Guilt Free Railing 11

[WouldBeGood]

The end was not nigh,and still looking far far away, so here’s the latest thread.

Usual railing rules apply: all rails or good news welcome, no nauseating positivity or resilience wankery. 😃

Ah, of course, our finance secretary is saying everything is the fault of big bad Westminster so they won’t have funds to lockdown again

I did ring, @ResilienceWanker. It's correct.

If I were working, or just out for the day and not home until evening, I would have missed the appointment.

And there's a whole bit on the letter about ringing if it's not convenient, but if you miss the appointment without telling them, you go back to the end of the queue. Now, nobody died from dermal cysts on their head. But it's a standard letter and if this is the way they're organising outpatient appointments...

It's ridiculous @BroccoliFloret.

I remember attending an outpatient appointment for DS to do with a recent hospital stay, I had the appointment letter with me stating it was at Stirling at x date and time and y area. Struggles to find the area so ends up asking another reception desk to be told that the appointments were now at FVR as they'd moved. Would have been handy to let patients know eh? To add to that it was by now chucking with snow so I wasn't keen to drive to FVR in 10 minutes in a snow storm.

Ahhhh. I see... They would restrict before the end of Sept when furlough is still in place, because if they delay it to wait and see (like they'd love to do, of course) there won't be any furlough available. Well, shit.

Though I think the furlough scheme only covers 60%(?) of wages now, and employers have to make up at least 20% to bring it to 80% in all. So if hours are cut in which the business can make money, not sure whether employers will be able to afford that 20% for any furloughed staff anyway? Surely they'll just be made redundant and hopefully can be reemployed once the business can afford them again, like they did last time?

@BroccoliFloret

I did ring, *@ResilienceWanker*. It's correct.

If I were working, or just out for the day and not home until evening, I would have missed the appointment.

And there's a whole bit on the letter about ringing if it's not convenient, but if you miss the appointment without telling them, you go back to the end of the queue. Now, nobody died from dermal cysts on their head. But it's a standard letter and if this is the way they're organising outpatient appointments...

Fair enough - if the timing is correct they're crazy and incompetent rather than just incompetent . Was giving them the benefit of the doubt... Fingers crossed it goes OK for you!

How to encourage employers to use zero hour contracts and push the risk of lockdowns on to employees 🤔?

Hospitality is losing workers in droves.
Lots of places not going to survive.
Couple of restaurants we go to locally and they're so short staffed this year. Particularly chefs but also bar and waiting staff.
No-one wants a full-time job in hospitality as it's unlikely to be, well, full-time.

@Lockdownbear

How to encourage employers to use zero hour contracts and push the risk of lockdowns on to employees 🤔?

Precisely. Hospitality jobs and contracts are hardly the most secure at the best of times, so unscrupulous employers will just cut them off without the expenses of furlough, whether or not it is theoretically available. I do feel for the "good" employers though, who have tried to keep on their staff - especially skilled chefs and so on, who just may no longer be able to afford it. I wouldn't be surprised if this continued knife hanging over hospitality just makes people think "sod it" and move to a more secure industry (as seems to have happened already, given the shortage of experienced staff since places reopened). It seems so unfair, especially as hospitality in England, for example, hasn't been a significant source of spread at all.

And can anyone remind me how closing the pubs early will help when BY FAR the largest cases per 100,000 are in under 19s this week according to SG public dashboard?

Have we lowered the drinking age

This was just before lockdown but I had a small op.They insisted that I had to go back to that hospital in a week to get my stitches out and not my local health centre of hospital.
I couldn’t make the appointment when I left, had to wait for a letter. (This was a Friday)

The following Wednesday I hadn’t heard from hospital. Typically missed a call from them as was working at 5pm. Tried to call hospital but since I didn’t know who called they couldn’t help me!
Thursday I spent the morning frantic trying to make contact to get some information. Eventually heard from them and was told my appointment was the next day, less than 24 hours notice and was slap bang in the afternoon. Wouldn’t budge for an AM appointment or let me go closer to home.

Thankfully I had an amazing boss who sorted it so I could attend but I was raging at the inconvenience and stress of it all. All that way for 5 mins was ridiculous.

I then had to go back a few weeks later for a check up. Check the wound was healing etc
Again couldn’t pre make appointment. And no flexibility on day/time when I heard from them.
All that way again for 5 mins to be told I needed to go back for another op as they found some dodgy cells they wanted to get rid of just incase.

Why that couldn’t have been relayed to me over the phone I will never know.

I was lucky to get second op during lockdown 1 before mask and isolating rules. Surprise surprise I was allowed to go to health centre to get stitches checked and a phone consult few weeks later to ask how it was healing!

How much time must have been wasted in the past when not allowing pre booking appointments or telephone calls in some situations would have sufficed.

Ah sorry that was a bit long!

@latissimusdorsi

And can anyone remind me how closing the pubs early will help when BY FAR the largest cases per 100,000 are in under 19s this week according to SG public dashboard?

Have we lowered the drinking age

I've no clue, I think shutting pubs & clubs just encourages people to 'come back to mine'. Or party in the house and not bother going out in the first place.

What's happening with the old guys are they all down the pub at midnight - giving it yeehaa on the dance floor - in their suited and booted 👔

Many too many dominoes parties in poorly ventilated back rooms @Lockdownbear

That's interesting latissimus - why the difference in sex?! Yy the old guys But also in children, there seems to be more infection in boys than girls. I know there has always been a slight worse outcome for men than women, but I thought infection rates were generally the same. And I would have thought teenage boys would be generally less "close contacty" (apart from the obvious ) than girls, given the general propensity to hang around in their bedrooms and grunt at everyone. Unreasonable stereotype, I know, but I can't see what boys would be doing more than girls, that would lead to an increased infection risk - esp now the football is over... Presumably not the dangerous activity of going to school and sitting in classrooms, as both sexes do that! Does this not suggest spread could more likely be out of school activities?

I do actually wonder if males are taking covid worse than females so are more likely to actually test.

Although I'll admit I'd be more likely to test just to be safe than DH would.

It is interesting Resilience
I hadn't really looked clearly at the difference in the sexes but you're right
And it's in both the childhood age bands which is even more intriguing as 5 or 6 yr old boys will not have the same structure to their day/ week as 15 and 16 yr old boys

I read somewhere that females are more resistant to infection in general than males.

Maybe it's all us mums of boys fussing over them more than girls?

Working age women are more likely to be in caring jobs where they need to test so that explains that being higher i would think.

I mean you'd almost be forgiven for thinking that masks in schools are a complete waste of time....

Yes, masks in school clearly do not help

The trouble is they won't want to ditch masks while the rates are so high, but I really feel for secondary kids and shop workers.

But it's really odd the highest figures are boys and retired men.
But someone commented that in their area the majority are still encouraging primary kids to maskup.

Manflu

@latissimusdorsi

Manflu

You've solved it! Could be true that males are more likely to get symptomatic infection comparatively. Though I'm not sure if that pattern has been seen throughout the pandemic in infections? It may well have- I've just not noticed before!

I think elephant could be right that the difference disappears in the 20-65 age range because women do have to do more testing (assuming this data is the "symptomatic" testing programme and not the ONS) - or even just that the kind of public facing jobs women have compared to men could leave them more susceptible generally.

We have chickenpox and norovirus at work. Never mind blooming Covid. I'm doing extra days to cover.

Yes, it's not totally clear from these graphs, but it seems the earlier peaks were topped by females (purple) and the later ones by males. On the tableau site you can split by age, so the first graph here is 20-24yo, where you can see the huuuuuge football unexplained spike in males in this age july. It's possible that the earlier female prevalence was due to them doing more caring etc overall (and of course the first spike in spring 2020 it would only be hospitalised people tested, so may not be so reliable) but it is odd the trend seems to have reversed now for no apparent reason. Ok, blokes could be less "careful" overall I suppose? But don't see why that would still apply to 0-14yos!!