Interesting perspective re lockdowns

[StormyTeacups]

Interesting article here arguing that falling into the trap of annual lockdowns could be foolish

www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/coronavirus-omicron-christmas-lockdown-uk-booster-shot-infections/

[quote celiamary]@Nidan2Sandan, You make good points about expanding services.
Any ideas how much it would cost?
First glance the answer seems likely to be 'lots'.

Which worries me about how we pay for it all both in money terms and other ways.[/quote]
Oh, I know it'll cost a bomb, but I'm not paid the big bucks to figure that question out.

I'm just stating what we need, vs a lockdown which will put people out of work meaning no money for these services anyway and a big benefits bill.

@TheVampiresWife as unpalatable it may be I think we have to come to terms with the point we’re at the mercy of Covid once the cases start to rise uncharacteristically and new waves start.

Until our health system is fortified against Covid and the disruption it brings we are stuck in this limbo. The same can be said for the fire service, police, teachers, food workers, transport operators, carers and so on. Many of those are stretched services at the best of times, Covid simply makes them impossible to function effectively as the cases rise and so they get stretched far enough to snap.

Massive sickness brings problems we can not afford to ignore without huge impacts on society that in many ways out weighs the catastrophic impacts on MH from lockdown, yes it’s shit but the alternative is far shittier.

Look at the other countries around the world now in lockdown or considering it, because the alternative is too extreme to contemplate and Omicron still hasn’t shown us it’s full potential yet.

@herecomesthsun

Not Carl Heneghan, oh man.

Listen to Chris Whitty instead.

Follow the science......but only the scientists you agree with.

Gotcha

I'm totally against another lockdown. I don't see what it can possibly achieve.

Most CEV people have to interact with systems all the time - hospitals, care home staff etc. They are the most likely people to be in positions where they cannot fully lockdown and isolate, so what is the point?

Closing pubs and nightclubs will make no difference. There aren't many CEV 80 year olds in a nightclub on a Friday night.

I can't recall the name of it now, but just before the first lockdown the idea of a 'basic income ' was put forward by some mumsnetters but then the furlough schemes were introduced instead.
Would the government consider this now, would it be cheaper than furlough and who could have it ?
I've no idea how it would work in practice. but it sounded as if it could work maybe as a temporary thing at least ?

Well Carl Heneghan (who is by training a GP)has quite a long record of being wrong about coronavirus.

I would suggest sticking with our excellent CMO myself. Here is his CV (thank you to the Guardian)

Prof Chris Whitty CB FRCP FFPH FMedSci
Age: 55.

Occupation: chief medical officer for England and practising NHS consultant physician.

Previous jobs: acting chief scientific adviser; director of research at the Department for International Development; chief scientific adviser to the Department of Health; head of the National Institute for Health Research Education; consultant physician at University College London hospitals; professor of public and international health at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine.

Education: doctorate in medical science from Oxford; two diplomas, in tropical medicine and hygiene, and economics; three master’s degrees, in epidemiology, medical law and business administration.

Awards: Companion of the Order of Bath; fellow of the Academy of Medical Science; honorary doctorate for medical work in the community from the University of Plymouth.

What people say about him: Prof David Mabey, an infectious disease specialist at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine says: “Chris is a polymath. He is really extraordinary. Since I’ve known him he’s done a diploma in economics, a degree in law and an MBA in his spare time. And in terms of his research, he covers all the disciplines: clinical medicine, epidemiology, health economics, social science. That’s really what makes him unique. He is the best man for the job, we are extremely lucky to have him.”

[quote herecomesthsun]@TheVampiresWife

That would be great if it were practical to do.

There has been a general medical consensus that trying to segregate vulnerable people wouldn't work.

For example, there are CEV parents whose children are at school.

So should those children be stopped from going to school? Or should the parents stop seeing their children? What do you think?

Likewise CEV doctors, nurses, grandparents, teachers, and so on.[/quote]
As I said, financial and practical help for all CEV who want it.

So, during periods when cases were high/a new vaccine resistant variant rears its head, that could mean access to online learning. DD is a teacher and when she goes back in January, she knows she could bring home covid to me - so for household members of CEV people, the same support could be made available. During a lockdown children wouldn't be seeing their grandparents anyway.

All of this should be optional, as I've said. The most important point is that nobody should have to choose between earning a living and their health (and possibly their lives), or that of a houseboy member.

What financial and practical help would enable me to isolate from my kids, even if I wanted to?

People are too interconnected, you see.

Lockdowns aren't the answer, particularly 2 years in. How long could this go on for seen as we keep getting a more infectious strain? South Africa are already seeing deaths and hospitalisations fall without a Lockdown.
Also, child abuse and domestic abuse went sky high during lockdowns. There's many factors to consider.
Even at our lowest infection rates this year, my hospital appointments weren't going ahead and it was practically impossible to get a gp appointment. Now they'll use sky high covid rates and the new variant as the excuse to cancel those appointments.
We need to take responsibility and access risk for ourselves seen as covid isn't going anywhere.

Lockdowns should not be used ever again and the term should be relegated to history

A set of proper restrictions designed to kick in when certain levels are breached is sensible

Right now some indoor mixing guidance and sensible rules for hospitality makes sense

We have become far too all or nothing and both are wrong in my opinion

*assess risk

@herecomesthsun

What financial and practical help would enable me to isolate from my kids, even if I wanted to?

People are too interconnected, you see.

Why would you need to isolate from your kids?

Well, they are my biggest risk of getting covid.

One is positive right now, for example. Probably not omicron as no one else has got covid after a week.

When they are in school, it will be a question of when is one of them going to come home from school with omicron.

It is not a situation that you can manage by isolating CEV people. Also, my kids very much want to be in school, and there are lots of reasons why that would be a good thing.

I don't think there is an easy solution, but trying to separate out the CEV from everyone else is not a good answer.

Someone posted on here recently that, after the unvaccinated, the biggest group in ICU is CEV women in their 40s.

Follow the science......but only the scientists you agree with.

I think it’s more to do with the fact that Heneghan has developed an unerring ability to be wrong about this pandemic. It’s an impressive track record and you’d have to be daft to still be taking anything he says seriously. He’s become a bit of a joke. The other week he was tweeting about how we wouldn’t see an omicron wave in this country.

And I know it’s been said before, but for those that haven’t heard it, you can’t really expand healthcare enough to be able to deal with the scale if the pandemic. Even if you did have the time and the billions it would cost. Especially not with something as transmissible as omicron. If it was possible some healthcare system somewhere would have tried it.

What financial and practical help would enable me to isolate from my kids, even if I wanted to?

I think the point is that we need to find a way that achieves your right to be with your family, kids, etc., despite being CEV, while simultaneously allowing others their equal right to live a private live without restrictions.

Neither of those things are unreasonable. And pre-covid, we'd basically got both solved.

Whatever that way is, it isn't lockdown for the general population.

@puppeteer

What financial and practical help would enable me to isolate from my kids, even if I wanted to?

I think the point is that we need to find a way that achieves your right to be with your family, kids, etc., despite being CEV, while simultaneously allowing others their equal right to live a private live without restrictions.

Neither of those things are unreasonable. And pre-covid, we'd basically got both solved.

Whatever that way is, it isn't lockdown for the general population.

This, exactly. Put far better and more succinctly than my ramblings!

@herecomesthsun

Well, they are my biggest risk of getting covid.

One is positive right now, for example. Probably not omicron as no one else has got covid after a week.

When they are in school, it will be a question of when is one of them going to come home from school with omicron.

It is not a situation that you can manage by isolating CEV people. Also, my kids very much want to be in school, and there are lots of reasons why that would be a good thing.

I don't think there is an easy solution, but trying to separate out the CEV from everyone else is not a good answer.

Someone posted on here recently that, after the unvaccinated, the biggest group in ICU is CEV women in their 40s.

I'm a CEV woman in my 40s who although triple vaccinated, is likely to have little protection from vaccines due to immunosuppression, so I can absolutely relate to that worrying statistic.

Personally I think it would be far better (not ideal, but nothing about any of this is ideal) for the children of CEV people to have access to remote learning rather than schools closing to all children during a lockdown. It would be awful for them not to be able to mix with their peers for weeks - but if we were in full lockdown, they wouldn't be mixing anyway.

As a CEV person I would rather be isolated myself than the whole of society to lockdown, with all the MH/financial/societal implications therein. It would be shit, but I'm pretty much living that way anyway. As I said, many CEV people are already segregated. What we need is the right support to be able to do so without risking our jobs, so those who don't want to lock down don't have to on our behalf.

Okay what do any of you propose in the short term if we have no emergency services, no police force, no safe way to run services? Supply chain issues. There are no easy choices in the short term. We may have to rely on emergency measures because of an emergency situation.

When having a heart attack do you say to the person ‘sorry I’m not ringing an ambulance you should have taken better lifestyle choices and taken better care of yourself’ no you ring the bloody ambulance don’t you.

CEV people been offered triple vaccination, like everyone else. If it is not enough they should isolate, not the rest of society. We can't continue locking down everyone else, ruining the economy and sacrificing the entire younger generation's wellbeing.

@StormyTeacups

I'm a regular on this board and have been since it's conception, under different names. We welcome the opinion of scientists don't we? Even if we don't agree?

I don't value the views of Heneghan, no, he has been wrong so many times. The people who value his views are usually those who are opposed to lockdowns ideoologically.

no emergency services - yes, that

Though it is a noble stance to offer to isolate oneself rather than have society go into lockdown, that has the potential for catastrophic results for the individual (ending up in ICU because of infection from a delivery/ hospital appointment etc) and for society (no ICU beds available because they are full of unvaccinated people and vulnerable people and no emergency services because so many workers are off for various reasons including personal sickness, and people dying in RTAs etc that would otherwise survive).

But if people are “interconnected” then you would accept perminant lockdowns also don’t work, since expecting my widowed mother to have no contact with her children perminantly is also impractical no?…unless you think interconnection in society only happens when people live together when it clearly doesn’t! But then however eminent the scientist this guy is right we need a long term plan which allows society to function for everyone not just cut the elderly off from their families forever because that isn’t actually practical for the running of society (and many medics accept it’s actually part of the reason for the burden in the nhs as loneliness isn’t actually very good for long term health outcomes.

@Dghgcotcitc

But if people are “interconnected” then you would accept perminant lockdowns also don’t work, since expecting my widowed mother to have no contact with her children perminantly is also impractical no?…unless you think interconnection in society only happens when people live together when it clearly doesn’t! But then however eminent the scientist this guy is right we need a long term plan which allows society to function for everyone not just cut the elderly off from their families forever because that isn’t actually practical for the running of society (and many medics accept it’s actually part of the reason for the burden in the nhs as loneliness isn’t actually very good for long term health outcomes.

no one wants permanent lockdowns, no

We might need some more measures in the next week or 2 though

I think we are in a very different position to last year.

We are really not sure it is needed. Despite cases exploding in London, hospital admissions have not done the same (yes, gone up, but moderately so far). We are also at the point where nearly 50% of the population is triple vaxxed (including the most vulnerable).

There is also decent evidence that Omicron is intrinsically milder.

Of course, if we do need to lock down, the later it is left, the longer it is needed.

My gut is we could squeeze through this wave without lock down, but I am not envious of those who have to take the decision.