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Original poster

People really have had enough haven’t they?

324 replies

DontWantTheRivalry · 11/01/2022 10:13

I was in my local newsagent this morning and it was me, two women behind the counter and 7 other shoppers.

5 of us were quite huddled together whilst waiting to pay, so we were very close to the staff members behind the till too, and the other two people were still shopping.

Of the ten of us in the shop, which is quite a small newsagents I was the only one wearing a mask and nobody was even bothered that nobody else was. I mean, the shop assistants aren’t going to make an issue of it seeing as they don’t wear masks either.

I felt like such an idiot as I stood there wearing one.

I’m not threatened by Covid, I would love for things to go back to being mask-free, I only wear one because guidance says to rather than because I want to, but I was just so surprised that nobody else was wearing one too.

I felt so uncomfortable wearing one and I think if my hands weren’t full of food and things I probably would have taken mine off because I just felt silly.

It really has made me think that people have just had enough haven’t they?

OP posts:
treeflowercat · 11/01/2022 16:16

@Hawkins001

I understand the frustrations, but the more people be careful then surely the quicker society will get back to normal ?
On the contrary, the longer restrictions last, the longer it will take to reach the point at which Covid is endemic... they just delay the inevitable.

There may be a good reason for some restrictions to avoid overwhelming public, especially health, services, but they delay rather than accelerate the return to normality.

Dghgcotcitc · 11/01/2022 16:18

@Hawkins001 we have had two years of people claiming that if we were just ever so good and behaved we would get our lives back no one believes it anymore! Three weeks to flatten the curve, lockdown to save Christmas etc no one really believes if they just did x, y or z it will all go B’s k to normal not now. Even those pro restrictions typically now admit they want a long term shift with mask wearing, working from home, limited social contact become the cultural norm not being a short term pandemic measure. So it’s the extent to which people like this vision if the future and too many people do not!

TheKeatingFive · 11/01/2022 16:18

I understand the frustrations, but the more people be careful then surely the quicker society will get back to normal

Do people really still believe this? It's like May 2020 called.

Blubells · 11/01/2022 16:19

I understand the frustrations, but the more people be careful then surely the quicker society will get back to normal ?

On the contrary. As we saw in South Africa, when cases rise quickly (and the virus has 'saturated' a large part of the population) they decline rapidly too.

MarshaBradyo · 11/01/2022 16:20

@Hawkins001

I understand the frustrations, but the more people be careful then surely the quicker society will get back to normal ?
This isn’t correct

In fact just looking at other countries in Europe rising sharply v my London borough which is falling sharply I can see the difference

treeflowercat · 11/01/2022 16:20

@Flaxmeadow

It's just a stonewalling tactic. There are pros and cons to doing nothing, to using some protective measures, to vaccination, to full on lockdown. In the same way as suggesting ventilation is addressed may be met with "so you want another lockdown / covid will be around forever / can catch it anywhere". Stonewalling and deflection.

Yes.

Ventilation and air filtration will be next i think. I saw a photo recently of a cinema i think in Japan. It was an air conditioning monitor screen. It had numbers representing air quality for each theatre. Science like that will get us through this. Expensive and will put prices up for everything but guessing it will be necessary in the future

And whereas I support increased air filtration and ventilation, it won't be enough though will it. It won't remove the risk so some will insist on restrictions remaining...
Blubells · 11/01/2022 16:22

And whereas I support increased air filtration and ventilation, it won't be enough though will it. It won't remove the risk so some will insist on restrictions remaining...

Nothing will stop omicron - that's why we need to get through this wave as quickly as possible (obviously subject to the nhs managing). Hopefully we'll gain some additional immunity from it too.

doublemonkey · 11/01/2022 16:26

@Flaxmeadow

Realism. I'm not putting a moral lens on this, I'm explaining why the threat of covid simply doesn't loom large for certain groups in society. That's not about them being 'misinformed' but about their (fairly accurate) understanding of how it affects them.

So if our services became overwhelmed and someone got acute appendicitis and needed urgent surgery but there was no ambulances, beds or surgeons available at all then they would be OK with that?

You are obviously not aware that many people have died, and will continue to die, because they couldn't access health care in the past two years. This happend not because hospitals were overwhelmed (they weren't) but because people's appointments were cancelled or they were frightened and blackmailed into not seeking help when they needed it.

Remember the Nightingale hospitals?? They were for Covid patients. They never got used.

BlueFlavour · 11/01/2022 16:36

Exactly @doublemonkey

HesterShaw1 · 11/01/2022 16:58

@Hawkins001

I understand the frustrations, but the more people be careful then surely the quicker society will get back to normal ?
I can't believe people still think this
KurtWilde · 11/01/2022 17:00

You are obviously not aware that many people have died, and will continue to die, because they couldn't access health care in the past two years. This happend not because hospitals were overwhelmed (they weren't) but because people's appointments were cancelled or they were frightened and blackmailed into not seeking help when they needed it.

Remember the Nightingale hospitals?? They were for Covid patients. They never got used.

Something else people seem to have forgotten when they start saying 'the unvaccinated will overwhelm the NHS..'

Funny how they keep churning this out despite never needing to use the Nightingales. What does that tell you about the 'overwhelming' of the NHS?

samyeagar · 11/01/2022 17:01

I can't believe people still think this

There are still people who are convinced that testing positive is a death sentence, so...yeah.

HesterShaw1 · 11/01/2022 17:05

@samyeagar

I can't believe people still think this

There are still people who are convinced that testing positive is a death sentence, so...yeah.

Yes, if restrictions aren't working it's because people aren't doing them properly so we need "a proper lockdown" etc
samyeagar · 11/01/2022 17:12

@KurtWilde

You are obviously not aware that many people have died, and will continue to die, because they couldn't access health care in the past two years. This happend not because hospitals were overwhelmed (they weren't) but because people's appointments were cancelled or they were frightened and blackmailed into not seeking help when they needed it.

Remember the Nightingale hospitals?? They were for Covid patients. They never got used.

Something else people seem to have forgotten when they start saying 'the unvaccinated will overwhelm the NHS..'

Funny how they keep churning this out despite never needing to use the Nightingales. What does that tell you about the 'overwhelming' of the NHS?

Granted, this is an American hospital, but no reason to think this is a one off, or exceptional, but my daughter is a charge nurse in a 600 bed, 30 ICU bed hospital, and her hospital is indeed overrun and at full capacity. So that much is true, but as with so many things, it does not tell the complete story.

Of the full 600 beds, 70 are occupied with covid patients. Of the 30 full ICU beds, 5 are covid patients. So while they are at capacity, they are not overrun with covid patients.

Their biggest frustration right now is that the ER has at times had as much as an 18 hour wait because people are going there because they still think that a covid positive test means they are supposed to go to hospital...even if they are asymptomatic.

JustDanceAddict · 11/01/2022 17:17

Not where I live. I’d say it’s 90% mask wearing.

luckylavender · 11/01/2022 17:21

@KurtWilde

You are obviously not aware that many people have died, and will continue to die, because they couldn't access health care in the past two years. This happend not because hospitals were overwhelmed (they weren't) but because people's appointments were cancelled or they were frightened and blackmailed into not seeking help when they needed it.

Remember the Nightingale hospitals?? They were for Covid patients. They never got used.

Something else people seem to have forgotten when they start saying 'the unvaccinated will overwhelm the NHS..'

Funny how they keep churning this out despite never needing to use the Nightingales. What does that tell you about the 'overwhelming' of the NHS?

They never got used because they were a PR exercise. There were never enough staff.
Hawkins001 · 11/01/2022 17:43

@HesterShaw1

I was positing that as a question for a debate topic, rather than it be presumed that's my thoughts,

frazzledali · 11/01/2022 17:47

@Pootle40

I'm in Scotland. I had ditched wearing the mask then restarted...not sure why....wasn't fear of Covid that's for sure. Said to my husband today that I'm ditching again but for good this time. Dirty rag in my pocket.
why are you carrying a dirty rag in your pocket? How weird of you. You know you don't have to use a dirty rag for a mask?
doublemonkey · 11/01/2022 18:09

They never got used because they were a PR exercise. There were never enough staff.

Had the NHS been 'overwhelmed' they absolutely 100% would have been used. The fact that they weren't has nothing to do with PR or staff. If we had ever been in a desperate enough situation they would have filled up and people would have been drafted in to man them.

MarshaBradyo · 11/01/2022 18:10

@doublemonkey

They never got used because they were a PR exercise. There were never enough staff.

Had the NHS been 'overwhelmed' they absolutely 100% would have been used. The fact that they weren't has nothing to do with PR or staff. If we had ever been in a desperate enough situation they would have filled up and people would have been drafted in to man them.

I think you’re right. We didn’t do the army thing back the iirc as we have later on
britneyisfree · 11/01/2022 18:12

@TheLovelinessOfDemons

Tell that to my adult son who could die if he catches it, and only recently is allowed out of his house, only for a 10 minute walk every day.
Wow. Because of covid or al bugs?

That must be super tough.

Op I agree. I'm exempt and constantly feel silly and overexposed for wearing my lanyard explaining why when most around me are unmasked anyway.

KurtWilde · 11/01/2022 18:15

@doublemonkey

They never got used because they were a PR exercise. There were never enough staff.

Had the NHS been 'overwhelmed' they absolutely 100% would have been used. The fact that they weren't has nothing to do with PR or staff. If we had ever been in a desperate enough situation they would have filled up and people would have been drafted in to man them.

Exactly.
MissMaple82 · 11/01/2022 19:05

Guidance my arse - live your life as you please

DockOTheBay · 11/01/2022 19:17

And I have had enough of people saying it’s mild, it’s like a cold, no it’s bloody not, it’s horrific and you feel ill for days
For the vast majority it is like a cold, or even milder. 30% of people have symptoms at all for goodness sake, thats hardly horrific.

tigger1001 · 11/01/2022 19:24

"In Scotland the requirement to wear masks has never been removed and almost everyone I see is still wearing one. I've still managed to catch a number of awful non covid bugs since Autumn as has nearly everyone I know."

Yep! Am in Scotland too and mask wearing is generally high where I am, but lots of people I know have still have colds etc as well as covid.