Coronavirus - The Thread :(

[e42b]

We won't overwhelm the virus. It fits perfectly to the actual human way of living, and since it's a virus it is able to react quite fast to human reactions (according to mechanisms Charles Darwin described some years ago).
Vaccinating, vaccinating, avoiding zoonosises by taking care of our natural environment or of what that we left over from, did i mention vaccinating, is what we now should be able to rely on.
(Unfortunately Germany seems to be lost in vaccinating management atm.)
In my opinion, we don't have another chance as to listen what FfF are fighting for to do us in long terms.

 

[pooroldcodger]

Catch 22 situation.

How many people have ended their own life in the last year specifically because of the lockdowns?

I'm not stupid, I know the answer is not zero and I genuinely know of at least one person who did take there own life. But then how do you square a few hundred lives of people dying from one thing versus 10,000 -100,000 dying of something else.

A motoring comparison is putting a speed limit on a road to reduce speeds and accidents, inevitably there will be that one person who crashed into the speed limit sign and gets killed.... do we ban all speed limit signs as a result.

Its that same sort of situation.

If we do .... then some people may die, versus a lot of people who will definately die. What do you do given that sort of data?

Well to continue with your analogy, you would put the speed limit signs in the least likely place for somebody to crash in to it such as on a straight and not on an apex. That would be minimising the risk of your intervention.
Then you would also make sure that road vehicles are as safe as possible, and therefore if somebody did manage somehow to hit a speed limit sign on a piece of straight road, they would probably survive it. That would also minimise the risk. But tehre always exceptions to every rule of course.
I think it is far too early to weigh up the complete effect of this exceptional intervention because just to state the obvious example, we don't know how many additional cancer deaths there will be as a result of delayed diagnosis do we? There are going to be so many aspects that will come to light over the next months and years to come.
Unfortunately in the new era where social media is the judge jury and executioner for governments and individuals alike, I am sorry to say that the Government were damned if they did and damned if they didn't (lock us down). I also think the Government are incompetent and arrogant, but as I say, they had a tough choice to make.
Just my opinion folks. Please don't take offence anybody.

 

[AndyRKett]

. But tehre always exceptions to every rule of course.

This alone makes everything else you’ve said irrelevant and is exactly my point.

You can do something to make things as safe as humanly possible and there could always be some weird of freak circumstance where someone still gets killed.

Yes there is the potential for deaths from all sorts of factors resulting from lock down, what you will never be able to accurately state is that lock down saved exactly “xxxx” number of lives. What you can conclude if you apply a bit of logic is that well over 100,000 died despite all the restrictions being in place, what would those numbers look like if there was no restriction and a virus that kills was able to run rampant without anything to stop it ? 200-300-500k who a knows for sure, what you can’t say is that 200k people won’t suddenly die because of missed cancer diagnosis because we know cancer numbers have had many years of recording and watching these and not every person who had:has cancer will be delayed In diagnosis and treatment, in many cases peoples own worries about catching the virus might mean they delay going to the doctor and getting seen this means that there is nothing the health service can do, the government did not tell that person to not see the gp about their specific symptoms so their delay was there own doing. If that person subsequently died is that a death you can attribute to lock down.

Too much is in flux to be able to make firm statements about what is or isn’t right or wrong but the complexity doesn’t sell new headlines so they will boil everything f down the black and white and take a side if it will sell papers

 

[pooroldcodger]

This alone makes everything else you’ve said irrelevant and is exactly my point.

You can do something to make things as safe as humanly possible and there could always be some weird of freak circumstance where someone still gets killed.

Yes there is the potential for deaths from all sorts of factors resulting from lock down, what you will never be able to accurately state is that lock down saved exactly “xxxx” number of lives. What you can conclude if you apply a bit of logic is that well over 100,000 died despite all the restrictions being in place, what would those numbers look like if there was no restriction and a virus that kills was able to run rampant without anything to stop it ? 200-300-500k who a knows for sure, what you can’t say is that 200k people won’t suddenly die because of missed cancer diagnosis because we know cancer numbers have had many years of recording and watching these and not every person who had:has cancer will be delayed In diagnosis and treatment, in many cases peoples own worries about catching the virus might mean they delay going to the doctor and getting seen this means that there is nothing the health service can do, the government did not tell that person to not see the gp about their specific symptoms so their delay was there own doing. If that person subsequently died is that a death you can attribute to lock down.

Too much is in flux to be able to make firm statements about what is or isn’t right or wrong but the complexity doesn’t sell new headlines so they will boil everything f down the black and white and take a side if it will sell papers

"Peoples own worries about catching the virus might mean they delay going to the doctor...."
Do you mean the STAY AT HOME, PROTECT THE NHS, SAVE LIVES" message by any chance? Of course they did not specifically tell that person not to see their GP about their specific symptoms. They didn't need to. The above message covered that one. Plus the nightly images from intensive care departments. It is only natural that people stayed away if they could. Especially as it seems that the most likely places you would catch covid were in hospital or a care home.
But whose fault is it when planned cancer treatment was cancelled? Was that the patients's fault?
As I said above - there are going to be so many facets of this that need to be taken in to account, and I agree with you in one respect - the sensationalist headlines of the media have been very unhelpful to say the least.

 

[09 johno]

"Peoples own worries about catching the virus might mean they delay going to the doctor...."
Do you mean the STAY AT HOME, PROTECT THE NHS, SAVE LIVES" message by any chance? Of course they did not specifically tell that person not to see their GP about their specific symptoms. .

I am certain they also made a point of ..'make sure you see you GP attend appointments unless otherwise informed' which I think makes your point mute.

 

[pooroldcodger]

See your GP - as in a telephone call. Yes that was possible in our surgery.

 

[AndyRKett]

You can have the greatest services in the world and there will still be someone who doesn’t go to appointments or doesn’t seek out treatment Covid or not.

It’s sort of got to the stage where I’m not sure what point you’re now trying to make ?

As the discussion about acknowledged that people might suffer in situations when people are trying to save the majority, no one has denied this so where are we going other than round and round ?

 

[NikolaMarinkovic]

Tbh, I don't think it is going to go away anytime soon. It's really hard, but this is our new reality now.

 

[bonifo17]

Tbh, I don't think it is going to go away anytime soon. It's really hard, but this is our new reality now.

I agree. To be honest, people are reaching out for help, but the medical community is at its capacity.

 

[AndyRKett]

I agree. To be honest, people are reaching out for help, but the medical community is at its capacity.

Not really maybe outside the uk but here things have been improving every day as the vaccine gets out there combined with the last long lock down,

 

[Kiltedboarder]

So just been for my 2nd Jab, it’s the Pfizer one so let’s see what tomorrow brings. Got another free pot of Jam - so not all bad

 

[Kiltedboarder]

Morning all, feeling fine after the 2nd jab. Maybe a bit tired but no sore arm like the 1st jab

 

[gar074]

Yes, but how was the jam?

 

[Kiltedboarder]

Oh yes, very good point. It was excellent. Raspberry and Rhubarb it was. Wife away for her jab - so more jam on the way

 

[e42b]

Not really maybe outside the uk but here things have been improving every day as the vaccine gets out there combined with the last long lock down,

Since i'm from D i must concede that my impression is that vaccinating in the UK is handled a lot better than here. I got my first jab yesterday though (AZ, only feeling some general indisposition).

 

[AndyRKett]

Since i'm from D i must concede that my impression is that vaccinating in the UK is handled a lot better than here. I got my first jab yesterday though (AZ, only feeling some general indisposition).

I think we just got a head start, but it won’t be long before the roll out across Europe catches up. I had the AZ jab, second jab coming soon. I looked at the new infection rate numbers here and it’s down to something like 2500 versus only two months ago when it was 60,000 a day.

I feel we are now reaching a point where as we slowly lift all the lock downs etc there will come a time that the government say, “that’s it, nothing more we can do”. I’d predict this could happen before the year is out

 

[bonifo17]

Good to hear that. Most countries in the southern Europe are officially doing better, shops are opening, we have less restrictions, but the numbers are the same.

 

[pooroldcodger]

I think we just got a head start, but it won’t be long before the roll out across Europe catches up. I had the AZ jab, second jab coming soon. I looked at the new infection rate numbers here and it’s down to something like 2500 versus only two months ago when it was 60,000 a day.

I feel we are now reaching a point where as we slowly lift all the lock downs etc there will come a time that the government say, “that’s it, nothing more we can do”. I’d predict this could happen before the year is out

I really hope you are right - about the "that's it, nothing more we can do" bit. Surely that would be the common sense approach but I have a horrible feeling that the government has now moved to a zero covid policy and come next Autumn we will be back under the thumb again. I really want to be wrong about this though.

 

[jimboy]

My concern is other countries. Things do indeed look promising here, but if other countries can’t stem COVID and its variants, there is a risk, if not a likelihood of spikes back here. Travel between countries is going to pose major risks. Our bubble up here in the Highlands is possibly one of the best places to be at the moment regarding this horrible pandemic, but people want to travel. Rightly or wrongly people have different thoughts and circumstances.

We can only hope.

 

[gar074]

I agree with jimboy. We should all be concerned about the importation and spread of new variants that our existing vaccines are not effective against. The "red zone" quarantine policy is a farce. The fact that it doesn't apply to India (where a new, more virulent variant is apparently spreading fast) is frankly absurd, and the surge testing for the SA variant in Wandsworth and Lambeth is in chaos. The mistakes of the last 12 months are being repeated yet again. (There's a theory that BJ won't prohibit travel from India because he's desperate to agree a trade deal before the EU does, but I'm sure our government would never sacrifice lives on the altar of Brexit...)