Sick of narrative that lockdowns were pointless

[Bagzzz]

I think lots of people are forgetting quite how scary the early days were, overwhelmed hospitals and exhausted (and now a lot burnt out) medical staff.

Many mistakes were made and some things that might have have been avoided but we know with the benefit of hindsight.
Scientists if not politicians were doing their best.

Maybe could distinguish later lockdowns but they weren’t done lightly either, knowing it would affect mental health and business.

@Cuppasoupmonster Which is why they’re clogging up our hospitals.

No, they should not be described as such, neither are they 'bed blockers'. They are delayed discharges.
They are delayed because of the problems with finding them suitable care packages, awaiting results of Physio intervention, awaiting assessments (of their homes) by Occupational Therapists, waiting for spaces in either Part 2 or Part 3 accommodation, funding to be made available etc etc.

HTH

The problem is it’s draining resources from people who are ill through no fault of their own, because they’re too selfish to pay for the extra care. A&E isn’t supposed to be a free alternative to care, but they’re forcing it to be.

Can you imagine the media if it did happen? We already have lots of sad looking faces whenever someone falls over and has to wait a few hours for an ambulance. If it happened with old people with covid, we'd have videos all over social media showing Grandma struggling for breath!

No one uses AE as a free alternative to care, thats being ridiculous, 10 or 15 hour weights for an ambulance, 72 hours stuck in a corridor waiting to be seen.

Like i said, frequent visits to AE will trigger responses & people can fall regardless of having a carer.

Which comes back to the point made earlier that a decade or so earlier, we wouldn't have had lockdowns and restrictions lasting 2 years because the internet wasn't as fast or widespread! The fact that we "could" lockdown for so long facilitated that decision. Ten years ago, it would have been impossible to have done it, simply because too few people had fast internet, smart phones, etc and that the "sharing" software wasn't widely/freely available. So, say, if covid had happened in 2005, we wouldn't have been locked down for so long - that's a simple fact. People wouldn't have been able to work from home in such great numbers, children/students couldn't have been taught at home, people couldn't have done all their shopping online, etc. So things would have been VERY different. It was basically a social experiment, simply "because they could", not because it was the only option!

But if they’re mentally capable, they can’t stop them from returning to their home can they?

Actually no, that is also my experience. There are elderly people with expensive paid for care packages arranged by SS who are constantly needing an ambulance in various crises and end being frequently admitted to hospital because their care at home hasn't worked out and has led to a fall, UTI etc. But they don't want to go into residential care.

My experiences differ to yours @Reindeersnooker. The first time MIL went into hospital she was discharged with a 6 week care package after making sure her home was suitable to go back to. The second time the hospital tried to discharge her with no care package and while we were on holiday so she refused to leave until we were back. DH found her a respite place in a care home which she ended up moving into permanently.

When my DM was in hospital the bitch of a doctor wanted to discharge her with nothing in place despite the fact DM was barely conscious and had heart and kidney failure. When I refused to look after her (as advised by her GP) only then was she going to get social services involved.

Exactly. We could have spent the billions of pounds that the lockdowns cost the country by throwing resources at those most at risk, i.e. the "vulnerable" - not necessarily lock them up, but at least use that money to employ people to take their shopping (many of them couldn't use the internet to order it), to finance doctors/nurses to go and treat them at home instead of expecting them to make their own way to surgeries/hospitals, provide all kinds of other "support" services to help them isolate themselves at home. For seriously vulnerable workers, pay them enhanced sick pay to stay at home instead of going to work, i.e. furlough only for the most vulnerable, etc. Or even requisition hotels and use them a kind of "care home" for isolating the vulnerable, providing them with food, entertainment, etc in a controlled/isolated enviroment to protect them. Likewise spreading out care home residents by moving some into hotels so that they weren't all concentrated in (usually) small lounges and dining rooms. It would have cost a fraction of the hundreds of billions that the lockdowns cost to throw money at protecting the most vulnerable, shopping for them, taking services to them, etc.

Let those of the least risk just get on with their lives as far as possible. Yes, some other restrictions are probably a good idea, i.e. restricting numbers of people into venues and events to help spread people out etc., but it's simply not acceptable to ban people who are low risk from working or socialising at all!

No one wealthy gets free home care, thats what i was answering.

People (with capacity) are free to decide where they live and long may that continue.

@user1497207191 What is happening in China, is the younger workers, inc health staff are also very poorly with covid, so no one is there to look after the elderly or trun up for work

Its probably going to lead to a further economic crisis for all of us.

not necessarily lock them up,

Wow, that's good of you. What about those who were vulnerable but didn't want to be semi locked up?

Also, what about my situation? I'm 47, DH is 68 so is in one of the 'vulnerable' cohorts. Should I be banned from going anywhere as well?

Or even requisition hotels and use them a kind of "care home" for isolating the vulnerable, providing them with food, entertainment, etc in a controlled/isolated enviroment to protect them.

Personally I'd rather have died of Covid, it sounds like hell!

Limiting social interaction consensually as happened in Sweden seemed to be as effective as our lockdowns, those who had harsher lock downs than us seemed to suffer no less either. In retrospect I think the first was necessary because we didn't have all the facts but 2&3 shouldn't have happened

What about those who were vulnerable but didn't want to be semi locked up?

then they have a choice don’t they? Stay home or go out and catch covid 🤷🏼‍♀️

Exactly. However as I read both on here and other social media many of those who said they were ECV were strongly against this and said it was discrimination. 'If I need to stay inside so should everyone else'...

A lot didn't have that choice. They had to go out, to GP surgeries, shopping, etc!

IF the covid billions had been spent on supporting them, then fair enough, then they have a choice and could stay in if they wanted.

Not to mention, because of the lockdowns, there wasn't much to go out for, was there? With pubs, restaurants, churches, venues etc forced to close, all they could go out for was food shopping and the GP surgery (if deemed worthy of being allowed in!).

In numbers term, yes, lots of people could be badly affected. But in percentage of population terms, the percentage is still very low.

Say, a million sounds a lot, but out of a population of 60 million it's only 1 in 60 or 1.67%.

As Rishi famously said to justify the 3 million excluded from financial support "We can't help everyone!".

You can't ruin the lives of many millions of people to save a few hundred thousand, many of whom would have died in a few months anyway.

You have to do the Maths. When you're dealing with big numbers (i.e. population) you can't obsess about small percentages, even if the "raw" numbers appear big!

Well obviously but the way some people talk about 'the vulnerable' it's as though they are one big group who should have been grateful to be locked up.

So if the lockdowns hadn't happened to the extent they did, all that would still have been available for those who wanted, CV or not! And we wouldn't have had all the business failures and job losses that were caused.

And by the way some vulnerable talk, the masses should have been happy to be locked up (which they were) for other people.

Disclaimer: I’m CV, had the jab early and all that jazz. Don’t want anyone to limit their life for me.

I actually agree with you on that @Cuppasoupmonster. My friend is also CEV and has never wanted anyone to limit their lives for her, and she's certainly not limiting hers! Whatever happened, there were people who were going to be upset.

They had no exit strategy in China, no way out of their Zero-COViD policy. Xi doubled down on his signature policy until protests literally broke out. Also, lockdowns were killing the Chinese economy, how could they have continued on this way?

Thought lockdowns were to prevent the nhs getting overwhelmed? It did get overwhelmed in my view. Many DNRs were pushed onto vulnerable people weren't they? Hospital staff worked crazy hours in awful circumstances. The bar at which you could get medical assistance was set higher etc. If we had e.g. triple the staff and capacity, would govt have been bothered that there were also many more deaths? They don't seem bothered about a strategy for the huge number of people with long covid and the impact on physical and mental health, economy, education, quality of life etc that's having.

Nice try, but there is absolutely no chance you thought this was a discussion about anything other than the only lockdown rules Gove ever had any input into, ie the English ones. He was not being asked for his opinion on the other rules when he said that, no great surprise since those were devolved and nothing to do with him.

The Lombardy/Veneto comparison in Italy is interesting where the hard, fast lockdown/mass testing resulted in a lower death toll than Lombardy who were slower.