Coronavirus - how is it/has it affected you?

[SocketRocket]

I didnt say abandon all attempts, we can all do our bit with the distancing, wearing masks etc. But lockdown 1 didnt work, lockdown 2 didnt work. Lockdown 3 wont work. You could argue the government weren't hard enough early on and i would agree, you only have to look at this forum to see how people try to get around rules. But look at other countries that locked down far harder than we did, its running out of control there again as well. It might be time to admit this one has us beaten until everyone can be vaccinated

The lockdowns did seem to work though, infections dropped quite a bit in England during the recent one but jumped again as soon as it was eased. Putting on the old glasses of retrospect we should have kept it on longer.

 

[HomerJSimpson]

Mother in law quite poorly at the moment so wandered to Sainsbury's for some medication. Number of people I saw nonchalantly wandering in with no masks and call me a cynic but none had the sunflower lanyard and struck me as immune. People are simply sick and and tired of Covid and the only way we have any chance of controlling this is to do what the other parts of the UK are doing and be ruthless and shut England down as a nation. These tiers and who can do what gives people a chance to bend the rules too easily. I still think, and the new quicker transmitting strain may be the perfect excuse, that we could face a total lockdown in January (when people don't usually have much money or go out too much) perhaps into February.

Yes that will be tough and this forum has highlighted from a relatively small number how prevalent mental health has been affected and you can argue the pros and cons regarding the economy but until the infection rate drops and the new strain is checked, the vaccination programme is ramped up what choice is there?

 

[Swinglowandslow]

For many it is very important , especially for mental health and well being . I know a nurse who has worked non stop and hasnt seen her family for 7 months , she was due to have Xmas off and go back home on Wednesday to spend 4 days with her family to help her just switch off - do you expect her to now sit in on her own over Xmas ? And the same with many others in that situation, people that have followed to rules to the letter in the hope of being with family for a couple of days - are you ok to tell them it doesn’t matter. I guess you have family to spend time with over Xmas so have zero concept of what it means to others



Was that the same when everyone was encouraged to get out and eat out and spend in shops and pub and restaurants, was that in their minds when they started to get people all mixed in together or when they allowed big shops to open up and markets and cinemas. They allow indoor places of worship yet someone can’t go to their family for a day.

The effect on people’s mental well being could end up being more dramatic

The minute they said that people could no longer create a bubble people in Tier 4 those people with plans already they were immediately going to act so they could have some sort of normality over a very emotionally straining period.

You are out of order assuming that I have no family that I would otherwise see, and that I have zero concept etc. And you are wrong.
I also have read that under tier 4 ,households cannot mix but support bubbles are exempt. , It says you cannot now form a Xmas support bubble, so it must be considered that almost anyone now in tier4 could be at very high chance of being unknowingly infected.
If you had been living alone ( originally intending to see someone for Xmas) would you now go to see them risking giving them the virus?
Because that is what you are advocating .

 

[Deleted member 15344]

You are out of order assuming that I have no family that I would otherwise see, and that I have zero concept etc. And you are wrong.
I also have read that under tier 4 ,households cannot mix but support bubbles are exempt. , It says you cannot now form a Xmas support bubble, so it must be considered that almost anyone now in tier4 could be at very high chance of being unknowingly infected.
If you had been living alone ( originally intending to see someone for Xmas) would you now go to see them risking giving them the virus?
Because that is what you are advocating .

When someone dismisses spending time with family over Xmas as not important then I believe I can make an educated guess

And I’m certainly advocating the action that if someone is on their own within any tier and believes they will struggle during the holiday period and want to be with their family after a hard , emotionally and mentally tiring period -for them to go be with their parents/family - being alone and struggling mentally during Xmas is as dangerous as any virus and I would expect anyone to understand the need for some to be with family. If that means breaking the tier guidelines then so be it.

I certainly hope my friends goes and spend Xmas with her family

 

[HomerJSimpson]

When someone dismisses spending time with family over Xmas as not important then I believe I can make an educated guess

And I’m certainly advocating the action that if someone is on their own within any tier and believes they will struggle during the holiday period and want to be with their family after a hard , emotionally and mentally tiring period -for them to go be with their parents/family - being alone and struggling mentally during Xmas is as dangerous as any virus and I would expect anyone to understand the need for some to be with family. If that means breaking the tier guidelines then so be it.

I certainly hope my friends goes and spend Xmas with her family

Breaking the rules. Sorry but if everybody continues to carry on with this mentality when does the madness stop. It is tough. I've seen it first hand with overseas nurses and doctors that haven't been home to see family in nearly a year and won't be going this Christmas. Some of these are in nurses accommodation and so will be on their own at Christmas and so have decided to work over the festive period so those with family can get the time off. They could potentially have broken the rules and travelled or formed inappropriate bubbles but stuck by the rules. I get the issue over mental health but the bottom line is unless we start taking this seriously and abide by the rules then loneliness and lockdown will run and run.

 

[Blue in Munich]

When someone dismisses spending time with family over Xmas as not important then I believe I can make an educated guess

And I’m certainly advocating the action that if someone is on their own within any tier and believes they will struggle during the holiday period and want to be with their family after a hard , emotionally and mentally tiring period -for them to go be with their parents/family - being alone and struggling mentally during Xmas is as dangerous as any virus and I would expect anyone to understand the need for some to be with family. If that means breaking the tier guidelines then so be it.

I certainly hope my friends goes and spend Xmas with her family

But not so sympathetic to those who would have found the same relief from playing golf when that was banned.

 

[Kellfire]

I'm regularly pretty annoyed by the people constantly and openly breaking the rules, but I mean this most genuinely when I say that really someone in your situation just needs to quietly do what they need to do after what you've been through.

Whatever the official rules are in place, I'd personally give you a pass, so I hope you have as good a time as you can under the circumstances. ?

Cheers man. I’m playing it by the rules, because I work for the NHS and I believe in practice what I preach but I still get why people aren’t being strict.

 

[Billysboots]

Cheers man. I’m playing it by the rules, because I work for the NHS and I believe in practice what I preach but I still get why people aren’t being strict.

I wish you’d have a word with my sister in law, an NHS district nurse, who seems oblivious to the rules or the threat posed by the virus. She’s quite happy to receive visitors at home, and was quite willing to have my family and her parents visit on Boxing Day, in full knowledge of the fact her parents were spending Christmas Day with two other families. I told my wife, before the changes yesterday, that if she went on Boxing Day she’d be going on her own.

Yep, my sister in law is quite happy to flout the rules. But she’s also been happy enough to have the vaccine. A classic “sod you lot, I’m alright” approach if ever I saw one.

 

[Ethan]

Or we could accept that there are others with different opinions and ideas other than our own. Something sounding mad to one sounds totally sensible to another.
Don't forget Barnes-Wallace was thought mad at the initial outset.

I think pretty much all of the potential vaccines are being produced in large quantities already so that if/when they get approval there are a lot of doses ready to go. I'm pretty sure that I read that on the BBC news website. Maybe @Ethan will have more info on this.

The big manufacturers all started production "at risk". AZ/Oxford a partnership with the Serum Institute of India, and once approved there, the SII will bring a locally made version to market. The more user-friendly storage requirements for the AZ vaccine make it much more suitable for India than some of the others. There are also arrangements for some other Covid treatments in India. The logistics of mass vaccination there are mind-boggling.

 

[Deleted member 16999]

Lots of sanctimonious people on here today, but it highlights the issues and problems with the virus, where one person’s moral compass points is quite different to the next person.

We won’t have a total lockdown, it might get tighter, but we’ll never get a full proper one. Sadly, money has a higher value than life.

We will sadly see thousands of more deaths, which ever path is chosen.

I’m just thankful I’m not in the decision making process and damn glad some others on here aren’t either.

 

[Kellfire]

I wish you’d have a word with my sister in law, an NHS district nurse, who seems oblivious to the rules or the threat posed by the virus. She’s quite happy to receive visitors at home, and was quite willing to have my family and her parents visit on Boxing Day, in full knowledge of the fact her parents were spending Christmas Day with two other families. I told my wife, before the changes yesterday, that if she went on Boxing Day she’d be going on her own.

Yep, my sister in law is quite happy to flout the rules. But she’s also been happy enough to have the vaccine. A classic “sod you lot, I’m alright” approach if ever I saw one.

I have some faith that NHS workers by and large will be sensible when they break the rules. If that makes sense. Avoid close contact, be more hygienic etc. But I have nothing to back up that faith!

 

[Ethan]

I didnt say abandon all attempts, we can all do our bit with the distancing, wearing masks etc. But lockdown 1 didnt work, lockdown 2 didnt work. Lockdown 3 wont work. You could argue the government weren't hard enough early on and i would agree, you only have to look at this forum to see how people try to get around rules. But look at other countries that locked down far harder than we did, its running out of control there again as well. It might be time to admit this one has us beaten until everyone can be vaccinated

The lockdowns, such as they were, did work, but they only worked as far as the relatively gentle conditions and the variable acceptance allowed them. If you think things couldn't get a great deal worse very quickly, I think you are mistaken. What was needed was a proper lock down early, and that could have fundamentally changed the course. Half arsed lockdowns only pause the pandemic and inevitably it flares up again.

Looking back at the last 9 months and predicting what the next few will look like, do people seriously not think it would have been better to have had 2 months of severe lockdown, literally house arrest, back in early March, with inbound travellers all marched off to quarantine like in Oz?

There should be enough common ground between those who are concerned for lives and those concerned about the economy to get together and agree that we will stick a knife in this wretched virus once and for all. Lock the [you know what] down until a critical mass of the population is vaccinated, and the risk starts to fall.

There is a nice piece of evidence from the Pfizer data set that shows the case numbers in the treated and control group. The case numbers in the control (untreated group) rises in a straight line with time. The case numbers in the treated group rise exactly the same for the first 10 days or so after the first shot, then the line becomes almost horizontal, meaning very few new cases are added. This basically shows that protection starts to become pretty good 10 days after the first shot. The more people we get to that point, 1st vacc + 10, the safer we become. Every effort should be made to do that, so people like me, who haven't treated a patient in a long while, have volunteered to vaccinate. I am waiting for a response from the NHS HR service to see if they want my help. These back benchers, public figures, businessmen should be clearing obstacles to achieving this like their lives and businesses depended on it. They possibly do.

 

[Backache]

The lockdowns, such as they were, did work, but they only worked as far as the relatively gentle conditions and the variable acceptance allowed them. If you think things couldn't get a great deal worse very quickly, I think you are mistaken. What was needed was a proper lock down early, and that could have fundamentally changed the course. Half arsed lockdowns only pause the pandemic and inevitably it flares up again.

Looking back at the last 9 months and predicting what the next few will look like, do people seriously not think it would have been better to have had 2 months of severe lockdown, literally house arrest, back in early March, with inbound travellers all marched off to quarantine like in Oz?

There should be enough common ground between those who are concerned for lives and those concerned about the economy to get together and agree that we will stick a knife in this wretched virus once and for all. Lock the [you know what] down until a critical mass of the population is vaccinated, and the risk starts to fall.

There is a nice piece of evidence from the Pfizer data set that shows the case numbers in the treated and control group. The case numbers in the control (untreated group) rises in a straight line with time. The case numbers in the treated group rise exactly the same for the first 10 days or so after the first shot, then the line becomes almost horizontal, meaning very few new cases are added. This basically shows that protection starts to become pretty good 10 days after the first shot. The more people we get to that point, 1st vacc + 10, the safer we become. Every effort should be made to do that, so people like me, who haven't treated a patient in a long while, have volunteered to vaccinate. I am waiting for a response from the NHS HR service to see if they want my help. These back benchers, public figures, businessmen should be clearing obstacles to achievin[/g this like their lives and businesses depended on it. They possibly do.View attachment 34077

I've looked at that graph a few times and I'm not sure that the difference is necessarily important till around 20 days bearing in mind that each point represents a case, tha actual cumulative number of cases begins to seperate at about 14 days but might not be significant till around 21 days, the early separation looks impressive because of the extension of the graph rather than much real difference, though with a five day incubation period between infection and symptoms and therefore diagnosis I reckon between 2 and three weeks should see you safer.

 

[Tashyboy]

France and Ireland have now banned any lorries from entering there countries due to the new Covid strain. Bottom line they have isolated us. I totally understand. What I don’t understand is why we did not isolate ourselves as an island from the very beginning.

 

[Ethan]

I've looked at that graph a few times and I'm not sure that the difference is necessarily important till around 20 days bearing in mind that each point represents a case, tha actual cumulative number of cases begins to seperate at about 14 days but might not be significant till around 21 days, the early separation looks impressive because of the extension of the graph rather than much real difference, though with a five day incubation period between infection and symptoms and therefore diagnosis I reckon between 2 and three weeks should see you safer.

Sure, it probably doesn't reach statistical significance for a while longer, but when the effect kicks in, it looks like a solid response. If I had been given the vacc, I'd be feeling more relaxed after a couple of weeks.

 

[Backache]

Sure, it probably doesn't reach statistical significance for a while longer, but when the effect kicks in, it looks like a solid response. If I had been given the vacc, I'd be feeling more relaxed after a couple of weeks.

Hope so I'm 10 days post vacc.

 

[Ethan]

Hope so I'm 10 days post vacc.

Lucky you. I doubt I will get it until Spring. My wife (NHS doctor) got her first last week too.

 

[Backache]

Lucky you. I doubt I will get it until Spring. My wife (NHS doctor) got her first last week too.

Fingers crossed that everyone can get it soon.

 

[AdamW]

Fingers crossed that everyone can get it soon.

There is an estimate calculator here:

https://www.omnicalculator.com/health/vaccine-queue-uk

July - September is mine

 

[Backache]

There is an estimate calculator here:

https://www.omnicalculator.com/health/vaccine-queue-uk

July - September is mine

Thing is there is a huge unknown variable in the calculation which is the rate of vaccination which is not yet known. It may be a lot quicker or slower than the underlying assumption of that calculator depending on which vaccines are approved and when,