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Coronavirus - how is it/has it affected you?

Ethan said:
It is not discrimination if everyone has the opportunity to get one. If people choose not to get the vax (and there are very very few who medically can't), then they accept the consequences. They have the right not to be vacc'd but not the right to spread the infection to others.
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Out of curiosity, any idea of the numbers who can't be vacc'd due to medical conditions?
 
Crumplezone said:
Oh I don't know, it just sounded like the usual 'blame it on foreigners, especially asylum seekers' Daily Mail rubbish. As asylum seekers are, as you say, separated from the rest of the population, it seems a far more reasonable assumption that British people were spreading it. There's a lot more of them and they were mixing freely. Colossal number of idiots were choosing to ignore the rules.
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Except that Folkestone and Hythe had some of the lowest Covid numbers in Kent around the time that Macron started worrying about the "Kent variance" and I'm not certain how a few hundred immigrants locked in an old army barracks met enough British people to catch Covid as quick as they did - and, by the way I live in the Folkestone, Hythe area and didn't get my views from the Daily Mail
 
Slime said:
Out of curiosity, any idea of the numbers who can't be vacc'd due to medical conditions?
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Really only allergy to components of vaccine, and most who are allergic to components of one can switch to another. Pregnancy is not a contraindication, but it passes with time. Being a cancer patient or having an auto-immune disorder isn't either.
 
Hobbit said:
It’s how it’s distinguished is my concern. imagine if it’s a yellow star worn on the breast pocket. I’m all for a vaccine passport but I’d hate to see people being barred from entry to a restaurant etc purely because they haven’t yet been jabbed.
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Was the "yet" part deliberate? Because that little word moves the goalposts.
What Blair ( and others here) are talking about is those who refuse to be vaccinated.
Please accept that we are talking about those who are able to be vaccinated ( no medical reason preventing it) , and have been offered the vaccination, but of their own free will have declined/refused it.
Now those people should most definitely be refused entry to a restaurant!
And other places of high density of people where the virus could/ would easily spread.
 
One of the elements in this debate is the idea that if we reach a herd immunity threshold, the problem of unvaccinated people goes away. It doesn't.

Herd immunity is a mathematical model that basically says that if 1 person spreads to 3, for example, and you vaccinate or demonstrate that at least 2 out of 3 people are otherwise immune, then 1 person can only infect, on average, less than 1 other, so the pandemic cannot propagate. But you can still pass it on to non-immune people and they can still die, have an ICU staycation or pass it on, so there can be a persisting grumbling level of infection. This may be what people mean when they say 'we must learn to live with it', but they should remember than it can still kill people who are unvaccinated or whose immunity is not rock-solid or wears off.
 
Ethan said:
One of the elements in this debate is the idea that if we reach a herd immunity threshold, the problem of unvaccinated people goes away. It doesn't.

Herd immunity is a mathematical model that basically says that if 1 person spreads to 3, for example, and you vaccinate or demonstrate that at least 2 out of 3 people are otherwise immune, then 1 person can only infect, on average, less than 1 other, so the pandemic cannot propagate. But you can still pass it on to non-immune people and they can still die, have an ICU staycation or pass it on, so there can be a persisting grumbling level of infection. This may be what people mean when they say 'we must learn to live with it', but they should remember than it can still kill people who are unvaccinated or whose immunity is not rock-solid or wears off.
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Out of interest, one of the consequences of SD and improved hygiene being the apparent decline of the common cold, is our immunity to it going to be reduced and its effects potentially more severe than we've been used to?
 
RichA said:
Out of interest, one of the consequences of SD and improved hygiene being the apparent decline of the common cold, is our immunity to it going to be reduced and its effects potentially more severe than we've been used to?
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There has been a dramatic reduction (90%+) in flu as well this winter. Flu immunity is complex and has built up over years and decades, and it would probably take the same amount of time to abate, so I doubt we will see an increase in infectivity. We might see some extra deaths this winter, mainly because some of the people who would have died from flu this last winter dodged it, but their vulnerability is such that the next time it visits, its trouble. That is not a reduction in immunity, more a stay of execution. There is some development ongoing of combined Covid/flu vaccines which so far show that both work just as effectively as when given separately.

The common cold is caused by multiple viruses, including some coronaviruses. Unless the mix of viruses that cause it change, I don't think we'll see much change.
 
Ethan said:
There has been a dramatic reduction (90%+) in flu as well this winter. Flu immunity is complex and has built up over years and decades, and it would probably take the same amount of time to abate, so I doubt we will see an increase in infectivity. We might see some extra deaths this winter, mainly because some of the people who would have died from flu this last winter dodged it, but their vulnerability is such that the next time it visits, its trouble. That is not a reduction in immunity, more a stay of execution. There is some development ongoing of combined Covid/flu vaccines which so far show that both work just as effectively as when given separately.

The common cold is caused by multiple viruses, including some coronaviruses. Unless the mix of viruses that cause it change, I don't think we'll see much change.
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Would the re-introduction of mask wearing in shops etc during flu season have a pronounced impact on flu deaths going forward. Now the idea is not so alien, and re-introduction during flu season could be an idea (suspect public would not go for it though).
 
GB72 said:
Would the re-introduction of mask wearing in shops etc during flu season have a pronounced impact on flu deaths going forward. Now the idea is not so alien, and re-introduction during flu season could be an idea (suspect public would not go for it though).
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Yes, probably. Mask wearing has persisted in Asia after SARS. The howls of protest from people who think this is one step closer to totalitarianism would spread a lot of, well something bad.
 
Had my first jab on Saturday evening, the Pfizer one. My arm ached like I'd been punched and given a dead arm, and I didn't sleep very well as I kept waking up. But no side effects other than that. Arm is already feeling better today. (y)

Second jab not til August 27th. ?
 
chrisd said:
Except that Folkestone and Hythe had some of the lowest Covid numbers in Kent around the time that Macron started worrying about the "Kent variance" and I'm not certain how a few hundred immigrants locked in an old army barracks met enough British people to catch Covid as quick as they did - and, by the way I live in the Folkestone, Hythe area and didn't get my views from the Daily Mail
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It only takes one person to come in contact. As social distancing was made impossible by the conditions at the camp, it would spread very quickly.
 
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