantkeepawayforever · 05/12/2021 14:46

My incentives are not dying and spreading it around so others die.

Second this view.

Given a) vaccine effectiveness waning over time and b) new variants that increase the likelihood of vaccine escape, I continue to welcome vaccines and boosters because they meet my primary aims - to stay alive, and not to cause others to die. I work in a very high contact, highly spreading environment (a primary school), with no other effective mitigations other than ventilation, so the protection that vaccines continue to give me and my colleagues is extremely welcome.

Making it marginally easier to travel / gain access to venues are definitely secondary considerations - nice-to-haves, but not the main incentive for vaccination.

Panacotta · 06/12/2021 05:57

I think governments should realise that once people have been double vaxxed they're going to need a bit of an incentive to keep going back for more...

Reducing the risk of death?