How would you rate the UK's handling of this pandemic?

[RobinBHM]

Remember we only locked down a few weeks after Italy and they were reluctant to do it and the virus was endemic by then anyway, we just did a safe political manouvre. So I think you probably feel clever being wise after the event but unless we locked down in Nov 2019 it would have made no difference. Most transmission is and was in the home

Untrue.

Viroligists have been saying since the beginning of the pandemic that ealier and hard is better.....resulting in overall less economic damage.

And studies concur:

"Figure 4bshows NPIs with the pattern ‘the earlier, the better’. For those measures (‘closure of educational institutions’, ‘small gatherings cancellation’, ‘airport restrictions’ and many more shown in Supplementary Information), early adoption is always more beneficial"

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-020-01009-0

 

[Billy_wizz]

Untrue.

Viroligists have been saying since the beginning of the pandemic that ealier and hard is better.....resulting in overall less economic damage.

And studies concur:

"Figure 4bshows NPIs with the pattern ‘the earlier, the better’. For those measures (‘closure of educational institutions’, ‘small gatherings cancellation’, ‘airport restrictions’ and many more shown in Supplementary Information), early adoption is always more beneficial"

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41562-020-01009-0

The truth is the true facts of how bad or well countries have done won't be known for at least 5 years if not 10

 

[billw]

You want to live in a country that would do that, go ahead find one and move there, I don't think you would like it the rest of the time though.

Singapore. Lovely place. It's authoritarian and the press is government-controlled but if you tell me that the government snooping on your emails isn't a price worth paying to have litter and graffiti-free streets, a police system that actively deters crime, and a massively well-prepared pandemic response programme, etc etc etc then hmmmm.

Oh and yes, I do want to go live there but it's somewhat difficult. Their passport is welcome visa-free in more places than the UK one too.

 

[Terry - Somerset]

From a political viewpoint there are only two possible outcomes:

• lockdown early and be blamed for the economic hardship
• lockdown late and be blamed for excess deaths

It is evident that rather than one right answer, both are right depending upon personal circumstances and beliefs..

We should not assume our personal balance of life vs economy vs personal freedoms is absolute, but that a range of opinions is justified.

Are deaths the only measure used to judge effective performance in C19 response. What about loss of jobs, livelihoods, mental health, education etc. Are all deaths equal irrespective of age.

We should look carefully at what has been learned to ensure we are far, far better prepared for the future.

I understand the Japanese in business prioritise rewarding those who find a solution, not blaming those who acted in error. This may or may not be true, but is a convincing behaviour.

Acting in error with the best of intentions is not wrong - acting with a clear intent for personal gain or political advantage is.

 

[PetePontoValentino]

Another record smashed today -

Last week's weekend lag took us to 1500 in a day.

This week we have topped 1600.

But just imagine how bad it would have been with that Corbyn chap.

(Or some other such non existent excuse for the massive failings of our currently leadership)

Yep, Boris is doing a fantastic job too, beating all records it seems

 

[PetePontoValentino]

https://www.tiktok.com/@memepower3232/video/6913960256796249345

 

[Rorschach]

Singapore. Lovely place. It's authoritarian and the press is government-controlled but if you tell me that the government snooping on your emails isn't a price worth paying to have litter and graffiti-free streets, a police system that actively deters crime, and a massively well-prepared pandemic response programme, etc etc etc then hmmmm.

Oh and yes, I do want to go live there but it's somewhat difficult. Their passport is welcome visa-free in more places than the UK one too.

That's fine if that's what you want. I have no problem with people living under whatever regime they want to, I just don't want that regime imposed here thank you nor do I want people saying "wouldn't it be better if we were like XXX country". There is a very good reason that thousands of people every year risk their lives (and many die in the process) trying to reach the UK having passed through plenty of safe, comfortable countries and some people want us to turn into the kinds of places they are escaping from.

 

[Rorschach]

From a political viewpoint there are only two possible outcomes:

• lockdown early and be blamed for the economic hardship
• lockdown late and be blamed for excess deaths

It is evident that rather than one right answer, both are right depending upon personal circumstances and beliefs..

We should not assume our personal balance of life vs economy vs personal freedoms is absolute, but that a range of opinions is justified.

Are deaths the only measure used to judge effective performance in C19 response. What about loss of jobs, livelihoods, mental health, education etc. Are all deaths equal irrespective of age.

We should look carefully at what has been learned to ensure we are far, far better prepared for the future.

I understand the Japanese in business prioritise rewarding those who find a solution, not blaming those who acted in error. This may or may not be true, but is a convincing behaviour.

Acting in error with the best of intentions is not wrong - acting with a clear intent for personal gain or political advantage is.

I agree. The problem is as nation we have become too afraid to deal with death because we are so good at putting it off. It's not just how many die, but who dies. At the moment we are still not dealing with uncomfortable that the vast majority of those dying are those who would die relatively soon anyway and we could be cutting years off the life of younger people (and giving them a much lower quality of life) in order to give Granny an extra 6 months of torture in a care home. Unless we have this conversation in the future lockdowns will be a regular winter feature I fear.

 

[selectortone]

People keep popping up on here saying that their local hospitals are ghost towns, yet every night on the news I see exhausted hospital workers and hospitals full of very sick people.

The only personal anecdote I have is from one of my daughter's friends, a theatre nurse of some 15 years or so, who has now been seconded to Covid Intensive Care at Bournemouth General. She's been one of my daughter's best friends since school and is level-headed and not someone I associate with hyperbole. She has always loved her job but she says she hates going to work now; she's basically holding people's hands, and watching them die. And no, they're not all in Rorshach's expendable age group either.

To add to this (for you doubters): I've just seen on BBC South Today that hospitals in Bournemouth and Poole are now full and Covid patients are being transferred to the Nightingale hospital in Exeter. Scary times. Still waiting for my vaccination letter.

 

[Jameshow]

I agree. The problem is as nation we have become too afraid to deal with death because we are so good at putting it off. It's not just how many die, but who dies. At the moment we are still not dealing with uncomfortable that the vast majority of those dying are those who would die relatively soon anyway and we could be cutting years off the life of younger people (and giving them a much lower quality of life) in order to give Granny an extra 6 months of torture in a care home. Unless we have this conversation in the future lockdowns will be a regular winter feature I fear.

How are we cutting years off the life of younger people?

My dad's 83 lived through the war - far worse than this pandemic as did all his generation and his / thier lives weren't cut short by it!!!

Cheers James

 

[Rorschach]

How are we cutting years off the life of younger people?

My dad's 83 lived through the war - far worse than this pandemic as did all his generation and his / thier lives weren't cut short by it!!!

Cheers James

This answer is a wind up, right? Please tell me it's a wind up.

 

[Selwyn]

I appreciate that is what you believe, however what you've said is opinion mixed with some emotive adjectives.

Please could you explain how it's possible to keep normal society functioning through a pandemic caused by a novel virus?

Given that London hospitals are pretty much overwhelmed
Given that hundreds of nurses, doctors, essential,workers have died.

I'm not sure how not imposing restrictions would've resulted in "normal society functioning"

You are not capable of looking at this issue in the round. You have covid tinted spectacles on which makes it difficult for you to understand that there is another side of harm being done. I expect you are comfortably retired

 

[Selwyn]

Dead healthcare workers
Dead essential workers
Hospital admissions higher than any flu
Long Covid damage

Those things mean a lot statistically.

research is certainly showing non pharmaceutical interventions reduce infection spread.

[/QUOTE]

I've told you. There was a pandemic in April. We are talking about the continued extension of the same narrative and the damage it is doing

 

[Selwyn]

The WHO says otherwise.

Why do you know better?

The WHO didn't even advocate lockdowns or masks.

 

[Selwyn]

There are many many ways to, statistically, represent how well or badly a country has performed during this time.

If you want to disregard simple statistics, like, for example, deaths per 1m of population, which make the uk look really quite poor indeed, could i ask -

What data puts the uk's handling of this in a favourable light?

I think given that all we will ultimately be left with one way or another, is the need for a level of community immunity then really we have a way to go yet. All countries do. The vaccine won't kill the virus.

The other glaring thing is type of death - you can pretend that all these deaths would not have occured if it wasn't for covid but its naive.

 

[selectortone]

Somebody commenting on the Bournemouth Echo website about the transfer of covid patients to the Nightingale hospital in Exeter (because our hospitals are full) says it better than I can:

"Has the penny dropping for you deniers yet?
Or is every gasping patient, grieving family member, exhausted nurse, and broken mortician I've seen on the news an actor?
Is it still a great conspiracy that governments worldwide are in on, with all the millions of staff involved from top to bottom complicit? Blimey, that's some great illusion to pull off."

 

[Rorschach]

Somebody commenting on the Bournemouth Echo website about the transfer of covid patients to the Nightingale hospital in Exeter (because our hospitals are full) says it better than I can:

"Has the penny dropping for you deniers yet?
Or is every gasping patient, grieving family member, exhausted nurse, and broken mortician I've seen on the news an actor?
Is it still a great conspiracy that governments worldwide are in on, with all the millions of staff involved from top to bottom complicit? Blimey, that's some great illusion to pull off."

Fair enough directing that at an actual Coviddenier, I am not a denier though and I don't think anyone commenting here is a denier?

 

[doctor Bob]

Somebody commenting on the Bournemouth Echo website about the transfer of covid patients to the Nightingale hospital in Exeter (because our hospitals are full) says it better than I can:

"Has the penny dropping for you deniers yet?
Or is every gasping patient, grieving family member, exhausted nurse, and broken mortician I've seen on the news an actor?
Is it still a great conspiracy that governments worldwide are in on, with all the millions of staff involved from top to bottom complicit? Blimey, that's some great illusion to pull off."

I don't think Rocshach and Selwyn are deniers, reading their posts, they are saying there may have been an alternative way.
The issue is not black and white, deniers and believers. To catagorise posters as this is wrong, I think there is a central position and some are one way or the other, more or less lock down / restrictions.

 

[selectortone]

Who said my comment was directed at anyone?

 

[doctor Bob]

Who said my comment was directed at anyone?