Is the situation deteriorating?

[Snowrabbit]

John Swinney wouldn't rule out a lockdown on the basis of a 'deteriorating situation' across UK and Scotland? Are things actually worse here yet? Numbers look better to me! I don't want the nonsense of Wales and NI where lockdowns can now be announced weeks in advance. It's either necessary or it isn't. You can't say, things might be bad in 2 weeks so we will lockdown. WHO says lockdowns should be an absolute last resort so I don't see how governments can say we need to lockdown on 28 December etc. Insane. Heard on news last night that someone on SAGE also pointed out that numbers might not be that bad with Xmas because of all the other things that will shut - schools/ unis/ nurseries etc. Are things really getting worse? I thought Scottish numbers looked better!

No, the situation is not deteriorating. You are completely correct.

Doesn't stop the scaremongering or folk shouting to stay indoors in case you kill a granny though.

We should at this point be reaping the benefits of the last Tier 4 lock downs. Figures are going down at the same rate as they were already heading down when they slapped tier 4 on. So, as numbers continue to do the same, how is putting Tier 4 (or worse?) going to achieve any different?

The first lock down had a bit of merit. No-one had any idea how quickly things would spread, how well the NHS would cope, we'd all seen the images from Spain and Italy right? That initial shock of complete lockdown worked, subsequent tinkering, not so much. They blame it on people not doing as they are told, it's simply virus gonna do what virus gonna do, which is, at the moment for things to be improving overall.

The issue is that lots if people will be travelling from very high covid areas to very low covid areas over Christmas and staying with their families.
For example, I have three friends who are flying up next week from London (there are only 50 intensive care beds left in the whole of London, rates are high and schools have been severely affected).
Yet my friends and their families will fly into the Highlands and stay with their parents in our town which has had 0 cases for months. It's a recipe for disaster in my opinion and this will be repeated all over.

Oh dear @starryeyesuprise- I'm in the Highlands hope it's not my town!!!

Starryeyesurprise - Yes but that doesn't make it a "deteriorating situation" right now. It could potentially cause a deteriorating situation but that's not the same (and not necessarily the case anyway according a to Sage scientist as per my original post)

Maybe I know you! Hmm... I don't agree with it. I know it sounds bad but one's staying for two weeks and staying with both mil and own parents over that time. Feel like the grinch but I think it's quite selfish. They think it's ok so they're doing it. Said there won't be any checks at the airport.

That was a reply to pp.

The UK situation is really dire. 35k new cases today so in two weeks that'll equal however many daily deaths.

I see your point op. Was he definitely talking only in regards to Scotland?

He said that the situation was deteriorating across Scotland and the UK... I'm not sure it really is in Scotland and if we have been doing our own much stricter measures for months and things are not really deteriorating here, I don't think we can justify another lockdown just because other places are doing it and numbers are worse elsewhere. Or all the measures are just getting us nowhere as we lockdown anyway and never see the rewards for the heavier sacrifices we have had in Scotland.

@StarryEyeSurprise

The issue is that lots if people will be travelling from very high covid areas to very low covid areas over Christmas and staying with their families. For example, I have three friends who are flying up next week from London (there are only 50 intensive care beds left in the whole of London, rates are high and schools have been severely affected). Yet my friends and their families will fly into the Highlands and stay with their parents in our town which has had 0 cases for months. It's a recipe for disaster in my opinion and this will be repeated all over.

You sound a very welcoming friend🤔

London is a very big place, what is the ‘very high cases’ area your friends are travelling from?

How are they going to behave any different from say, someone from Glasgow driving up to your town to see their own parents? I presume you just won’t socialise with them if you’re worried at all. So what do you have to worry about?

Well, for a start a positive PCR test does not equal a case.

A case should be someone who requires hospital treatment or has died because of Covid, not with a positive PCR in the previous 28 days.

But I'll play along with the positive pcr tests. 35k new positives in the UK, 11.5k of which were in Wales, 850 in Scotland.

R rate been at or below 1 for weeks, rates of hospital admissions and deaths going down pretty steadily, ICU admissions steady and low for months, Positive tests down but still the doom and gloom.

Lock downs are ineffective, masks are ineffective, worldwide data backs this up. There is absolutely no appreciable difference in the data curves for countries with hard or soft restrictions, other things such as seasonality, whether they've previous had hard or soft previous death seasons. Lock downs and masks - nah!

On an individual basis it may help some individuals to shield, on a society level, makes no odds.

Absolutely no reason for saying situation is deteriorating. It's scaremongering and deflection tactics. Bunch of gobshites.

Schools are riddled with it, absolutely riddled. Swinney continually repeating that there's no evidence that it's spreading in schools is making me so angry. In my school - Glasgow Secondary- we've had constant cases throughout the staff and pupils. A few weeks back we had a third of the pupils off either positive or isolating, and many, many staff. I caught it at the end of Sep and it was grim.

If the schools are shut cases will go down for sure.

OP sounds like you might want to join us on Tiery Weary thread, lots of like minds over there.

Sorry, posted too soon. I completely agree that it's scaremongering. Like PP said the virus is going to do what the virus is going to do, we need to get back to some sort of normality, I'm over it ALL!

Tiery weary thread?

This is about the 4th incantation

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/scotsnet/4108540-Tiery-Weary-Crackers

Thanks @WaxOnFeckOff Good to know I'm not alone as so many agree with anything restrictive and others don't seem bothered!

I wouldn't say we all have matching views but pretty much everyone is wanting to think and discuss and have a laugh as much as we can rather than just pledge allegiance to scotgov and tell folk that they aren't doing lockdown properly.

I would say the situation is deteriorating in Scotland, but no way near as much as other areas and it varies by LA. I believe R was expected to have increased this week, cases have fallen a lot in the highest transmission areas such as Glasgow but now look as though they are levelling off rather than continuing to fall, and some areas such as fife have been increasing again. It's a bit mixed, not awful but not all rosy, time will tell.

ByTheLoch I would act exactly the same and I am not travelling up from the Central Belt nor mixing with others at home for weeks.

And Glasgow's rate is half that of London- 148 and 300 respectively.

@StarryEyeSurprise I'm exactly the same - we're not travelling to the Highlands to see family this Christmas as I will not risk bringing the virus there. Just because you CAN, does not mean you SHOULD. I know there's a lot of concern in small rural areas who have had very few cases.

@StarryEyeSurprise, what do you mean you are "not mixing with others at home for weeks"? It hasn't been possible to do that for I don't know how many months now.

Also, the population of London is about 1.7 times the one of the whole of Scotland. Greater Glasgow covers about 100 sq m, while Greater London 600 sq m. (or so Wikipedia tells me), so the comparison between Glasgow and London is not really relevant, is it. Might as well compare Glasgow to Airdrie

It's not right, is it? The Highlands have achieved 0 cases in nearly all neighbourhoods.. an area the size of Belgium!
People getting off one submarine have caused our current biggest outbreak and in an area which previously had extremely low cases. This disease is extremely contagious.
I'm happy you're doing the same as I've been despairing at people's attitudes and we're all going to have to suffer the consequences.

Thanks for the geography lesson Arkadia (!) That's why we use the per capita figure. And my comment was in response to ByTheLoch asking if I would feel the same about people travelling up from Glasgow. Yes- despite Glasgow having half the covid rate of London, I would not feel it's the right thing to do. Indeed, I live in a lower rate area in the central belt but am not going up for Christmas ( my friends will be and will be mixing with their families for days/ weeks). Again, a recipe for disaster in my opinion and this will be done all over the UK- people from areas of high covid mixing with those in low covid areas.

@StarryEyeSurprise, I really don't think so. People who wanted to do it would have done it anyway, and those who don't want to do it will just keep not doing it. It is much better to give people A CHOICE, rather than rule by decree (which more often than not appears to make no sense).
Re: geography lesson, it has always bemused me how people think of one's local authority as some huge place. Take clacks... It is tiny and so is Stirling and many other places in the central belt. To compare a LA to an English county or city shows ignorance of basic geography (not talking about you, but in general).
To be in a LA with low incidence is almost meaningless as very few numbers will tip the scale hugely (see clacks).
It is no surprise that in the Highland they have few cases: the area is huge and almost all deserted. Villages are tiny and scattered along the east cost, but far apart. The only exception I can think of are Wick and Thurso, but even they are not bigger than a Fife village.

Scotland is currently the only part of the uk who aren’t staggering start back after Xmas. I wonder if Nicola will change this stance?