How can they still say nothing?

[Purplegurple]

So numbers today over 183,000. How can BoJo and his cronies still be making no statement? No clear guidance, nothing. I'm not wanting lockdown or anything but can't believe they're so quiet over all this.

Yes Tealightsandd

Because unlike the UK Govt, the devolved Welsh Govt isn’t made up of a cabal of freeloading incompetents.

@HarrietPierce

Yes Tealightsandd

Because unlike the UK Govt, the devolved Welsh Govt isn’t made up of a cabal of freeloading incompetents.

I mean nobody knows who they are so…

@LittleBearPad Yes they might have. But we don't know on what basis they are making that declaration because they don't say.
A decent article would say, we are a membership organisation who have spoken to all our members x number of trusts, and this % say their Trust can cope with any covid cases over the next few months.
What is said is far too vague to assess whether it could be valid.

And yes I got the number of Trusts who are members from Wikipedia as their website does not say how many members they have. That is very unusual for a membership organisation, they are usually keen to show how many as it affects how valid they are seen as being. So yes they may have less members, we don't know.

@Lifeisnteasy So your argument is - people die of things, so why should we do anything to stop people dying of this one thing?
It is a strange argument.

Lifeisnteasy

Speak for yourself.

[quote RoyalFamilyFan]@Lifeisnteasy So your argument is - people die of things, so why should we do anything to stop people dying of this one thing?
It is a strange argument.[/quote]
Well, yes. It isn’t strange at all. Why did you not want similar restrictions for flu in previous years?

OP I'm staggered that two years into this you are surprised that there is a lack of "clear guidance".

The guidance has never been clear, and has frequently been ridiculous.

Almost a year ago we were being assured that schools should reopen. Our local schools dutifully opened, hundreds of young people sat in classrooms for one single day. The following day they were told to close. WTAF.

On-top of their proven track record of incompetence the government have now lost respect from huge swathes of voters from all sides of the political spectrum.

I have voted Conservative always. I won't vote for them ever again unless something very very drastic changes.

I also won't do what Boris or the government tell me to wrt Covid. I'll make my own decisions from now on.

@Lifeisnteasy It is a strange argument. Imagine it applied to other scenarios.
People get food poisoning all the time, so why are we spending taxpayers money assessing food hygiene in restaurants and cafes to stop them from giving people food poisoning?

Your entire argument is that lots of other things kill people, so why should we care if this one thing kills lots of people.

With cancer, there has been a lot of work to reduce cancer deaths. Lots of taxpayers money on stop smoking initiatives, banning smoking from public buildings which caused many pubs and bingo halls to close down and people to lose their jobs.
There is this myth going around that the government has never done anything to reduce deaths before. It is simply not true.

[quote RoyalFamilyFan]@LittleBearPad Yes they might have. But we don't know on what basis they are making that declaration because they don't say.
A decent article would say, we are a membership organisation who have spoken to all our members x number of trusts, and this % say their Trust can cope with any covid cases over the next few months.
What is said is far too vague to assess whether it could be valid.

And yes I got the number of Trusts who are members from Wikipedia as their website does not say how many members they have. That is very unusual for a membership organisation, they are usually keen to show how many as it affects how valid they are seen as being. So yes they may have less members, we don't know.[/quote]
So you automatically assume it’s wrong? Why? It’s based on a press release and written up by journalists. You just don’t like the narrative.

our members x number of trusts, and this % say their Trust can cope with any covid cases over the next few months.

In addition nobody’s said this. They’ve said at the moment net cases in ICU aren’t increasing and they would have expected elderly cases to start growing by now but they aren’t.

No crystal balls as to what will happen.

@LittleBearPad I am assuming nothing about the organisation. But I am suspicious of an article that presents an external membership organisations views as if it is NHS Chiefs saying that, without any evidence that this is true.
A lot of journalism these days is very sloppy.

And everyone I have heard speak including Jenny Harries says the virus is only just starting to move into older age groups, and they are waiting to see what the impact will be. They hope vaccines will offer enough protection, but they don't know if it will.

They are reporting what NHS Chief Execs are telling them.

But they are not saying how many Chief Execs think that.
You simply don't get everyone agreeing on anything. There would always be at least one person disagreeing.

@Lifeisnteasy

I do wonder though if some people will be clinging on to dramatising this as a way of coping with their own anxieties.

That’s also my suspicion - it’s been a great tool for people who are antisocial, work shy, hypochondriacs and Facebook community group busybodies.

What a pair of nasty comments.

If you don't know the fear of getting letters from the NHS & consultants warning you that your underlying conditions make you very vulnerable to dying from covid count yourself bloody lucky. The one in Nov was great. Basically 'you're as vulnerable as you were when we suggested that you shield, but the govt aren't asking you to shield now, you are on your own, but remember your chances of dying with covid are high'

I'm not anxious,work shy, a hypochondriac & I don't use Facebook.

I am vulnerable to covid due to (ironically enough) basically conditions I got after having another virus that attacked my body.

My hope during all the covid research is that they find a way to help my existing conditions.

But you can fuck right off with your cheap shots of work shy, hypochondriac, anti social & anxiety.

@Hospedia

Even over five days, that's an aversge of 66 a day.

Deaths have an even larger lag vs hospitalisations.

The deaths you see now (Dec 30) were infected about 3-4 weeks ago (Dec 2 - Dec 9)

At that point in time Delta was dominant and the vaccines were holding up reasonably well, which kept deaths low.

From Dec 14 we have had an increasing number of cases (58k Dec 14 to 190k Dec 30) due to Omicron.

Two things here:

1. Average Omicron hospital stay is estimated at 5 days (Delta was 10)
2. Omicron is c70% less severe than Delta (which hospitalised 2% of people).

This means that the lag of hospitalisations and healthcare utilisation will take longer to build up vs Delta. In time series logic (using a two state model of infected and recovered), we have X people landing in hospital due to Y infections, but out of those X people, Z are recovering after 5 days (est). Problem here is that Y is so large that the number of people in the hospital still accumulates this is the problem really. Exposure has grown beyond the reduction in severity so we have a problem. The number of people hospitalised will start slowly at first, and then keep ramping up.

You will see a noticeable uptick in hospitalisations this week, followed by a larger one the following week. Deaths will be about a 2 week lag from each point. Also increasing slowly at first and then ramping up.

People seem to be forgetting one thing about the flu:

Unlike last year (due to lockdown which reduced transmission to almost nil) it is now circulating again because people are interacting more.

That means we now have to deal with Omicron + newly circulating strains of the flu. There are now several flu outbreaks going on in various countries due to the strong re-emergence of the flu. The UK is also likely to be impacted by this.

A bad flu year sees 30,000 deaths, even if we didn’t concentrate them in winter that would be 82 deaths a day.

That is from flu and pneumonia though and as others said these still exist along with COVID. Will make for a very difficult winter. @Lifeisnteasy

I'm not blaming teachers (see posts above) I'm blaming the NEU. They put the interests of their members first.....before children and the most vulnerable in society

But that's what unions are for: to represent the interests of their members.

I'd be pretty pissed off if my union didn't put its members' interests first. That's what I pay them for.

@LakieLady then the neu need to stop pretending they give a shit about children and meeting with government ministers on that pretext.

[quote GiveMeNovocain]@LakieLady then the neu need to stop pretending they give a shit about children and meeting with government ministers on that pretext.[/quote]
It's in the interests of everyone to manage the situation in schools better.

Lifeisnteasy
I do wonder though if some people will be clinging on to dramatising this as a way of coping with their own anxieties.

That’s also my suspicion - it’s been a great tool for people who are antisocial, work shy, hypochondriacs and Facebook community group busybodies.

Actually, the people I’ve seen expression caution are those in the real world, who have jobs to do, people to see, lives to live. Weirdly, the people most in denial, saying everything is fine appear to be what you describe. Seemingly having all day (including over Christmas) to post on MN and try and tell people how hysterical they are.

BTW, you never answered my question earlier. Have you tried to get an ambulance in an emergency in the past week?

I do wonder though if some people will be clinging on to dramatising this as a way of coping with their own anxieties
This is so true. The colleagues who are most vociferous and gagging for restrictions these are those same ones who are socially awkward anyway and who take a day off for the most trivial of reasons. At least the In England the more level-headed people have woken up to this and are just getting on with their lives.

[quote GiveMeNovocain]@LakieLady then the neu need to stop pretending they give a shit about children and meeting with government ministers on that pretext.[/quote]
No one has ever explained what the harm to kids would be from having better conditions in schools, which is all the unions asked for.

How would having vaccinated teachers have harmed kids? There would have been fewer teacher absences.

If you just oppose everything because a teacher said it, you're being a bit irrational.

gagging for restrictions

BJ is being bossed around by his pesky back benchers. They are the source of so much angst and trouble.