No More Tiers (Enough is Enough)

[WaxOnFeckOff]

Here it is - thread 365 - was getting too twitchy....

Parents in law who are in the 76 to 80 age group will be getting their jabs in England next Thursday in a local leisure centre.

My local council has just announced that they are pleased to have chosen our local leisure centre as a vaccination centre, and will start setting it up soon.

My parents who are exactly the same age have heard nothing.

Of course we're not behind in the roll-out.

@Bytheloch

I saw a theory about not oversharing the vaccine impact (and figures) because it will mean the compliance levels around restrictions will fall, as people start to believe the most vulnerable are now protected. Agree with that. I’m not sure anyone will want to wait around for the youngest, strongest and healthiest to be vaccinated too.

I also agree with this Bytheloch, most people will keep complying until the top however many groups are protected. Then when the headlines say that all over 70s are done, or over 65s, or wherever your personal tipping point is, you start flocking to blatantly flout the rules.

Which is fine, I'll do the same. Have already had the convo with my parents. And inlaws.

But yes I can "break the rules" if they are still in place about having people in the house, or going into other people's houses. But I can't unilaterally decide to send the kids into school, or break into John Lewis and demand they serve me, or go out for a meal at a restaurant.

Hopefully the government will read the room and realise that public compliance with lockdowns is almost exhausted, despite what some of the weirdos on MN would have you believe.

Yes byetheloch

That’s what’s been great helping each other and not just flopping when things go wrong.

Imagine being 9 years old and able to bake like that

We like the wee platforms they have as some are to small to reach the work tops properly

I do my grocery shopping online and have done for the past 5+years. I have a regular delivery slot once a week wit a big supermarket and pay for an annual delivery pass. I haven't been to the supermarket in a very long time (over a year at least). I'm young and have no medical reason to shop online I just really dislike going to the supermarket and online is much more convenient. Although dp works NHS shifts so likely would need to shop at 10/11pm when he finishes work or take 2 dc with me.

My elderly single grandparent who hasn't left the house since March also shops online and has never had a problem getting delivery slots, so I don't feel I'm taking delivery away from someone else.

I haven't been to supermarket it a very long time, probably over a year or even longer. Nothing to do with covid, I just prefer online. If I need to top up on bread, milk, or fruit and veg I use the small corner shop and the leave the dc to wait outside. Probably been there 4 or 5 times in the last year.

Morning all. Loving seeing my telly habits are within normal parameters. We are currently reliving our youth with The New Avengers.

DH took himself away with his book afterwards because he couldn't stop laughing at the football commentary (Arbroath vs Dundee) - he is not Scottish and has no interest in football whereas I am somewhat of an armchair fanatic about all Scottish sport and sports commentary.

Went to bed too late last night cos I got caught on to a programme about the Chicago Blues scene - Friday is my de-stress music evening and I love Blues and also have friends in Chicago. DH is more of a prog rock man so he would have been equally annoying about that.

Self-imposed self-isolation is always an option in our house.

I see Zero Devi was still at it on Newsnight last night. Someone ought to introduce her to sport and music and junk telly.

Just to say my housebound DF aged 89 got his jab at home from a district nurse this week, out of the blue, she just turned up without an appointment or anything. He hadn’t heard anything but obviously somewhere it was in the system that he wouldn’t be able to get to a clinic.
Just reporting that in case anyone else in same position

That’s positive!

Never mind holidays this year, I wonder if we will get holidays in 2022!

Are we likely to still be WFH come summer?

It's so reassuring to hear of people being vaccinated in the community! I'm really glad it is happening for some. But I'm still angry about how slow we are being compared to other UK nations. I appreciate it's ramping up, and I know they are focusing on care homes - but really, can't we multitask and do the community too?! Surely every week that goes by is a chance for people to be infected, and potentially need hospital support, when had they been vaccinated quicker that wouldn't be needed. But, hey, the SG were looking around for leisure centres, and interviewing staff, so that's fine.

Our GP surgery is going to be a vaccination centre, apparently (well, duh...) But of course, they have no vaccine. I just don't understand why they haven't just given supplies to centres that are already set up to deal with vaccinations, and have the staff. And why anyone with any interaction with the NHS isn't just offered the vaccination as a matter of course as part of their appointment. (DH happened to mention at a routine appointment a couple of years ago that he hadn't had the MMR jab as a child, and was worried there was a measles (?) cluster in the first year undergrad cohort he was teaching, and they just gave it to him then and there). Both parents (75 and 79) have been in and out of hospitals for various things over the past month, yet their GP doesn't have a clue when the vaccine will be available to them. Crazy.

I had a bit of a swear at the news last night with NS telling us how to do our shopping. "if it's a bit busy just go back another time". Well, no. If I've walked half an hour in the snow to get there to get something I need that day, I'm not going to just decide its not actually that important and can wait. I know she means well, but come on... Can't her spin doctors tell her that it's just patronising and insulting to micromanage us like 6 year olds?

And while I'm on a rant, what use is BJ telling us that the new variant may (or may not) be more deadly? Its not going to affect our behaviour, because we already can't do anything apart from what is necessary. And unless we've been in a cave for the past year, we have picked up that hospitals are struggling, and it's a nasty illness to have for some. So why do we need to know? We can't do anything about it so it only serves to cause more worry over catching it, which is hardly on anyone's to-do list. Well done BJ...adding more unnecessary stress onto people at an already pretty grim time. Thanks for that.

I was able to set up vulnerable parents on priority lists last time for online deliveries it's worth doing as its they then see spots. Also the delivery passes means that you see further in advance so definitely worth it!

We have done online delivery for years as our closest supermarket is a 50 mile round trip. We have switched to local deliveries of milk, eggs, butchers and veg so that we only need a slot every 2-3 weeks and feel loads better about supporting local too!
If we could just find a bread delivery we would be set for even longer!

NotAnActualSheep Hear, hear!

@Dinnafashyersel Chicago Blues ! I'd have watched that had I known it was on!

I'm the non footy watcher here.

I agree we don't need to know lethality vs spreadability at this point cos we can't do anything about it. However I had a certain amount of sympathy for BJ and PV yesterday. They were doing their best to undo Prof Ferguson's usual extrapolations out of nothing all day prior to them.

Prof F is only theorising it may be marginally more lethal but not as spready because cases are not matching his death curves. Of course his data is all junk because they keep doubling the testing and changing who they test when. Also even the ONS can't work out the excess death data atm because of the Christmas Bank Holidays and the week 53 effect. He is not looking at biological data but death and case stats.

Very difficult for Govt to manage comms with a plethora of ego driven science personalities freelancing while using the moniker "Govt adviser" and a MSM mendaciously playing along.

LetItGoGo SkyArts have had some really good content since they joined Freeview. We've never had Sky so it is all new to me. I have already seen most of BBC4 and ITV3 and even the Cooking Channel several times.

I find I'm having less and less patience with Ferguson.

And I never had a good opinion of Peston who seemed to whip it all up via twitter yesterday.

Ferguson has been so widely discredited, I have no idea why he’s still given free rein with his “predictions”.

@Dinnafashyersel

I agree we don't need to know lethality vs spreadability at this point cos we can't do anything about it. However I had a certain amount of sympathy for BJ and PV yesterday. They were doing their best to undo Prof Ferguson's usual extrapolations out of nothing all day prior to them.

Prof F is only theorising it may be marginally more lethal but not as spready because cases are not matching his death curves. Of course his data is all junk because they keep doubling the testing and changing who they test when. Also even the ONS can't work out the excess death data atm because of the Christmas Bank Holidays and the week 53 effect. He is not looking at biological data but death and case stats.

Very difficult for Govt to manage comms with a plethora of ego driven science personalities freelancing while using the moniker "Govt adviser" and a MSM mendaciously playing along.

Fair enough! I didn't realise he was firefighting a particular "rumour"... I've decided to avoid keeping up with the rumours and suggestions, as they are all opinions, really, albeit opinion based on data (of variable quality). If it becomes generally accepted, I'll take it on board! Though actually, a less spready but more lethal version sounds like bad news for the virus (if it kills its host without spreading well to others it won't get very far) so hopefully that version will bugger off to extinction pretty quickly.

And agree about the "government advisors". Yes, they are very clever and know a lot about their area of expertise, but epidemiologists can only "advise" about epidemiology, virologists about virus biology, modellers about the parameters they have put into their model and so on. Of course from the point of view of getting virus spread as low as possible we need to lockdown forever (the same would apply to getting cold or flu or chickenpox spread as low as possible) and it would be negligent for someone tasked to advise on that to suggest otherwise (unless there is a vaccine that prevents spread). But that's not the only thing we need to think about. If the vaccine prevents illness reliably, does it really matter if spread is as low as it can be? If children are leaving school unable to read or write, or without basic maths, does it matter if spread is as low as it can be? If people can't get cancer treatment or have to wait til they need teeth removing before they can get dental treatment, does it matter if spread is as low as it can be? And so on and so on...

To be fair, I don't think all the "advisors" are trying to speak beyond their area of expertise, but a lot of the media (and therefore the public) seems determined to set the government against "scientists" when the scientists are only giving one small (but important) part of the story.

This paediatrician is always very measured on Twitter. Sensible view of the situation

I like Alasdair Munro too. He gave a really good explanation of why kids appear to be more affected this time round.

My mil is immobile, got an appointment to attend the surgery for her jab. We phoned to say she couldn't come and they said they would take her off the list! She needs 2 people to hoist her out of her chair into her wheelchair, there is not a single accessible taxi near her. We're not just being lazy.

Yes, totally! If more people are dying I can't understand why it's more likely to be a property of the virus and not because hospitals are over capacity, nurses and doctors knackered and stressed, resources needing to be rationed and treatment not being as effective as it could be if these things were not the case. Not the fault of the staff at all, but years/ decades of underfunding, understaffing, failure to update buildings and processes and so on.

that's terrible Rae but no doubt make the stats look better if they can take them off the target.

I was particularly done with govt advisers when whitty and ano did a bit back in the early months deliberately using outdated predications that showed a much worse figure to essentially scare people when they had in their hand ones that showed a different picture from the same people, so not like they were likely to be any more or less accurate than the ones they chose to show.

Rae that's awful about MIL.

What's was Alasdair Munro logic for kids being more affected this time?
My oldest 10 is less affected, he can still meet his pals that he couldn't do in first lockdown. He got really depressed first time round.

My youngest 4 is more affected, really needs pals his own age, more than he did at 3, the dark nights means by the time I've done school with oldest, done a bit of my job, it's too dark to even go to the park.
Don't trust oldest to look after him.

That is awful rae. Are you able to say she's not to be taken off the list, but just isn't able to get to the surgery? Hopefully they can put her on a list for a home call. She can't be the only one in that situation and it's really not a reason for her not to be vaccinated!

What's this news about Erasmus maybe coming back for Scotland only? Can they do that? Or is it a total pile of pish?