If you are cancelling plans/think we should have another lockdown

[Maddymorphosis]

Would you be prepared to do the same next winter, and the one after that and so on?
Last December I heard a lot of "It's just one year"
People not seeing family for "just one Christmas".

Are you prepared to do it again, and going forward maybe every time there's a new variant in winter?

I read somewhere (wish I could remember where maybe the Guardian) that winter lockdowns and restrictions may become an annual norm with socialising confined to the warmer months. Mentally that's very tough

That does sound like the sort of doom and gloom piece the media like to print. I really doubt it will reflect reality for more than a couple of years. Humans find it pretty easy to adapt to the idea of increased death rates and our population will build up a level of at least partial immunity over the next few years.

I don’t want it now so no

@AlwaysLatte

If it's a winter thing generally I would be fine with having a belated summer Christmas instead. Whatever it takes to keep the numbers down.

Whatever it takes? Like children’s mental health and education being destroyed. Like vast swathes of the economy suffering. Like higher long term deaths due to other illnesses, much higher than Covid. Are you this irrational about everything in life, or is it just Covid?

The NHS struggles in normal times with the demands of winter flu and respiratory disease. There was a pre-Covid documentary series called 'Hospital' on BBC 2, which highlighted the fact that we have fewer I.C.U. beds than most of Europe.

When most of these beds are occupied by unvaccinated, often youngish, patients with Covid, there is obviously a knock-on effect on those needing major surgery for cancer and cardio which extends to those lower down the ladder waiting for diagnostic procedures. There's now a huge backlog of people who will die because they weren't diagnosed and treated sooner.

All we're being asked to do is wear masks in shops/public transport and minimise our exposure in crowded indoor spaces. That's a small ask for a huge benefit. Not least to the paramedics who are queuing for hours outside A&E with cardiac patients or the consultants who have to break the news that cancers which would have been stage 3 are now terminal.

@sst1234 if you are worried about the effect of COVID pressures on other healthcare then the only way to reduce this in the short to medium term is to keep COVID admissions low. You dont get to rant about the terrible effect of restrictions on industry/education/the arts and in the same breath get to rant about the knock on effect of no on the health service. That is irrational.

..of no restrictions on..

No I've complied had all the vaccines done everything the government said but them having parties last year while us plebs were at home has changed things for me. I won't be complying I will do a LFT before family visits but life is too short. It's nearly 2 years and I've had enough!!!

I don't disagree that things are not great @sst1234. What I do take issue with is this ridiculous idea that because you are wearing a mask this weekend, or this month, you'll be wearing one next Christmas. Treatment and vaccines have been found, there is no reason to image that it's going to go on forever though.

I'm in a slightly weird position as I work in a restaurant, so I'm exposed at work. I also have dcs at school. We also tend to have Christmas Day just dh, me and dcs. So we don't have any relatives to cancel on the day.

So, we are doing everything we had planned in the run up to Christmas, until we are told we can't basically! I'm as likely to catch it at work as anywhere else tbh. No masks required in hospitality either. Most guests don't wear them. No staff wear them.

So, doing a little lockdown lite myself where I can stay at home as much as possible and hope to have a healthy Christmas with other family, just isn't realistic.

We went to panto today and it was full. Everyone wore masks except the very odd person who I assume were exempt and obviously the little kids didn't wear them. But other than that, it was as normal.

I'm following all the rules but I'm not going to add on extra rules. I am still meeting with my friends and going for a meal with them and the cinema. If we end up on lockdown in January I want to feel like I had a decent amount of socialising prior to it.

However I'll accept that my DH and I are both young, with no kids and our parents are fairly fit and healthy with no vulnerable people at Christmas. If we end up having to self isolate over Christmas we will just do Christmas another day. (Although I will miss midnight mass!)

No and no. We didn't shut the world down for flu - for most people this is less serious. What we should do is give good financial and practical support to the vulnerable to keep them safe

Whilst Xmas is a time to see family do we want to risk a lockdown again in January just to see people and have turkey? I know it's more than that to some people but we have to think of the hospitality industry and the teens doing exams .....

I don't know. It's all quite appalling. I didn't think last year that we would be here again. And yet, what can we do? I'm not booking the theatre or dinner with friends. Our work lunch has been cancelled. I'm sad/annoyed about it but I'm still of the opinion that it is necessary.

@gogohm

No and no. We didn't shut the world down for flu - for most people this is less serious. What we should do is give good financial and practical support to the vulnerable to keep them safe

You’re (still) missing the point. Restrictions are less about keeping people from dying or needing to go to hospital, it’s about stopping large numbers of people dying or needing to go to hospital at the same time.

Omicron is more transmissible which is an issue even with the benefits gained by vaccines because more people (small percentage though they are) will need hospitals and die in a short space of time. Even isolating identified vulnerable groups is unlikely to relieve that pressure and that’s before you take into consideration the impact of taking economically active CV/CEV groups out of action.

Quite honestly the only thing we can do is to try and reduce the levels of infection circulating which means restrictions. It’s not all doom and gloom because we have an advantage with vaccinations that we didn’t have previously.

@NeverForgetYourDreams

Whilst Xmas is a time to see family do we want to risk a lockdown again in January just to see people and have turkey? I know it's more than that to some people but we have to think of the hospitality industry and the teens doing exams .....

Yes I would prioritise seeing my family at Christmas over teenagers doing exams. We didn’t get a proper family Christmas last year either. Or Easter 2020 or 2021. I don’t want Christmas on a random day in June 2042 when everyone has decided it’s no longer “selfish” to want to spend time with my family or friends.

The fear building and threats is making me do more socialising not less, because if we’re going to get slapped with more restrictions I want to have made the most of the time we’ve got.

I worry about the effect all the cancelled get-togethers is going to have on the hospitality industry when there is no support.
People are cancelling in droves, meaning many places are losing money at what should be their busiest time. Many won't survive. Those that do are bound to put prices up again (cost of goods rising fast, plus losses to try and cover), so people won't be able to afford to go as often... you can see where it's heading.

Clearly the govt wants us to mix less, but without doing anything official, so they don't need to prop anything up. And it's working.

[quote Silverswirl]@Oakdene good for you.
It’s all or nothing because many of us were put in tier4 for Christmas last year and it was illegal to ‘sit round the fire pit’ having a lovely old time with family.
Also, when you have elderly parents who you want to see at Christmas, sitting round a fire pit in December hardly cuts it does it?[/quote]
It did cut it and will have to again. Elderly parents were much happier to be safe with a doorstep visit or time in the garden. If allowed this is all we will do this year. No way will I bring generations to stay together in a warm, crammed house.

Cancelling plans is not the same as wanting another lockdown. I desperately do not want another lockdown. My mental health is only just recovering from the last 18 months. However, I also really want my 3 year old to spend Christmas with her Grandparents. They've already missed out on so much of her life so if minimising the amount of exposure we as a family have over the next couple of weeks means we get a family Christmas then it's worth it.

I understand the wider concerns about the hospitality industry and similar struggling to survive (we lost our 2 favourite soft play centres in the first lockdown plus two others I know of) but we have to make decisions that are right for our family. We try to support our favourite local independent restaurants by getting take-aways and going to some local outdoor farmers and craft markets to support local producers.

I think we need to be prepared to live like this indefinitely, because thats the way its going. I hate it, and I hate how skewed people's risk perception has become, but what can you do? Majority rules, and the majority want (or think its necessary, due to risk perception) to live like this. It may be like this for years, sadly.

I traveled on a train to see my best friend last night and returned today and was shocked at the amount of people not wearing masks or wearing them under their nose. I have been required to continue wearing a mask and taking precautions at work, so little has changed for me. I do not have plans over Christmas apart from having my family over but will continue to take at least twice weekly LFTs, wearing my mask anywhere outside my home and continue to clean shopping trolleys and anti bac my hands etc. I do not want to be responsible for passing Covid onto my elderly and ECV parents and in-laws

Making some sensible alterations to plans is fair enough and not indicative of wanting/approving of a lockdown.

For instance a guy I see for PT has opted not to go to the big company-wide party where he would be in a room with everyone from several locations. But he is going to a small get together with the colleagues he sees every day anyway who are all as keen as he is not to get ill/be in isolation and who are rigorous with testing and hygiene.

I have no big gatherings to go to and would not want to. I am still going to my favourite restaurants with my husband and maybe one other couple, but am avoiding anything like a crowded music night at any of those venues.

We've reduced our contacts precisely because we don't want another lockdown.

I'd prefer that we had the kind of government covid policy that didn't leave us completely at the mercy of new variants.

But in the absence of that.

I do my bit.

I agree OP