So happy tests are to be axed

[Wizzbangfizz]

So according to reports they are going to stop handing out LFT and will be stopping mass testing - this is excellent news for both the tax payer and the environment and surely marks a clear path this whole thing becoming endemic

@MarshaBradyo

On the timing of first lockdown I always questioned why the North had such long restrictions when it was earlier on their curve.

Many posts criticising London / SE timing, so maybe earlier wasn’t that good

UK didn't get to the 2nd highest CV deaths in Europe by luck (comparable countries)

per capita, only Italy is (just) higher, Spain France esp Germany significantly lower.

Its only not the highest because of an excellent vaccine roll out, which Johnson did very well on, its a shame he and others do not acknowledge the EUs contribution in the funding of the Jenner Instate over many years pre CV.
Funding now lost as we are out of the Horizon project.

UK didn't get to the 2nd highest CV deaths

Are you looking at excess deaths?

It’s a more accurate representation

www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker

Spain is higher plus a few others in Europe

Re France I’m not sure why anyone would think it’s doing better atm - over 400k cases the other day

Happily We’re dropping down the league table of deaths. This time last year we were 4th I think, now we’re something like 30th and we’ll drop further too during 2022.

Germany did better than the UK... perhaps because they hadn't destroyed their health service and they have less brutal inequality.

No, World meters, european deaths.

Agree excess deaths are perhaps a better reflection as most countries didn't have the testing place in early 2020.

The UK is the first european country to pass 150k deaths, Germany's is 114k, despite a far bigger pop.

Look, no one has covered themselves in glory here but to try and make out we ve done well is ridiculous, our health service is no longer functioning, its terrible, my DD works in NHS and she says they have no staff, they have no facilities, they ve even run out of uniforms.... the AE dept has long queues, walk in's will wait 10 plus hours, even with heart conditions, broken limbs, she is shattered by it all and i think she'll leave, i'd want her too, go into the private sector or abroad perhaps, no one values what they do

I don't know about tests but will be happy to see the back of "can you see a line" posts on here.

@puppetear

Interesting perspective, *@TheSunIsStillShining*, and it gave me pause to wonder if I am thinking about things rightly.

I think you’d agree, though, that the current policy isn’t making your situation much safer: it’s a nod in a direction I can see you approve of, but in and of itself, it’s at best a small contribution.

That in mind, I still feel its not appropriate to continue with the current measures. Perhaps that leads to questioning whether to deepen them (e.g., mandating FFP2 masks for all, not surgical, etc.). But — and here to be blunt — that is it turn measures towards a new purpose. I don’t see a mandate for that even referencing the “new normal” that was once in the discourse.

My opinion is the government finally has it right, which is to allow/encourage covid to burn itself out, leading to a high rate of population immunity, and much lower future rates. That does create a hard place for you in the short term.

But the alternative is to draw out a lower rate. I don’t really see that helps — the rate is not low enough to make safe. Unless you push for very low rates indeed — perhaps not zero, but close. But then we end up asking people to put up with a lot of enduring measures. That seems a very difficult position to sustain.

Sense your frustration. Can see we come at the problem from very different angles. Interested hit there is any pragmatic overlap in practice.

@puppetear It is great to hear that someone with such wildly different take on things even acknowledges where the other side is coming from in a perfectly adult, calm and normal manner :) Fresh on mn for sure and thanks for that.

I still don't agree with you, because (imo):

• we are creating a petri dish and it might go well, it might not
• i don't think we know enough of the long term consequences of this virus to let it rip. If we did + my next point...
• ...if there was a timeframe and solutions in place for that timeframe to solve/help/manage CV/CEV population I might be inclined to consider it a good option even.

I think it's reckless to declare the pandemic over, stop testing, stop acknowledging it being a problem. Now we have vaccines, treatments, loads of potential mitigation elements -- I'd be happier if we went into a direction where these combines would help us keep safe and not the magical thinking that if we don't talk about it it will go away.
And the argument that it is costly... well friends and family is way more costly to the country. And we could do without the bloody yacht as well.

sorry, didn't want to include that long quote as well.

why do you and others always talk about lockdowns? I have not talked about lockdown, but about

About what? We're talking about lockdowns because it's not clear that much else would actually be enough to control something as Omicron.

The idea of doing nice little tweaks like surgical masks on the train and so on.... sounds great in theory, doesn't appear to have done much to reduce cases in Scotland, Wales or continental Europe.

China-style lockdown might be enough to squelch this virus, but that's hardly on an option.

Vaccinations and boosters are the only interventions that I can see which actually have big useful effects and are feasible. Yes, do get better ventilation into classrooms and offices too, by all means (it's better for people's health anyway), but it probably won't make more than a small dent in the cases for something this infectious.

[quote RoyalFamilyFan]@Mookie81 I have children at school. I cant isolate my whole family for months at a time. And my friend needs help.[/quote]
My point is the test isn't some failsafe, you're still a risk so panicking so much over the test is unnecessary.

My point is the test isn't some failsafe, you're still a risk so panicking so much over the test is unnecessary.

@Mookie81 - yes it’s funny that up until now the tests have been widely criticised for being far too unreliable and yet now people are up in arms at the prospect of them being axed because they neeeed them to keep safe 🤨

Lockdowns were never really a public health measure. They were based on superstition and moral panic. There are a lot of people who feel on some dumbfuck atavistic level that there has to be punishment and sacrifice (usually for other people) in order to keep 'us' safe. For many governments, they were an excellent opportunity to award themselves extra powers and to profiteer but even more benign governments found them somewhat appealing (perhaps, to be fair, in some cases it was more a matter of not being brave enough to reject the concept because there was so much gibbering moral panic globally - if you didn't cage your population and strip away their rights you didn't care enough).

All lockdowns can do is slow down transmission. They just defer the problem while exacerbating other problems, particularly inequality.

All lockdowns can do is slow down transmission. They just defer the problem

That was always the intention. I.e. to level out the peaks. It was always a way to buy time to spread out the number of covid patients in hospitals over a longer period of time, and to buy time until the vaccines were rolled out. It was never the aim nor intention to eliminate covid.

Dealing with public health crises through the criminal justice system has always been a risky game. It was always clear that such powers could be abused and would not be evenly applied across the population, even if resources had allowed it.

So I'm not in favour of lockdown, but I do understand the point being made about other interventions being ineffective in the face of Omicron.

Lockdown is looking likely to be ineffective against omicron too

We’re lucky it’s milder as it’s so transmissible the old methods have limited impact

@MarshaBradyo

Lockdown is looking likely to be ineffective against omicron too

We’re lucky it’s milder as it’s so transmissible the old methods have limited impact

Yes, even the Chinese style model might not do it.

@MarshaBradyo

Lockdown is looking likely to be ineffective against omicron too

We’re lucky it’s milder as it’s so transmissible the old methods have limited impact

Surely if you keep people apart, then it can't be transmitted? Wasn't that the purpose of lockdowns?

Of course the big question is how far apart you keep people - is 2 metres enough for direct contact. And, how far does it travel and at what temperatures if it's airborne and can be transmitted through air ducting systems and whether it lingers in corridors etc?

Some proper scientific studies at how it transmits would be really useful. At early stages of covid, we were clearly using the same "social distancing"/isolation strategy from the dusted off text books for small pox. But 2 years on, we should be more knowledgeable. We need to be better prepared for the next pandemic. We can't just "lockdown" for months again, so we need better, more directed measures to target the next. Lockdowns are a clumsy sledgehammer to crack a nut - we really need to do better, especially as the public won't be as compliant next time as they've now experienced the devastation that lockdowns cause.

We do know what's effective - proper ventilation and adequate financial support for low-paid people when they need to quarantine. That's it. Well, that and investing money in NHS recruitment and retention (which means paying PEOPLE not promising new buildings).

But then again, the ruling class would rather do absolutely anything (especially if there is a good old-fashioned punitive aspect to it) than give poorer people more money.
Unfortunately they were backed up, to a dangerous extent, by the left of centre people who have always been more interested in controlling the lower orders for their own good, and who think that virtue is to be found in dedicating yourself to joyless drudgery and a 'simple' life...

I think it's very telling that the Tories have, when making restrictions, so often pushed for things that require the least government expenditure and that push responsibility and costs onto Joe Public, like masks, rule of six and the like. Can't be giving proper sick pay to the proles, they might want it to carry on after the pandemic!

@Wreath21

We do know what's effective - proper ventilation and adequate financial support for low-paid people when they need to quarantine. That's it. Well, that and investing money in NHS recruitment and retention (which means paying PEOPLE not promising new buildings).

But that's not the full story is it?

Even with the best ventilation possible, if people are "close", it'll pass between them, i.e. my son caught it at an outdoor gathering of his Uni friends a few weeks ago - they were watching the formula 1 final outdoors in an open sided marquee, and when Verstappen won, they were all excited and started randomly hugging each other, cheering, etc. You can't get better ventilation that an open sided marquee, but that's no help if people get so close together.

As for quarantine, numerous reports have said that you're infectious before you start to get symptoms, so you may well pass it on long before you get your positive covid test and well before you find that you have to isolate/quarantine.

@VikingOnTheFridge

I think it's very telling that the Tories have, when making restrictions, so often pushed for things that require the least government expenditure and that push responsibility and costs onto Joe Public, like masks, rule of six and the like. Can't be giving proper sick pay to the proles, they might want it to carry on after the pandemic!

That's not really true given the scale of the covid support packages that have cost hundreds of billions, such as SEISS, furlough, local authority grants, etc. A huge amount of money has been handed out to people and businesses to support them through the covid restrictions. Yes, a lot had been given to people who didn't "need" it and lots of people who did need it were excluded, but in total, the support packages are the largest the UK have seen.

Surely if you keep people apart, then it can't be transmitted? Wasn't that the purpose of lockdowns?

Not everyone can stay apart as we need essential services

If you look at Netherlands it’s got a vertical line upwards even though in lockdown for a few weeks

Each time the variables change - eg rate of transmission gets higher it gets harder to reduce

Even when alpha appeared R went over 1 whereas before it was under with schools open

I’m very relieved we didn’t apply lockdown to omicron and London looks like MV beds are decreasing - showing peak

That's correct about furlough and the support measures being expensive, though they certainly left some gaps, but furlough was not a restriction and thus not what I refer to in my post. It's interesting though, and I'd argue that policy wasn't actually a choice.

If you want people to stay at home, which they did, you have to be willing to pay enough of the ones who would otherwise go out. Lockdown doesn't happen otherwise. There's also the reality that the UC system would've been utterly overwhelmed by so many new claimants, and that it would've been politically suicidal for the Tories to expose so many of their voters to life on UC.

@TheKeatingFive

err whose fault is that? Tories have been in for 11 years.... and despite 2 years of Pandemic, have done nothing to increase staffing in the NHS

I don't think anyone's denying that Tory policies have been instrumental in this. But equally, no party seems willing table the kind of reform necessary.

Our infection rates are some 30% higher than France's that has a direct effect on hospitalisations and staff absences, its not rocket science. Who had restrictions and who didn't?

I hate to break it to you, but I'm in ROI and are rates are higher than the U.K. despite much more stringent restrictions. Everyone's just riding the waves now, the degree of minor restrictions are making fuck all difference.

I hate to break to all of you that no one knows what the rates are in England as reinfections are not being counted.