Would you consider canceling a holiday/family visit if COVID was surging there?

[Muffster]

The idea of flying to visit family and stay with them for a summer holiday is now giving me concern: 1 in 19 people where my family live have COVID, there is a surge going on and it hasn’t peaked yet.

There are very few people masking, case numbers are not accurately reported, people do not have to stay home when positive/unwell so infections continue and the health care system there appears to be under serious strain.

would you fly over and visit now?

@Muffster yes I think it very much has become something of personal responsibility and whilst I think the Government messaging has been that it would have happened anyway.

There is no gaslighting from the Government - the fact is Partygate destroyed any faith most people had means that whatever they say would not be listened to anyway.

Any Government attempt now to mitigate would simply not be followed - it simply comes down to what individuals feel comfortable with

making people personally responsible for public health during a pandemic seems to be going great 🤦🏻‍♀️
next up: people asked to take “personal responsibility” for climate change?

This whole thread: absolutely dead-on accurate

threadreaderapp.com/thread/1549541508247949312.html

Depressingly accurate.

But @Muffster personal responsibility for climate change has been a thing way before Covid was a thing www.jstor.org/stable/23039149

But climate change actually is appropriate because it does should that you need both individual change and widespread overarching change. It is the latter which we are still trying to figure out!

Covid is exactly the same personal responsibility is a key driving factor - no matter how many mitigations you have what individuals do is still key.

Here people see that lockdowns tried and still we are here in another wave - and that waves is pretty much as the same waves as before and of course that effects what people feel.

making people personally responsible for public health during a pandemic seems to be going great

What's the alternative?

This virus will live amongst us for many years to come.

What's the alternative?

This virus will live amongst us for many years to come.

Changing the messaging would help. It’s not ‘lockdown Vs freedom’. Protections are not restrictions. The pandemic is not over. Public health requires public understanding of changing risk levels. Living with Covid doesn’t have to mean repeated infections and ever-increasing long term damage to population health. It’s not binary. The virus evolves, human response has to evolve too.

Dial-up/down responsive mitigations such as respirator mask use during surges
Indoor air quality monitoring (using CO2 monitors as a proxy for viral load, mitigating when air quality is poor),

Necessary focus on improving ventilation, filtration - treating clean air without viral backwash & pollution as being as important as clean water.) Educating people that Covid is airborne. Understanding cholera meant change: clean water was the only way out of it. Same with airborne viruses.

Free tests and right to work from home if possible, right to sick pay.

Continuing to monitor spread and variants so people have the information to make informed decisions.

Vaccine access and development including access for the Global South

Being honest about the long term impacts of repeated infection, what is and isn’t known.

Not giving up. It’s not virus mitigations Vs economy. The economy can’t function properly if repeated waves are allowed to crash again and again, schools can’t function that way, hospitals and health care staff can’t function that way. It’s shit that this pandemic happened, it’s traumatic and exhausting and everyone is sick of it and the suffering has been immense - but herd immunity isn’t a thing, wishful thinking isn’t a thing. It doesn’t work. It’s not 2019 anymore and here we are.

All of this has been said over and over and over by experts, and I am simply trying to summarise what public health people are saying, no doubt poorly and someone can pop in and tone-police if they want and no doubt will.

The reality is that there are multiple reasons for public attitudes, to most things really but certainly to covid and restrictions. The Guardian article doesn't do a very good job at describing them.

It's not a great surprise that a social psychologist focused on social psychology, but the fact that the article only touches mildly on economic factors, in the middle of a massive cost of living crisis, is a significant flaw. It says that because of the shift away from isolation people haven't been able to take personal responsibility. No mention of how some people were priced out of it even while isolation laws remained and still are now. Not citing sick pay is a bit of a what the fuck, really. It's a very privileged take.

There's also no examination of why employers might be pressuring workers more, not even a mention of what nearly two years of some level of restrictions and multiple lockdowns has done to many businesses and organisations.

And lastly, it doesn't consider at all people's feelings about their own lives and priorities. It's all about government messaging, nothing to do with people autonomously wanting to do things they like and live their lives in the way they choose.

Protections are not restrictions.

Indy Sage tried that line a few months back, to general amusement. I think it might have been around the time they wanted a pre Christmas circuit break?

Honestly, if you want to make the case for things people know fine well are restrictions, explain why the end justifies the means. Why it's the least worst option. Pretending it's something it isn't is going to resort in snorts of derision from many of us.

@Muffster People may not want to wear masks, they may not want to be told what to do, many people are struggling financially and need to go to work and send kids to school. And your suggestion of continued free tests, that would cost a lot of money (that we as a country don't have), not to mention the environmental impact of all those bits of plastic. We also don't have the money for 'more sick pay' ...

It's not so easy unfortunately.

“Evidence shows that SARS-CoV-2 reinfection adds risk of all-cause mortality, hospitalization and adverse health outcomes during acute and post-acute SARS-CoV-2 reinfection, and that the risk and burden may increase in a graded manner according to the number of infections.”

There is no herd immunity.
There is no evolving to be mild.
There is increased evidence of post-acute COVID immune dysregulation & the potential increase in acquired impaired immunity as a result. People will keep getting sick and not just with Covid but with impaired immunity, from other diseases as well.

….this needs to break through to more people. It’s terrible and it’s expensive and people don’t want to hear it and usually they attack the messengers.
Public health protections increase access to in-person education and help people continue to work. That is literally the point of them.

One source for the immune dysregulation stuff, there are many: this is public health Ontario today for example

www.publichealthontario.ca/-/media/Documents/nCoV/voc/2022/07/evidence-brief-ba4-ba5-risk-assessment-jul-8.pdf?sc_lang=en

I certainly wouldn't look to Ontario for a 'successful' response to Covid!

@Muffster it is not going to break through to more people though. That is the issue - the first lockdown worked because people were scared of the unknown - fear kept them going. Once you reach 2 years and most people already having had at least one (if not more) Covid infections that has gone.

So whereas nothing you say is wrong and indeed in an ideal world would be followed - we live in a far from ideal world. Should it be followed - yes of course it should.

Look at climate change - have you watched The Simpsons Movie - Lisa trying to educate Springfield about the environment impact that is what you are trying to do here.

I dont think it is a coincidence that it is the worse hit countries (US/Europe) are the ones who have let loose now - psychologically it makes perfect sense. Those who havent been hit and whose methods have allowed control still are working in the parameters of trying to control.

All of the information you have put on this thread is well known and in the public - even Chris Witty etc standing up and saying it isnt going to change it

@Muffster you sum up the situation both disease and behaviour well, and I hope that you find a way through to being with your family and keeping safe. I know what it's like when those you love have been separated, however thankfully most of the places mine are at are far better than the UK in every measure of covid outcomes.

There's little point in wondering whether your very vocal antagonists knowing the hugely increased and long lasting say just cardiovascular risks of infection will change their behaviour. The type of people who need to be "free" compute risk "differently" anyway, and value future quality of life much less than immediate gratification. Those who need to work but are risk aware are not going to be shouting freedom, they're just puzzling out how to avoid the covidiots feckless in order to maintain some quality of life.

Those of us who have a responsibility for patient outcomes are similarly repulsing all feckless boarders, in order to treat other patients. While I dread the ignorant line on treatments being shaped by the "deserving" and "undeserving" sick (usually by people who are properly clinically deprioritised and blame strangers whose circumstances they're ignorant of), it brings to the fore, that if they're freely transmitting and later in life present with the full range of related conditions, surely that's 100% "undeserving" sick in their terms? When these loud angry people get sick, they usually stay loud and angry and very scared, especially when they hit the limits of treatment.

The type of people who need to be "free" compute risk "differently" anyway, and value future quality of life much less than immediate gratification

Really?

I personally value personal freedom as well as enjoying delayed gratification.

To answer the original question.

A lot would depend on the family I was visiting and how they act given Covid has not gone away. All of the relatives of mine I might visit work with older people and are fastidious about face coverings, testing and basic hygiene practices.

Compared with the UK, most countries seem to at least have some actions to recognise that Covid is here in numbers for a while.

Protections are not restrictions

They are though. If you tell me I can only meet people outside, can't have visitors in my home etc that is a restriction. I'm being told where I can meet people and, even worse, what I can do in my own home.

Dial-up/down responsive mitigations such as respirator mask use during surges

Who'll be paying for these when the cost of living is going up and up? I know I won't be buying any

@Muffster if it helps the data thread on here and a data thread I follow on another forum both have hospitialisations peaking and this wave should be well on the way down when you come

You're so superior, OP, lol.
Thanks for the laugh.

You know all the sickness costs money too? Refunds for cancelled gigs, costs of agency staff, reduced productivity, costs of short and long term covid treatments, stuff like that? Widespread disease is not good for the economy and subsidised or free tests and masks for use at certain times could actually help.

Thankyou for your empathy toward the many reasons that mask wearing is not a simple thing for many people.

I thought your response was very clear.
I also accept the fact that if I enter a busy space I may eventually get covid again. Once accepting of that fact it matters to me not one bit whether people cough or wear masks. It's not even on my radar.

Thank you @maryso and I appreciate what you’ve said and on other threads too. Thank you for your work with patients too

Thank you - let’s hope so. Autumn is going to be tough I think.

(Quick aside: it’s not possible to mute or block people on MN is it? I haven’t used this site for years, not sure if I’ve missed it if now a feature. It sure helps having this function available when discussing COVID on other social media)

1. Masks in crowded places/indoors is what many public health authorities are saying is needed to help with this latest BA.5 surge, not lockdowns, bubbles, visitor restrictions. Outside meetings with friends suggested not mandated. (I’m talking about Public Health in other countries like Canada, USA, for clarity, although several UK experts are saying it too eg: British Medical Journal editors)
2. Let’s say N95 masks are cheap - say 3 for a quid, or free. Free masks are being used as a public health tool in New Zealand and US.

See? Not the same as lockdowns