No new measures in England before New Year

[Jourdain11]

Has just been announced by the Health Secretary and reported across BBC etc.

@InCahootswithOrwell

And mild doesn’t mean like a cold. I do know a few people who were asymptomatic or barely ill. I know many more who were definitely not fit enough to work during their isolation, a number of whom weren’t fit enough to go back to work after 10 days. And that’s before you get to the handful that have long covid or were off for weeks. None of them were hospitalised, all come under the umbrella of ‘mild’.

Sure and they get time off like in any other situations where people are sick or gave long term health conditions .Covid has perfectly well people needing time off. That’s what’s causing shortages.

Pneumonia kills the elderly but everyone just excepts it as a illness that does that.
We have three jabs, new anti virals, people being careful. There is nothing else.

I'm not sure I'll forgive Whitty for that last press conference "we don't know much about this but what we do know is very bad" putting the goddam fear of god into people and ruining many businesses.

Excess deaths are a more useful measure. The economist has done a lot of analysis of excess deaths.

They reckon UK recording is pretty accurate, mildly overstated but not far off. So for all the people recorded dying of Covid who actually had cancer there were plenty of Covid deaths that were missed. Or Covid related I guess, so maybe some deaths that could have been prevented if it wasn't for Covid.

Globally though it's much much worse. They estimate 18m excess deaths globally.

@rrhuth

Think one problem we have with this government is their approach is what can we annouce, not what can we actually do to solve an issue.

So the announcement of getting retirees etc to come and volunteer is all that is needed, they do not care whether it actually works.

Also - like everything in the big society - there are more volunteers in the areas that need fewest as volunteering is usually done by wealthier people with time on their hands.

This is so spot on. They love to just say things with no planning or thought about what is actually needed then rely on mates in the media to give positive coverage (we need more proper investigative journalists), hope that others will step up and do it and rely on people just believing it's therefore happening.

They announced when A&Es were falling over and there was a huge delay in offloading ambulances that 'the delays at A&E and handover will end' or some such - but did diddly squat (better masks for NHS staff, which would improve staff absence figures, more funding etc) to make it happen

They said 'schools won't close' and considered that job done, meanwhile schools were closing loads of years near us, and some the entire school, due to lack of staff and inability to open safely. The only way schools weren't closing was on paper, and the remaining teachers were on their knees and my kids certainly weren't getting normal education.

They announced everyone over 18 could get their booster when nothing had been put in place - resulting in massive queues of hours long (some very crowded potential super spreader events). My GP surgery phoned me about getting a booster about a week later (I'd eventually managed by driving a long distance to the last remaining walk in in my county) and the receptionist told me they had absolutely no forewarning of the announcement and that they'd had to cancel things and move staff around to set up a booster clinic all within 48 hours. Which they did, because it was what they'd wanted to do all along (boost all their patients) but there was no planning for this. Just a reliance on overworked staff putting in even more overtime and goodwill to do it.

@ThinkAboutItTomorrow

Excess deaths are a more useful measure. The economist has done a lot of analysis of excess deaths.

They reckon UK recording is pretty accurate, mildly overstated but not far off. So for all the people recorded dying of Covid who actually had cancer there were plenty of Covid deaths that were missed. Or Covid related I guess, so maybe some deaths that could have been prevented if it wasn't for Covid.

Globally though it's much much worse. They estimate 18m excess deaths globally.

But we’ve had THREE vaccinations. That’s as good as it gets. We have to get back on with life. People are careful especially with loved ones.. They wash their hands , avoid others before they mix with the vulnerable. What else us there.

@Wizzbangfizz

I'm not sure I'll forgive Whitty for that last press conference "we don't know much about this but what we do know is very bad" putting the goddam fear of god into people and ruining many businesses.

I agree with this

@lightisnotwhite I agree, hopefully the virus is milder and vaccines protect most so numbers of seriously Ill now are small enough for the healthcare system to cope with.

I'm ok with the 30k death prediction if 90% of them are unvaccinated by choice. That's their roll of the die & the rest of us shouldn't be shut at home to protect them.

My point was to those who seemed to be arguing that deaths are being routinely miscrecorded and therefore the numbers are inaccurate - with not of Covid. The data doesn't bear that out to a big degree.

They wash their hands , avoid others before they mix with the vulnerable. What else us there

It's an airborne virus - hand washing does diddly squat. What works is medical grade masks, proper isolation, not mixing indoors, filtering air and ventilating.

mobile.twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1475567604504973318

@JanglyBeads forever? Are you prepared to do that indefinitely? It's here it isn't going away.

[quote TheScenicWay]@kickupafuss so what restrictions would you put in place seeing as a very transmissible variant will rapidly go through the usual high transmitting routes such as households, work environments and schools/colleges/unis?[/quote]
You do know I'm not the PM don't you? I don't get to attend Cobra or Sage meetings. I just want my children to get an education and not have their mental health trashed again by school closures. If, as you suggest, there is no hope of slowing this thing down, then the government should tell us that instead of the mixed messaging they are currently giving.

@JanglyBeads

They wash their hands , avoid others before they mix with the vulnerable. What else us there

It's an airborne virus - hand washing does diddly squat. What works is medical grade masks, proper isolation, not mixing indoors, filtering air and ventilating.

Which isn’t conducive to every day living.

Prof Francois Balloux
@BallouxFrancois
This is not an easy message to convey, even to those who have have already accepted that zero-covid was toast. Essentially everyone will eventually get infected by SARS-CoV-2 in the near future, and likely more than once in their lifetime.
1/

One can don an FFP2, FFP3, N95 mask, or a hazmat suit, or whatnot, but at this stage, all this may achieve is to delay the time until some of us will get infected, and thereby marginally prolong the pandemic.
2/

Vaccine protection against infection is meh, though protection against severe symptoms, hospitalisation and death remains stellar (~20x), including against Omicron. There's also no moral failing in catching a respiratory virus. It's OK; it's life, which sucks at times.
3/

It gives me no joy to announce the inevitability of SARS-CoV-2 becoming endemic, and in an ideal world I wished we could have avoided yet another respiratory virus circulating in the community (there are already ~200 including 4 HCoVs), but the world is just not always ideal.
4/

I believe it is time to give in soon. Vaccine protection rates are as high as they may ever be in many places, and now we've got a couple of decent drugs. Pretending we remain in control, of sorts, is just becoming too costly.
5/

"I just want my children to get an education and not have their mental health trashed again by school closures."

You and every one of us who is praying for the same thing need to hope that all those planning on having a wild time out socialising on New Year's Eve will decide to tone things down a bit.
January is going to be carnage in schools anyway, but today's news might just make it all even worse.

@JanglyBeads

They wash their hands , avoid others before they mix with the vulnerable. What else us there

It's an airborne virus - hand washing does diddly squat. What works is medical grade masks, proper isolation, not mixing indoors, filtering air and ventilating.

Sorry forgot opening a window.

The cost of producing medical grade masks and air filters isn’t worth now we have vaccines.

@AlecTrevelyan006

Prof Francois Balloux *@BallouxFrancois* This is not an easy message to convey, even to those who have have already accepted that zero-covid was toast. Essentially everyone will eventually get infected by SARS-CoV-2 in the near future, and likely more than once in their lifetime. 1/

One can don an FFP2, FFP3, N95 mask, or a hazmat suit, or whatnot, but at this stage, all this may achieve is to delay the time until some of us will get infected, and thereby marginally prolong the pandemic.
2/

Vaccine protection against infection is meh, though protection against severe symptoms, hospitalisation and death remains stellar (~20x), including against Omicron. There's also no moral failing in catching a respiratory virus. It's OK; it's life, which sucks at times.
3/

It gives me no joy to announce the inevitability of SARS-CoV-2 becoming endemic, and in an ideal world I wished we could have avoided yet another respiratory virus circulating in the community (there are already ~200 including 4 HCoVs), but the world is just not always ideal.
4/

I believe it is time to give in soon. Vaccine protection rates are as high as they may ever be in many places, and now we've got a couple of decent drugs. Pretending we remain in control, of sorts, is just becoming too costly.
5/

I read an interesting article recently on the "sunk cost" theory comparing the war in Afghanistan and the approach on Covid restrictions.

The war in Afghanistan lasted 20 years and it's been apparent for at least 10 years that the war against the Taliban was unwinnable. Yet nobody in high political office could decide to withdraw because it would be extremely politically damaging with voters understandably asking "why did we go in and what was the point in wasting so much money, time and most importantly lives".

Similarly on Covid politically it is nearly impossible to run with the message of " we just need to learn to live with the virus" as some voters will angrily ask "why didn't we do that from the start instead of wasting so much money and damaging education, mental health, the economy etc"

Other voters faced with the easing of restrictions will angrily argue that this easing of restrictions will cost further lives and that the Government is uncaring to the vulnerable and old.

Politically it is a lose lose scenario, so the easiest thing is to continue with the booster campaigns, face masks and other preventative measures / restrictions for next winter and for quite a few more winters thereafter.

God this is depressing.

I remember when the vaccines were on the horizon and the general feeling was that vaccines would make it much less transmissible.

All it took was one variant, and transmissibility is back to square one. There is no ultimate vaccine which will stop covid dead in its tracks. They’re going to keep rolling out boosters for new variants, but of course by the time this happens the new variant is usually way ahead. The only way this will ‘end’ is if covid mutates into something like a common cold… and even then, what’s to stop it from mutating again? This will take years. I’ve heard scientists guess at the pandemic being ‘over’ after around 6 years.

Nope. 6 years is a huge amount of time, who knows where we will all be as individuals by then. We’re not ants, we don’t need to lay our lives down for a collective good. We need to make our own decisions, own them and stop expecting others to sacrifice their quality of life for ‘the public’.

The cost of producing medical grade masks and air filters isn’t worth now we have vaccines.

This is a really weird POV given we have just learnt that the latest variant escapes the vaccine and has set us back some considerable distance.

It is definitely worth having medical grade masks and air filters.

We've had vaccines,we've had boosters...

Well yes, in the richer countries. Many scientists and politicians such as Gordon Brown, have been pointing out the need to vaccinate the whole world, for a year. Then we might stand some hope of beating this virus and of stopping new variants appearing.

And yes, that would require the west to make a few sacrifices for the common good.

Sure and they get time off like in any other situations where people are sick or gave long term health conditions .Covid has perfectly well people needing time off. That’s what’s causing shortages.

I think you are still missing the point. It’s an infectious disease and whilst it may be milder than delta, that’s more than counteracted by it’s insane transmisibility. Getting your infectious but well enough to work staff in might solve your problems in the short term, but it’s going to fuck you over in about 4-5 days time when way more of your staff are off because they all have covid and way more of them are unfit to work than would have been the case if you’d not deliberately introduced the infectious people into the work place.

For who? How many?

Me and many others have worked throughout and not got sick. Not saying we haven’t had it but worked with teenagers in a college every day even through lockdown.
Staff that did get it we’re back the following week - 10 days. Dies that warrant massive government spending.

Genuine question- is it worth giving the vaccine to countries when the dominant variant becomes the omicron? The vaccines were developed for a different variant and now omicron is mild, tearing through populations and possibly providing herd immunity. Similar for those who haven’t had any vaccines here. Is there any benefit in them getting the original vaccine?

@InCahootswithOrwell

Sure and they get time off like in any other situations where people are sick or gave long term health conditions .Covid has perfectly well people needing time off. That’s what’s causing shortages.

I think you are still missing the point. It’s an infectious disease and whilst it may be milder than delta, that’s more than counteracted by it’s insane transmisibility. Getting your infectious but well enough to work staff in might solve your problems in the short term, but it’s going to fuck you over in about 4-5 days time when way more of your staff are off because they all have covid and way more of them are unfit to work than would have been the case if you’d not deliberately introduced the infectious people into the work place.

They aren’t all unwell though. The pinged or positive can be sick or right as rain. Those need to work. The risk of infection is mitigated by vaccines.

Surely this is a good thing? The data has been looked at, and no restrictions are needed.

Surely this is a good thing? The data has been looked at, and no restrictions are needed.

I’m pretty sure the data was looked at by experts who decided that restrictions were needed about a week ago. I think Boris means he has looked at the data which is a little less reassuring since I’m not sure he has a grasp of the relevant area so of maths/science and his overwhemlming motivation is keeping his job which relies on him not putting restrictions in place and keeping the libertarian section of his party on side.