Westminstenders: Run Forrest Run

[RedToothBrush]

Need i say more?

I wonder how effective the mask wearing is here. I see so many people with their noses hanging out.

Anyway, nice and quiet here as both DC are at schools. So I should study or clean or something.

Must admit I did wonder if my rather innocuous posted been reported in error?

Hey ho.

Johnson has never performed well at PMQs. Covid-19 or no Covid-19.

I would say now he is worse but I'm assuming that the strain of actually being PM and the alleged issues in his private life are rather wearing too...

I've been into town!
1st time since January.
Most people wearing masks except children and one or two older men.
Not a brilliant experience in that you can't really browse anymore...no testers obviously and some shops had one way systems that weren't very well marked...
It was a bit odd really :( not sure I'll hurry back.

....caught a bit of the JV show on radio 2 with Vanessa feltz standing in...

Very upsetting calls about family on care homes...awful.

As a caller pointed out they are paying £1k a week and they cant even facetime or phone their loved one :(

30 + staff who can be out in the pubs/restaurants/shops then go to work :(

Feel so sorry for the residents and families.

My gp surgery is like fort knox. People have/are going to die simply because they cannot/are too scared to access basic primary health services

People have/are going to die simply because they cannot/are too scared to access basic primary health services

Sounds like the plan.

I don't buy the post covid excuse for Johnson being utterly shite. His attitude to being PM is the same as it is to brexit. He wants all the privileges, chauffeur driven, country retreats, palace grounds to exercise etc, but none of the responsibilities, like having to actually work.

@DGRossetti

People have/are going to die simply because they cannot/are too scared to access basic primary health services

Sounds like the plan.

... My GP and dentist resumed normal service - but with masks - from late May and sent reminders for checkups

I had my totally non-urgent dental checkup, scrape and polish in early June, with the dentist in a mask, no problem
Regular smears, blood tests etc resumed as normal
Essential treatment continued as normal throughout lockdown

In all these cases though, nervous patients may have chosen to ignore medical advice to come in and get treated
That's in every country

It is a reminder that whatever the relaxation / removal of measures, those people who feel unsafe won't resume normal habits,
whether that be work, seeking medical treatment, going on shopping sprees, outings etc

It is about the individual assessment of risk, which may be skewed and emotional rather than fact-based

My GP and dentist resumed normal service - but with masks - from late May and sent reminders for checkups

A family friend was due an operation for glaucoma in April that was cancelled. Their sight has got worse and will probably result in them having to give up work. not a squeak from the clinic. Said friend (despite urging) doesn't want to waste their time while people are dying.

Tales from the Rossettibank ...

I'm awaiting another scan for my eye.
It's no better.
No visual field tests being done which is what I need.
Nothing from dentists and we are all overdue for a check up.
They are seeing private patients though!

Yoikes - they are probably seeing private patients a because there is no extra funding in the nhs for all the garb they have to wear...... plus they can't fit as many people in because of the cleaning that needs to happen between patients.

In fact if I know NHS dentists are completely screwed. My cousin is a dentist in private practise - but when we were discussing what she is having to do to see patients, she was saying the nhs dentists were in a terrible position. Cost of required PPE gone up enormously...... she quoted the price differential pre-pandemic and it was something like a 1000% price rise. It's all pretty grim

My GP is also like Fort Knox and where I am NHS provision for anything apart from Covid seems to have ground to a halt. There was recently a thread where people posted how their or loved one's illness/conditions had drastically worsened and many cases where people had sadly died.

I'm also not convinced Johnson's state is much due to Covid. More the reality of a demanding job in a pandemic with Brexit looming and neither the skill or intelligence to cope. PMQs was something else.

My dentist cancelled all check ups and is operating some sort of waiting list but I haven't heard when they will get to me.

A friend waiting for an op since March has finally got a date for next week.

We have fairly normal medical service here in France, although of course people will have had appointments cancelled and in some cases that will have delayed diagnosis. But it's easy enough to get appointments especially if you are mobile and prepared to book online.

Also so many towns here now require masks everywhere (including outdoors) that it feels odd to go anywhere without one. It's amazing what you can get used to.

It's amazing what you can get used to.

Like mothers dying of starvation, naked corruption and cronyism, and to continued dilution of human rights, you mean ?

Funnily enough it does seem that (on Mumsnet at least - hope it's not representative of the U.K. but fear it is) there are a lot of people up in arms about masks but very few bothered about young mums dying of starvation or Cummings' pals helping themselves to public money.

@Mistigri

Funnily enough it does seem that (on Mumsnet at least - hope it's not representative of the U.K. but fear it is) there are a lot of people up in arms about masks but very few bothered about young mums dying of starvation or Cummings' pals helping themselves to public money.

1) is probably reflecting a view that it's the right sort of Mum

2. is probably a reflection of the sentiment of "well who wouldn't" ?

either way, it's not really a great advert for English society being much worth saving at times.

As I have just read - "There's no law that says the revolution you want won't take your life"

---

Vote early and vote often

Speaking of voting, my slip from Italy arrived today.

...

Ah, referendums ... doncha just love 'em ?

Boris is struggling because he’s a nincompoop.

But he may also be a nincompoop with post-Covid syndrome, which everyone needs to know about, as there will be a lot of it.

@Mistigri

Funnily enough it does seem that (on Mumsnet at least - hope it's not representative of the U.K. but fear it is) there are a lot of people up in arms about masks but very few bothered about young mums dying of starvation or Cummings' pals helping themselves to public money.

Yep I think that’s about right from what I see in my own circles.

In other news:

Two interesting books out in France:

The first is “Flic” (= slang for the policeman, Les Flics = the police). A really worthwhile investigation by a journalist into the extent of violence & racism (and also suicide) in the police. Had to be published secretly in Slovenia.

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/03/french-reporter-who-joined-police-exposes-racism-and-violence-valentin-gendrot

The second is an autobiographical novel by Raphael Enthoven “Le Temps Gagné”, who had a relationship with Carla Bruni after she ditched his father Jean-Paul (a well known philosopher) for him, before she married Sarkozy. Father has now disowned son over the novel.

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/03/french-philosopher-jean-paul-enthoven-disowns-son-raphael-over-autobiographical-novel

The first is “Flic” (= slang for the policeman, Les Flics = the police). A really worthwhile investigation by a journalist into the extent of violence & racism (and also suicide) in the police. Had to be published secretly in Slovenia.

Reminds me that when the Met Police were investigated for widespread corruption in the 1970s, the investigating force refused to work in London for fear of assassination.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Countryman

If rumours are to be believed this wasn't because of an imagination of what might happen. It was in response to things that had happened. More than once. Notice how the investigating officers were ordered not to report their findings to the Met ...

There was an episode of The Professionals that managed to sneak some facts into fiction around that time ...

Just a quick post to say hi to everyone on the thread. I've had a break from brexit (politics & current affairs in general) simply because my personal life got too chaotic, with long covid, marriage breakdown, unexpected redundancy & trying to set up my own business in the midst of that mess. I just don't have the energy or mental space. I'm by no means unique and I think so many of us have just been beaten down recently. So I salute those of you who persevere in the debate and scrutiny of this ongoing mfg shit show.

@DGRossetti

My GP and dentist resumed normal service - but with masks - from late May and sent reminders for checkups

A family friend was due an operation for glaucoma in April that was cancelled. Their sight has got worse and will probably result in them having to give up work. not a squeak from the clinic. Said friend (despite urging) doesn't want to waste their time while people are dying.

Tales from the Rossettibank ...

My elderly relative has been having regular eye treatment during lockdown, and has just been booked in for cataract surgery in a couple of weeks.

DS has just been taken on as an NHS dental patient in his uni city. I know some clinics are charging a £40 Covid surcharge, not sure if that’s private and NHS.

We had Gov on the BBC earlier this week, assuring people in NI that they would not face shortages of fresh food. After which, the food consortiums went "That's untrue".

Below is a variation on the theme; it will hit NI residents first and hardest, but we can expect it to affect the rest of the UK too.

||www.businessinsider.com/brexit-food-companies-warn-boris-johnson-has-missed-labelling-deadline-2020-9?r=US&IR=T?||