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Coronavirus - how is it/has it affected you?

Ethan said:
Because they made obvious and repeated major mistakes despite being advised what to do by internal and external experts. Those mistakes cost many lives. But I guess you are saying 'Gee, that is just how it goes'.

And it was not hindsight, it was foresight based on the horror playing out in Italy and Spain on out TVs and historical strategies for dealing with contagion.

This situation was unprecedented in terms of scale, although not in nature, and there is a well trodden path to try to tackle it. The first and bleeding obvious step is top try to stop the contagion getting into the country. Fail. The next one is to test widely to determine how much there is. Fail. Need I go on? You don't let mathematical modelling lead policy. You don't embark on a herd immunity strategy unless you know the contagion very well.

This country had a pandemic exercise a few years ago, under the same Govt party, and did nothing with the report. Other countries acted more on the UK exercise than the UK did.

People in power are there because they choose to be. They must accept the responsibility of dealing with major crises. This lot have abjectly failed and continue to do so. Delaying putting India on the red list in order to do a trade deal is a shameful abdication of responsibility for which sacking isn't close to good enough. Likewise choosing known Covid deniers to get advice on an autumn circuit breaker was cynical and negligent.
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I disagree with most of what you take as read , which you call 'bleeding obvious "
Shutting a country's door is not like shutting a shop. This day and age , for the UK and it's place in the world of commerce, trade, finance, tourism, and relationship with the developed world, shutting its borders is totally impractical.
Starters- every month in early 2020 , 7 million uk citizens went overseas.
To close the border to keep out the virus means no one come in. Or can some come in and be supervised.? Which and how many of the one or two million? What happens when they demand to be not stranded,- cue lawyers, street protests, in fact, bedlam.
So some can come in then. ? The ones not carrying the virus?. The fact that one in three with the virus show no symptoms is not a problem there then?
Your bleeding obvious solution is totally impractical.

The virus spreads by a person infecting one or more others, and they in turn infect, etc etc. And it isn't known that you are infected for up to a week.In the meantime these people are infecting those they meet.
Before the virus, how many people did you touch, speak closely with, shout at or with, breath over in trains, buses , queues, pubs, etc.? A week later, how many can you recall and identify so that "trace and isolate " can happen?
Again a mostly futile exercise, I suggest,with little impact on containment.
Sure, an effort is seen to be made, but it isn't practical.

Much better to explain to the nation that this thing is in our midst ;this is how it spreads and it is up to each of us to try to stop it spreading to us, or by us if we think we might have it.
Thus the broadcasts were made and the message went out. It was up to the Nation as a whole to work towards the common goal of containment, it could not be left only to certain parts of the government to chase this lead and that, days or weeks behind, or shut the Country. We were 66 million, not 5. We were crowded on a small island, not scattered ( relatively) over a large one.
And we still had to function as best we could for that 66 million.

Other large population countries did what we did, and initially lost out as we did( inevitably). So, our "incompetence" wasn't alone. Strange , that?
Some small populous countries whose logistics problems were infinitely smaller than ours, managed to achieve good results because those remedies ,impractical for us, were not for them .

Sure, mistakes were made by most governments, but I don't believe any of them decided to take advantage of the situation for their own benefit.
I believe they are trying their best to get us back to normal, and I certainly refuse to castigate them from a stance of their being of a certain political persuasion with which I don't agree.
This is a classic case of disparate authorities being thrown together , who otherwise would have had occasional dealings, to solve a major national crisis, and who find themselves criticised ,in turn, by almost everyone.
A thankless task indeed!
 
Swinglowandslow said:
I disagree with most of what you take as read , which you call 'bleeding obvious "
Shutting a country's door is not like shutting a shop. This day and age , for the UK and it's place in the world of commerce, trade, finance, tourism, and relationship with the developed world, shutting its borders is totally impractical...
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Everything I wanted to say, but decided I couldn't be bothered.
Well put.
 
Swinglowandslow said:
I disagree with most of what you take as read , which you call 'bleeding obvious "
Shutting a country's door is not like shutting a shop. This day and age , for the UK and it's place in the world of commerce, trade, finance, tourism, and relationship with the developed world, shutting its borders is totally impractical.
Starters- every month in early 2020 , 7 million uk citizens went overseas.
To close the border to keep out the virus means no one come in. Or can some come in and be supervised.? Which and how many of the one or two million? What happens when they demand to be not stranded,- cue lawyers, street protests, in fact, bedlam.
So some can come in then. ? The ones not carrying the virus?. The fact that one in three with the virus show no symptoms is not a problem there then?
Your bleeding obvious solution is totally impractical.

The virus spreads by a person infecting one or more others, and they in turn infect, etc etc. And it isn't known that you are infected for up to a week.In the meantime these people are infecting those they meet.
Before the virus, how many people did you touch, speak closely with, shout at or with, breath over in trains, buses , queues, pubs, etc.? A week later, how many can you recall and identify so that "trace and isolate " can happen?
Again a mostly futile exercise, I suggest,with little impact on containment.
Sure, an effort is seen to be made, but it isn't practical.

Much better to explain to the nation that this thing is in our midst ;this is how it spreads and it is up to each of us to try to stop it spreading to us, or by us if we think we might have it.
Thus the broadcasts were made and the message went out. It was up to the Nation as a whole to work towards the common goal of containment, it could not be left only to certain parts of the government to chase this lead and that, days or weeks behind, or shut the Country. We were 66 million, not 5. We were crowded on a small island, not scattered ( relatively) over a large one.
And we still had to function as best we could for that 66 million.

Other large population countries did what we did, and initially lost out as we did( inevitably). So, our "incompetence" wasn't alone. Strange , that?
Some small populous countries whose logistics problems were infinitely smaller than ours, managed to achieve good results because those remedies ,impractical for us, were not for them .

Sure, mistakes were made by most governments, but I don't believe any of them decided to take advantage of the situation for their own benefit.
I believe they are trying their best to get us back to normal, and I certainly refuse to castigate them from a stance of their being of a certain political persuasion with which I don't agree.
This is a classic case of disparate authorities being thrown together , who otherwise would have had occasional dealings, to solve a major national crisis, and who find themselves criticised ,in turn, by almost everyone.
A thankless task indeed!
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Thank you for the explanation of how the virus spreads. There are many aspects of that splurge of opinion with which I disagree and which are demonstrably wrong, but I really couldn't be arsed.
 
I'm amazed the virus spread like it did given the wealth of experts we have on here.
Maybe the mistake the government made was going to SAGE for advice instead of posting the question on here ??
 
Pathetic Shark said:
Yeah because heaven forbid anyone should disagree with you or think you are not the total expert in anything related to this.
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Well, it would be a good start if people used coherent arguments rather than sweeping generalisations or personal attacks. If you are capable to any coherent arguments, have at it. Otherwise keep your personal attacks for the playground.

BiMGuy said:
I'm amazed the virus spread like it did given the wealth of experts we have on here.
Maybe the mistake the government made was going to SAGE for advice instead of posting the question on here ??
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If the Govt had properly followed the real SAGE advice, it would have done better, but it picked and chose according to other priorities.
 
Ethan said:
If the Govt had properly followed the real SAGE advice.
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I appreciate your not a fan but your now doing what you accuse others of. Can you fully substantiate that claim taking into acc all the issues that any government may have to take.

SAGE, the real one, may have advised in private that all members of the public should have been vaccinated, we don’t know, but from your posts that’s something that you would disagree with. People in power have to make hard choices and unless you have a private line into number 10 along with the one to the real SAGE HQ I’m not sure how, unless it’s just your opinion, you are able to state the above just yet. If true hopefully it will come out in the enquiry and then the public can make an informed decision based on fact.
 
Politics creeping back in to this thread, there is no way we can discuss it without breaking forum rules, skirting round the edges does nobody any favours.
 
Ethan said:
Well, it would be a good start if people used coherent arguments rather than sweeping generalisations or personal attacks. If you are capable to any coherent arguments, have at it. Otherwise keep your personal attacks for the playground.
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Oxymoronic comedy gold.
This is an internet forum on the website of a golf magazine. There is no hierarchy among us. Any comments should be scrutinised within the house rules - even those of self-appointed experts.
It's a golf forum, not a public inquiry.
 
RichA said:
Oxymoronic comedy gold.
This is an internet forum on the website of a golf magazine. There is no hierarchy among us. Any comments should be scrutinised within the house rules - even those of self-appointed experts.
It's a golf forum, not a public inquiry.
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This is an interesting position to take considering the make-up of golf clubs covers a huge range of people and expertise. If you meet a pilot in your golf club do you accuse them of not being able to fly aircraft because they're only there to play golf?

There are many people on this forum who are bona-fide experts in their chosen profession and there are many here who are not. I'm personally comfortable with the position Ethan takes in the disregard of foolish opinion, long may it continue.
 
Jimaroid said:
This is an interesting position to take considering the make-up of golf clubs covers a huge range of people and expertise. If you meet a pilot in your golf club do you accuse them of not being able to fly aircraft because they're only there to play golf?

There are many people on this forum who are bona-fide experts in their chosen profession and there are many here who are not. I'm personally comfortable with the position Ethan takes in the disregard of foolish opinion, long may it continue.
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I don't recall accusing anyone of being unable to do their job.
If the Easyjet pilot starts talking about the mistakes of the government's wider policies, focusing solely on their personal view of air travel, while belittling anyone who disagrees with them, they'll probably be standing on their own fairly quickly.

More importantly, cream first, jam second, no butter. Any other technique is madness.
 
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