What are the chances of lockdown this Christmas?

[43leftfeet]

I've been away this weekend (UK, but I've been distracted and not following the news).

I see there's been talk of Johnson announcing a "ban on Christmas" possibly, around the 17th - or not, depending on what happens with Omicron - is that about right?

I know we can't know yet what's going to happen, but what are people's feelings?

What do you think the restrictions, if any, are likely to be in England & Wales & in Scotland?

My DPs in their 80s have scarcely left the house since March 2020. DM has health anxiety so DF is a virtual house prisoner, even when restrictions were relaxed and numbers were low they did not go out.

Very dangerous to make generalisations about a generation.

@MumbleCrumbs

I agree with *@julieca*, if the worst comes to pass and it's true it is making little ones more poorly and more likely to need hospital treatment, lockdown will be inevitable.

But why should those of us without children have to lock down and not see family and friends? If it affects mainly young kids I'll be seeing my friends and elderly family, there's no reason not to.

@rookiemere Even before the pandemic I know relatives in their eighties who are out and about all the time, and others who rarely leave the house.

@PinkSparklyPussyCat wow!!

@julieca my DPs were quite active socially prior to the pandemic.

She'll have plenty of company, though. Lots of people just don't want to make that sacrifice for other people's benefit anymore, and can't be made to.

[quote julieca]@PinkSparklyPussyCat wow!![/quote]
I don't know anyone with young kids so I wouldn't affecting anyone!

I'm not prepared to stay away from my elderly family again, I'm sorry if that upsets people but, like everyone else, I've lost too much time with them. I don't have much family left in the UK so they would be my priority.

@VikingOnTheFridge I don't understand that level of selfishness.
And anyone like that I do not want to be friends with. Awful.

@PinkSparklyPussyCat same here. I don't know anyone with small children. I live alone... there is no way on earth I will stop seeing people if we have another lockdown. If looking after my own mental health makes me selfish, then so be it.

But why is it selfish to want to spend time with my family who haven't got many years left? Going by that reaction anyone would think I was planning on deliberately infecting a group of kids, not visiting my family with no kids involved!

I'm pretty sure anyone who says they wouldn't put their own family before others is a liar.

Of course, it is selfish.
If you can't see that then there really is no point discussing it.
I have learned over the years to consider friends values. I have quietly ditched all the selfish gits over the years. I have no time for anyone like that. I want to spend time with decent people.

I don’t think it has been a choice in many cases. Ie when schools closed and dc had to isolate I couldn’t get around that.

Having said that I would look at risks and decide against harms of lockdown and hope that parents could decide if it came to it. Months long lockdown is hugely detrimental for dc imo

If you can't understand why my ELDERLY family who may not be here next Christmas would be more important to me than people I don't know then you're not the sort of person I'd want to be friends with either. I also want to spend time with decent people, i.e. my family who are no less important than anyone else.

Of course it's not being selfish, I don't know any young DC either, people will just keep them in, I won't be staying in because random kids might be ill, of course on here a lot will be just thinking of their own DC and how everyone else must consider them too. I was surprised how few of the population had kids at schools and were affected by school closure, can't remember now but it wasn't very high, though by the posts on here you would thing it was very high

@PinkSparklyPussyCat Nope, not a liar. Of course, we don't always put ourselves first.
That is being a basic human being.
So yes visiting the neighbour in the hospital who is elderly and lonely was boring, but it meant a lot to him.
Putting up a friend who turned up on the doorstep distraught because her partner disrupted our house and sleeping arrangements. It was a decent thing to do.
Having a work colleague living with us because she was fleeing DV meant we had someone we didn't really know living with us. I would do it again.
I don't respect anyone who always puts them and their families first. So why would I want to spend time with them?

@PinkSparklyPussyCat I was not talking about your relatives. Just your assertion that you will always put your family first. Yes that is selfish.

[quote julieca]@VikingOnTheFridge I don't understand that level of selfishness.
And anyone like that I do not want to be friends with. Awful.[/quote]
Well, whether you want to be friends with her is immaterial. The point is that such sentiments exist, are inevitable and don't go away because others don't like them. There would be plenty of opposition to a lockdown proposed or implemented on the basis of risk to children.

@VikingOnTheFridge yes which is why I despair at people.

@julieca so visting an elderly neighbour is OK but visiting my elderly family isn't? Jesus Christ.

Thank you for sharing all the wonderful things you do for other people but you're still no better than me.

@PinkSparklyPussyCat I am a LOT better than you.

I don’t think that PinkSparklyPussyCat is being selfish by saying that, any more than those of us who struggled alone with babies and toddlers in lockdowns were being selfish by finding ways to meet up other people in the same situation. It wasn’t that I didn’t care about elderly people who were most at risk - I had to find ways to cope (the isolation gave me PND) otherwise my children would have really suffered.

@RichTeaRichTea I would never do anything to put a child at risk despite apparently being the equivalent of The Child Catcher apparently! Me visiting my family would be putting no one at risk but me and them but would mean I could keep an eye on them and they would have some social contact.

I was clear that I wasnt talking about you visiting relatives. But at your assertion that you always put your family first.

[quote julieca]@PinkSparklyPussyCat I am a LOT better than you.[/quote]

Wouldn't most people put their own family first when push comes to shove?