To be desperate for government to start charging for LFTs

[CautiousOptimist11]

I'm not sure I can take it any more. The absolute dependency on these tests, the fact that a positive or negative means that all critical thought and common sense fly out the window. Even as the omicron cases get milder, people are still clinging onto these tests and cite their results as a means of explaining their behaviour. A positive test is a dramatic thing to be waved around like you have the plague. A negative absolves you of keeping away from the vulnerable even if circumstances suggest you'd be better off doing so. It's like a religious cult of people who do not understand science medicine or statistics, but believe they have all the knowledge. Dangerous. Just get on with it now people, please. Get on with your lives.

Not even going to get into the hideous, hideous amount of plastic waste created in all of this ....

So, let's start charging and see whether the LFT dependents still shove a stick up their noses at every opportunity

I test when it seems sensible to do so as I assume most people do. Charging for tests will means poorer people won't be able to access tests and then we will have a situation where the poor are getting ill/dying I assume that's your grand plan?

@WhiteCatmas

YABU and a bit of a dick.

What an insightful and intelligent post.

Yanbu- so your solution to a problem of interpretation is: no testing???? That is a failure of critical thinking. In specific situations eg medically vulnerable (not necessarily extremely vulnerable, but people who are at high risk if they get covid) - doing LFTs before meeting (assuming both people are asymptomatic) can allow social interactions while mitigating the risk. It’s not an absolute barrier to infection, but would help some tread the fine balance between some people’s health and mental well being.

I would certainly expect people who work with cev patients (eg on chemo or lung disease) to be able to access the tests free of charge.

I think it might be reasonable to restrict the free tests to certain groups of people, but to stop them for everyone would not be fair.

Haha - sorry I meant Yabu

Your post makes no sense. Critical thinking means employing non biased evidence to form decisions. Like a scientific test.
Have you forgotten that lots of Covid cases are asymptomatic and wouldn't be picked up otherwise ?

WhiteCatmas:YABU and a bit of a dick

southeastdweller What an insightful and intelligent post*

I thought so too: pithy, and nailed it. :o

@AlDanvers

You don't like lft so are "desperate" for other people to be priced our of doing them?

Doesn't even make sense.

Agreed. The only "sense" it makes is motivated by sheer spite.

Also for us 'to live with it' would take extra investment in Health, Social Care and the add on services. That hasn't been announced. Be careful what you wish for.

@catfunk

Your post makes no sense. Critical thinking means employing non biased evidence to form decisions. Like a scientific test. Have you forgotten that lots of Covid cases are asymptomatic and wouldn't be picked up otherwise ?

No, that's not what critical thinking is: www.skillsyouneed.com/learn/critical-thinking.html

I wonder if your problem is social media, OP, rather than LFTs.

@Bagamoyo1

I think a lot of you are missing the point that OP is making. The idea is that, by charging for the tests, people will think twice before indiscriminately testing themselves and waving a positive around like a badge of honour. I don’t think OP is advocating a system in which people who are TOLD to test (for work, school etc) have to pay for their own tests. It’s more to do with stopping the requirements for those tests in the first place. That’s my interpretation anyway.

That doesn't account for the self employed and those testing to offer some protection to the vulnerable.

LFTs have allowed life to move on.
Many people prevented others getting I'll by using them before Christmas gatherings by spending a few minutes testing.
Unless flu has mutated so that people can be asymptomatic , you must know by now that Covid isn't flu. People with flu know that they have it so naturally stay at home because they are ill.

What a brilliant idea, increase the risk profile for poorer people even more.

That’ll make it into the next Tory manifesto.

I think that, in a nutshell, is the Tory manifesto.

@echt

How does the OP not get that LFTs (and masks, and social distancing by the way) are all ways of getting on with life?

"Getting on with life" invariably means doing fuck all to mitigate Covid in certain posters. Like the OP.

Absolutely.

Maybe they should. It would stop people who post that they do them every other day 'just to make sure'.

.

Every time I see a post like this I want to go and order multiple boxes under different emails out of spite.

Pricing out poor people isn’t the solution.

No, that's not what critical thinking is

Wrong!!! what catfunk defined is part of critical thinking.

I agree with your first paragraph but not sure how making people - many of whom will it be able to afford them - pay will solve anything

@Oblomov22

Maybe they should. It would stop people who post that they do them every other day 'just to make sure'.

That's just MN, and a few posters, not the UK, as I think you know.

@Whatafustercluck

2x dc here. School cases through the roof and both schools asking that our dc take am LFT every day for 7 days. That's 14 tests, we're doing it because we're being responsible to try to help stop the spread among school children. So we should be penalised for doing what we've been asked to do in order to keep school classrooms open?

Incidentally, dd tested positive last night. We now have 3 of us having to test every day, because that's what the rules require. In all likelihood, when 11yo ds catches it, a few days down the line, another 7 days of daily testing on top of what we've already been doing.

Most people are not testing because it's fun and they like shoving a stick up their nose and throat. They're doing it because that's what they're asked to do - by schools, by employers, by the government. Omicron may well be milder, but nobody can function with up to 50% of the workforce (including teachers and child carers) on sick leave.

Exactly what I was going to say.

@AsYouWishButtercup

I agree with your first paragraph but not sure how making people - many of whom will it be able to afford them - pay will solve anything

People on lower incomes are more likely to come into contact with Covid because of their jobs.

It has been widely reported, eg Sunday Times, that free tests will end by July. A price of £30 per box of 7 was quoted.

Let’s start charging for prescriptions too. All these idiots running around thinking their sick. If only they understood how medicines work through watching more YouTube

Yes they should be paid for now. If required by school or work they should be provided by that institution. It's a ridiculous waste of tax payers money