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Proceedings of the Castle Aching Parish Council, 1905


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2 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

Unitary Authorities. Berkshire is an ex-county and has been since I forget when - late 1990s. If the unitary authority idea had caught on, then the gradation of tiering could be more subtle but for some arcane reason when it came to it every other county council found good reasons for its continued existence. The real disaster was that with the break-up of Berkshire County Libraries, when we moved over the border into Wokingham*, I lost access to Reading Central Library's loan copies of Bradley's Southern-constituent locomotive books.

 

*Although where we live is really part of Reading. Wokingham itself is a place I go less than once in a blue moon; it has no relevance to me.

 

While Berkshire is now six unitaries, it does not have six major hospitals with critical care units. That is a major factor in determining the Covid tier.

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I’ve been scratching my head about this low-rate rural area conundrum, and I think it’s related to the hierarchy of local authorities, and to hospitals.

 

The chosen ‘divvying-up’ is based on counties and unitary authorities, which makes it quite coarse-grained, but it sort of makes sense if particular hospitals serve the identified areas.

 

I somehow expected the divvy to be based on district councils and unitary authorities, which would have permitted a closer fit to local conditions, but maybe it would also have created an absolute morass of ‘border issues’, and been a nightmare to ‘message’ too.

 

Fortunately, we live in the area of a unitary authority, and the hospital catchment area maps very closely onto that, so at least the logic of the tier we are in makes sense (and the quite large rural parts of the authority can’t complain because they’ve had among the highest rates in the authority area, oddly).

Edited by Nearholmer
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Today Australia (with the exception of Sth Australia) has reached the working definition of eliminating the virus - no new cases from an unknown source for 28 days. Victoria has gone 26 days with no cases at all,  NSW is now on 20 and the other states have gone weeks or months.

 

The sobering thought is that back in August Australia actually had days of higher new cases than the UK .

 

At that point we went into targeted lockdowns,while the UK let its  people travel to Europe for holidays.

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As I have posted in the lockdown 2 thread, the decision is more than just how many cases.

 

we live in a high risk area.  So far out commune has had zero cases.   The last date for official statistics - 2018 - showed the area had 8 ITU beds.  Today we have 16 people in ITU beds (it was 17 when I posted in the other thread, but it looks as if one died today).   Clearly our resources are stretched even if case levels are relatively low.   So low levels but high risk.

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Because kids need education and structure, and some of them need the stable environment of school because they don't have stability at home. The damage to children caused by school closures in L1 was immense.

 

HMG have set keeping schools open as one of their objectives, the others clearly being not to have immense numbers of deaths from covid among 60+yo, and to keep the NHS functioning for non-covid treatments, the suspension of which also caused immense damage during L1.

 

Once those three boundary lines are in place, the freedom for manoeuvre in other respects pretty well disappears. 

 

Way back in the summer we were warned that it might come down to a choice between schools and pubs, and much as the present government isn't to my tastes in many respects, I think they made the right choice on our behalfs.

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I suppose you're right. It just seems strange that a class with 30+ kids in is fine whilst any more than 6 in any other environment apparently isn't. And they then wondered why cases rocketed once the schools reopened. Not everyone needed to be in school, in-person. And if it causes social problems for them then too bloody bad; They can learn what its like to have nobody to speak to most of the time and to feel cut off by their peers. Most of them have social media anyhow, which I didn't have the luxury of.

 

Sorry, just a bit sour about that. I heard lots of complaints first time about children not seeing their friends and my main thought was that they were lucky to have any in the first instance. 

 

Anyway, another problem is that most children and university students, unfortunately, seem to still be meeting in large and non-essential groups. I was kept up again last night by a group of approximately 12 of my fellow students drinking, smoking and I think consuming illegal substances outside my room; I've complained about it several times and nothing seems to be done. They all seem to think Covid will avoid them, I reckon; Yes it doesn't affect the young quite so much but it can still affect them and with the right conditions can still kill them. And we're not even in lockdown or tiers.

 

Mind you, this time round I gather that precious few people in England are abiding by the rules; From what family have said on the 'phone people are being more sensible up here, where we're out of lockdown, than down there where you'd be hard pushed to tell that they're in it.

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1 minute ago, sem34090 said:

It just seems strange that a class with 30+ kids in is fine whilst any more than 6 in any other environment apparently isn't.

 

I've heard that said so many times, and the explanation is pretty simple really.

 

We can only "afford" to have X number of really sick people per week, because that is how many can be effectively treated - any more and its over to gently allowing people to die (painkillers, sedatives, and quietly fade away), rather than an attempt to save them.

 

To control the number of really sick people, it is necessary to control the overall number who catch the bug because, without control, the numbers getting it, and the numbers getting really sick, will be too great.

 

So, there is effectively a "bucket" of disease spread that is allowable, any more spells trouble, and choices about what you put in that bucket.

 

So, you put in the transmission that occurs in schools and universities, because you want those places to remain open. You put in transmission that occurs during essential shopping, because that's essential. You put in transmission that occurs in workplaces that have to stay open. 

 

Crikey! This bucket is getting very nearly full ....... right, there is just about room to add meeting your mates in groups of six ........ oh sh!t, if we let you do that indoors the bucket overflows ..... ah, but if we only let you do it outdoors its just about OK.

 

Make sense?

 

 

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If you except Liverpool, which had distinct and specific measures employed and has reversed a bad situation to its credit, the Tier 3  and Tier 2 map is the perfect North-South divide, with only consistently affluent Tory pockets, such as North Yorkshire and Cheshire escaping to Tier 2.

 

Two things are suggested by this, to my mind. 

 

Either:

 

(1) Infection rates are as bad pretty much across the board, but Minister's constituencies and the affluent south have by and large been spared further restrictions for political and economic reasons.  Sir Graham Brady's righteous angst over Greater Manchester may run somewhat counter to this as he is a senior Tory, but he also appears to be one of the libertarian anti-lockdown voices who will rebel anyway, so can be left out in the cold according to the sorts of calculations this government has made before. 

 

And/Or

 

(2)  Decisions are not being made based upon localised infection rates, but on the NHS's capacity in each administrative area and this will be a function of a combination of matters including the relative funding levels and the enhanced impact of the virus on areas with greater social deprivation.  Both are, of course, consequences of Westminster's long-term indifference to and neglect of the remoter regions of England.

 

The interesting question is whether the next election will be determined, like the last, by a somewhat xenophobic displacement of the understandable discontent at that neglect, cynically whipped up by Brexiteer populists, or whether the current mood of resentment will remain, and the present administration's perceived failure to support the North properly will be recalled.

 

As things stand at the moment, fortunately Tier 3 travel restrictions are likely to allow the PM to avoid a trip to the Red Wall. He'd be torn limb from limb in some places up here.    

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20 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

Decisions are not being made based upon localised infection rates, but on the NHS's capacity in each administrative area and this will be a function of a combination of matters including the relative funding levels and the enhanced impact of the virus on areas with greater social deprivation. 


Of course.

 

The U.K. went into this with near ‘third world’ levels of ICU capacity, not much more than half the capacity per capita of Italy and France, and less than a quarter of the capacity of Germany.


And, we have endemic poverty and the poor background health that goes with it in wide swathes of the country.

 

Large chunks of north Kent, and South Wales are in the same boat economically as ‘the north’, and they too are suffering very badly under Covid, so it isn’t a simple N-S divide, it’s a comfortable-poor divide.

 

This happy Isle?

Edited by Nearholmer
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Figures published in Scotland by the NHS, through Test and Protect, showed that prevalence among teachers and pupils in Scotland was no greater than in the community as a whole and the inference was that spread was community based rather than school based.

 

If a few people won't follow the rules, everyone pays the price.

 

Jim

 

 

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2 hours ago, Caley Jim said:

If a few people won't follow the rules, everyone pays the price.

 

 I agree but, unfortunately, if you cry "Wolf" or play Matilda too many times people ignore the warnings.

 

I personally think, and have said this from the start, that the government overreacted to a relatively minor threat.

Before anyone disagrees with me note that I said overreacted to a relatively minor threat.

That does not mean that they should have ignored it, as the US president attempted to do, but that they perhaps should have been more circumspect in their actions.

 

As far as I can determine roughly 60,000 deaths have been attributed to Corvid-19 in the UK.

I agree that it is tragic that anyone has to die from it.

However, putting this into perspective, this is 60,000 out of 60,000,000, i.e. 1 in 1000 or 0.1%.

There seems to be a prevailing almost hysterical reaction to this and a demand that all Corvid deaths should immediately be stopped at any cost.

I recently saw a TV programme in which a well known presenter, a Professor at either Oxford or Cambridge, seriously implied that Corvid was of the same magnitude as the Black Death.

I have also learned that I was invited to return to work on the railways because Network Rail were apparently advised to expect 25% of their signalmen to die.

 

Such overestimates of the death toll have to be set against the economic consequences of the government's actions and people;s unwillingness to accept advice.

We are now forecast to enter the worst recession in 300 years.

Many people (a lot more than 60,000) now face unemployment as a result of the government's actions.

It seems likely that large numbers will have their homes repossessed because they will be unable to meet mortgage repayments because they have been made unemployed.

Other items, such as cars, are likely to be repossessed as well.

 

The costs of these decisions will be borne by the workforce for decades to come, and to what avail?

Corvid is a respiratory disease.

It therefore seems likely that it will recur every winter.

The governmrnt has touted a vaccine to cure this but no-one has so far managed to eradicate the common cold or flu which are similar respiratory diseases.

What do they intend to do if the disease flairs up again next year and the year after, and the year after that ad nauseum?

At some point in the proceedings they are going to have to acknowledge that indefinite lock downs is not the way forward.

 

I appreciate that it is easy to look in from the outside when one is not making these decisions but the government have not helped themselves.

They producing scaremongering projections of the anticipated death rate which proved massively higher than anything actually sustained.

They manipulated outdated and massively inflated death figures as justification for their last lockdown.

They then then promised that the lockdown would last for four weeks.

By a sleight of hand they have re-introduced lockdown by the backdoor, i.e. classifying the entire country as tier 2 or 3 with a few exceptions.

 

Given the deliberate misinformation or simple incomptence displayed by the current admininstration is it any wonder that people are losing faith in their ability to govern and are ignoring whatever warnings they produce?

 

I appreciate that some will find my views distasteful and take umbrage as they feel fit.

Unfortunately they are quite representative of those of many people, and rather more restarined than plenty that I hear, in my own area of rural West Norfolk where there have been very few Corvid deaths to date.

 

 

Ian T

 

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32 minutes ago, ianathompson said:

Before anyone disagrees with me note that I said overreacted to a relatively minor threat.

It’s not minor if you get it, and are in a “high risk” group, and at the time, we didn’t know how bad it might be - nor indeed do we yet, as we have not done nothing at all.

But of those 60,000 or so, Covid-19 may have been an exacerbating factor which brought death sooner, it may not have been a factor at all in some cases, so the number of deaths directly attributable to the virus may never be accurately known, but it is likely to be substantially less than that number.

 

I think the reaction shown by the government, if it was to be taken, was taken too late, and lifted too early. Without good trace, track and isolate procedures, it was terribly flawed, and a less severe reaction was only possible with a reliable system, which again is something the Germans were very capable of doing, and we weren’t. (Although we used to be able to do it, but got rid of stockpiles of PPE and people to do things like make calls, so “outsourced” it to a mate of the PM.) 

 

We are governed by a weak elite that is incapable of making a firm decision until the circumstances decide it for them, which is a recipe for disaster in a disaster, and they haven’t even delivered on the promises they made over what got them elected: Brexit.

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Oh dear Ian,

I won't go through every point but 60,000 deaths is not nothing.  We introduced car seat belts to get the death rate on the roads down from 6000. 

 

Remember it is 60.000 so far (9 months in) and if your pessimistic view on vaccines were to be right that would be around that number every year.   The evidence so far strongly suggests that the vaccines will protect - although it may be necessary to get a booster jab on a regular basis.  But that is no difference to the flu - where again we vaccinate the vulnerable to avoid many thousands of deaths each year.  

 

Comparing deaths with job losses is I am afraid a false comparison.  You can always get another job later, getting another life is  rather more difficult.   That is not to belittle the consequences that you rightly point out

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Ian

 

I will ask you the same question I ask anyone who lays out the ‘overreaction’ line.

 

What, in some detail, would you advocate should have been done instead up to now, and what, in some detail, would you advocate should be done now?

 

So far, I’ve never had a cogent, practically-based, answer, and neither have I heard a scientist, pundit, or politician who is in the ‘overreaction’ camp give one either.

 

Over to you.

 

Kevin

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1 hour ago, ianathompson said:

They manipulated outdated and massively inflated death figures as justification for their last lockdown.

I will try to remain polite and restrained in responding to you Ian, but I have to agree entirely with @Regularity@Andy Hayter and @Nearholmer .  These 'massively inflated death figures' you mention were the likely outcome if nothing was done.  You clearly have no knowledge of Public Health.

 

If the virus was to be allowed to run out of control there would not only be huge numbers of deaths, but also a great deal of morbidity as we now know about 'Long Covid' as it has been dubbed.  What do businesses do if large numbers of their employees either die or are no longer fit to work?  Likewise their customers?

 

I'm afraid I have little time for those who simply attempt to shoot down whatever is suggested or has been done without proposing an alternative solution.

 

Just look across 'The Pond' for the health tragedy which is unfolding there through lack of any coherent strategy.

 

As @Nearholmer has said - Over to you!

 

Jim

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8 minutes ago, Caley Jim said:

Just look across 'The Pond' for the health tragedy which is unfolding there through lack of any coherent strategy.

 

That is the most flattering reference to the UK government's response I've yet read.

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Our 'walled city' approach here in New Zealand with nobody getting in unless they are a citizen and then only after compulsory military supervised 14 day quarantine combined with high levels of contact tracing should an outbreak occur has worked for us since there's only 5 million of us.  BUT I'm not so foolish as to think that the same thing would have worked in the Uk. 

I really could not say what could have been done or what could be done now in your present situation.  Certainly more decisive action right from the start would have made a difference, but apart from that I really don't know.

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46 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

That is the most flattering reference to the UK government's response I've yet read.

I was not intending to 'flatter' the UK government over their actions in England, but merely to indicate the sort of scenario we could have been facing if the 'it's only a mild virus' attitude had been taken.  While I am no supporter of their overall policies I feel the the Scottish Government have taken a much more reasoned, coherent and cautious approach.

 

Jim

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30 minutes ago, Caley Jim said:

I was not intending to 'flatter' the UK government over their actions in England, but merely to indicate the sort of scenario we could have been facing if the 'it's only a mild virus' attitude had been taken.  While I am no supporter of their overall policies I feel the the Scottish Government have taken a much more reasoned, coherent and cautious approach.

 

It was the implication that there has been a "coherent strategy" in the UK to contrast with the situation in the US that amused me, grimly.

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It would seem that I am, or am not, very popular for presenting my views which are at variance with those normally expressed here!

Right at the very start i will state that I am not going to enter into protracted arguments with various correspondents on this thread.

I have stated my views and If you disagree with them and wish to disparage them that is fine.

Many people on this thread state things that I disagree with but I do not usually take umbrage.

I will answer some of the questions raised immediately after the initial post and leave it at that.

 

 I would reiterate that my views do not seem to be untypical of those held by many people.

 

4 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

I will ask you the same question I ask anyone who lays out the ‘overreaction’ line.

 

What, in some detail, would you advocate should have been done instead up to now, and what, in some detail, would you advocate should be done now?

 

If I was being cynical I could imply from this statement that you totally endorse every aspect of the government's handling of this disease.

I am not being cynical (today anyway) so I will take it in the manner in which I hope that it was intended.

 

In response  I would have suggested that moving more along the lines adopted in Sweden might have been better, although I appreciate that their policy has come in for criticism.

 

The government initially imposed a three  week lock down to establish quite what the virus was.

I have no problem with this. That seems a reasonable response to an unknown threat.

The government extended this, without any cogent explanation, or apparent jusfification, to three months.

I am not a policy planner, obviously, but I would suggest that the following might have been tried.

 

1. Isolate any vulnerable people and theit carers. Restrict their social contact. Make sure that they get priority medical attention.

I think that we are all agreed on that point.

 

Now we come to the more contraversial suggestions.

 

2. For non vulnerable people introduce restrictions such as face masks in confined spaces and restricted physical contact such as 1.5 metres (adopted by the rest of Europe) or the 2 metres adopted in Britain.

Otherwise continue as close to normal as possible.

If there are severe localised outbreaks impose restrictions on the smallest area and for the shortest time commensurate with bringing the outbreak under control. As the vulnerable people are out of circulation the outbreak should theoretically affect those more able to cope with it.

This would allow businesses to continue operating, albeit at reduced capacity, without hopefully the need to furlough large proportions of the population.

These workers and businesses would also be paying taxes to fund those who were unable to continue working.

The government's current policies have reduced this revenue stream whilst increasing outgoings.

 

3. Accept that a latge proportion of the non vulnerable population will contract Corvid-19.

Corvid-19 is unpleasant, I understand, but that the vast majority of healthy people will apparently survive contact with the disease with few after effects.

I know of five or six people that think that they have had it, unbeknownst to them at the time., including one who retrospectively tested positive for it.

Improve the testing facilities so that people can be tested locally and quickly informed of their results.

I understand that this facility was available in my area but it would seem that incompetency prevented it working as intended in many areas of the country.

For those who have a bad reaction to the disease hospitalise them and treat them. 

Within reason, minor medical cases will have to wait whist Corvid-19 cases are treated.

 

4. Whatever restrictions are introduced keep them simple and do not constantly tinker with them at five minute intervals.

The government carried out so many about turns that few, including the police and they themselves, seemed to know at one point what these restrictions were.

I would also suggest trying to encourage people to see the restrictions as necessary evils rather than something imposed by an uncaring potentially malevolent higher authority.

I certainly would not, as our PM has done, advocate potentially bringing the army onto the streets or to suggest, as the Home Secretary did, that people should act like Stasi informants, reporting their neighbours for any minor infringement of the regulations.

Oh, and yes. I know of one case where this happened.

The social implications will reverberate for years.

I might also have thought that removing the Police as the first line of call for infractions would also help to persuade people of the government's better intentions.

 

 

And finally, most contraversial of all.

 

5. Accept that the country will sustain a higher death rate than you will obtain by totally shutting the country down.

I am not advocating massively inflated numbers such as 10% but  would perhaps suggest that, if push came to shove, that the figure should be  higher than 0.1%

 

I accept that many correspondents on this thread have made this their line in the sand and will recoil in horror.

 

Unfortunately, whatever we do, we have to accept that Corvid-19 will cause deaths. 

The unpallatable question that has to be answered is how many do we accept and what collateral damage do we sustain if we devote our entire attention and resources to tackling Corvid-19?

 

Before my critics react to this perhaps they might ponder the following costs of fighting Corvid-19 in the manner that they advocate and that the  government have done, the "friendly fire" if you like.

The government's advice, and that emanating from Ministers, was that people should not go to hospitals except during dire emergencies during the first lock down.

The resulting analysis showed that fighting Corvid-19, to the exclusion of all other considerations, has had its own, expensive, costs.

 

Regarding the medical points these are, as I understand them, that many people waiting for non-essential but still life enhancing, operations have been told that they will be waiting for many more years now, if they are still alive to receive them.

How many people do you advocate should lose their mobility or eyesight to prevent one Corvid-19 death?

 

Many people have died of heart attacks, other treatable maladies and cancer that would have been alive had the NHS not been Corvid-19 focussed.

Is this an acceptable cost of a Corvid first and Corvid last approach?

 

I also understand that admissions to mental institutions have risen significantly and that suicide rates have gone up whilst domestic abuse towards women and children has soared during these lock downs.

 

I would also reiterate the points made in the original post about the economic costs to this country.

Again I know, from having discussed these points, that some argue these are not worth one death that could be prevented. 

Presumably those people advocate saving 1 life at any cost are prepared to wreck roughly 2,000,000 others, which is the likely cost in unemployment terms in the next year or so.

Presumably they also are pepared to disregard the large numbers of people who will be made homeless as a consequence.

 

In answer as to what I would now do and in sysnopsis of the ideas as outlined above.

 

1. Keep the vulnerable secure from sources of the disease.

Keep the relatives of these people, who provide care, out of general circulation and pay them for not working, if they are unable to work from home.

2. Allow social contact for non vulnerable people, in a restricted manner (I.e. face maks indoors and socially distanced outside).

3. For those non vulnerable people that get Corvid isolate them (not their community) and provide treatment if necessary.

For those who suffer intensely offer hospitalisation.

4. (As a government) Stop being prescriptive and coercive.

Engage in dialogue with people on the ground.

Put out clear guidelines that are easily understood by everyone.

Encourage a co-operative rather than adversorial spirit.

Involve the legal process as a last reaction rather than as a knee jerk.

5. Accept a higher death rate from Corvid-19 if necessary but concentrate upon preventing as many other deaths and medical problems as possible.

 

 

 

It seems to me that the reaction to this disease is a balancing act. There are tough decisions to be made but I stand by my assertion that I do not think that we have got it right.

 

 

 

4 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

Oh dear Ian,

I won't go through every point but 60,000 deaths is not nothing.

 

 

I have reread my original post and I fail to see where I have stated this.

I actually stated that I agree that it is tragic that anyone has to die from it.

 

 

Finally, as numerous people have asked what I would have done differently, and as I have honsestly attempted to answer in the full knowledge of the vitriol which will be tipped upon my head, can I ask again one of the questions from my original post?

 

5 hours ago, ianathompson said:

What do they intend to do if the disease flairs up again next year and the year after, and the year after that ad nauseum?

 

Corvid-19 is a respiratory disease.

It is here and it seems unlikely to disappear.

If, and it is a vary big if, a vaccine is found that eradicates it, all well and good.

I am no medic but it seems likely that the disease will mutate and that no definitive vaccine will be found.

If that is the case we will have to get on with out lives or live cowering in permanent fear.

 

Lets assume that the vaccine does not eradicate Corvid-19 and that it is till here and virulent in 2030.

What do the people that rush to disagree with me propose?

 

Ten years on, will we still be undergoing lock down for five months of the year and restricted in our civil liberties for the remaining seven?

 

What fiscal policies will be adopted whereby we pay large proportions of the workforce to remain furloughed whilst the revenues from taxes diminish to a trickle?

 

How will you persuade people to follow the latest government health guidelines without the imposition of harsh martial law, including rationing and forced labour?

 

I look forward to being the thread's favourite targetman for the next few days.

 

I have said what I will say on this subject and will not respond further. 

 

This reply has already cost me nore than a couple of hours that could more profitably, and less contraversially, making models.

 

Ian T

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11 minutes ago, ianathompson said:

Isolate any vulnerable people and theit carers. Restrict their social contact. Make sure that they get priority medical attention.

 I think that we are all agreed on that point.

 

No we are not agreed.

 

"The Vulnerable" (identified slightly differently at different stages, as knowledge has increased) comprise a significant proportion of the population, and aren't people who are somehow detached from the daily business of society, they are "among us", in most cases fully-functioning members of society who happen to either have a medical condition or be getting on a bit. I know three mothers of young children who live within half a mile of here who are immuno-suppressed due to recent cancer treatment, for instance, and multiple 70+yo who are key to childcare in their families, and that is just off the top of my head.

 

If you advocate "isolating" them in some complete way, you need to get to the nuts and bolts of how, to describe what that actually means. Do the immuno-suppressed mothers of young children go and live in a nunnery in the country for the duration? Do all the Dad's who suffer diabetes decamp to a re-purposed Center Parcs for a year? Does everyone 70+ go and live in Bournemouth, around which a barbed wire fence and  a moat will be erected?

 

Affording some people special protection for a short  period is one thing, but the practicalities of "isolating" about 20% of the population, even confining them to their own homes, would be immense, and not something that could be done quickly, even if it was a good idea, which is very questionable from a social-cohesion perspective in itself.

 

25 minutes ago, ianathompson said:

It seems to me that the reaction to this disease is a balancing act and I stand by my assertion that I do not think that we have got it right.

 

On that I totally agree with you. There are definitely things that could have been done much better.

 

It also happens to be the case that I seriously wonder if we would be forced to move to a "fully isolated" model, to tackle all the horrendous practicalities involved in that, for next winter if vaccination wasn't quick/effective enough. But, thankfully the signs are that we won't need to contemplate that.

 

But to "back fit" the a fully isolated model to what has happened this year so far, or even to attempt to fit it to where we are today is simply to ignore a myriad real, practical issues.

 

No vitriol, Ian, merely a repeated plea to think really hard about the practicalities of what you advocate. Even advocating permitting a higher rate of fatalities begs the question: so how is that going to work then? What are the nuts and bolts of it? You need to tell us what it means in practice.

 

Finally, I do respect that you've got the b*lls to at least try to lay out a plan, even if I do think its deeply flawed.

 

Kevin

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1 hour ago, ianathompson said:

 

 

 

It would seem that I am, or am not, very popular for presenting my views which are at variance with those normally expressed here!

 

Having a minority view doesn’t make you unpopular.

Ranting on at length when others disagree with you, on the other hand, is not to be undertaken lightly...take it from someone who really knows!

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Ian

Thank you for that thought out response.  I don't agree with much that you say but I do accept that a lot of thought has been put into the answer.

 

Just one point of detail regarding the vaccine.  The vaccines are not designed to eliminate the disease.   They are intended to protect people from the effects of the disease which is not the same thing.  It is highly likely that C-19 will be with us for many years to come therefore and that is why, as I said above, booster jabs may well be required.  So yes we may well be getting our shots in 2030.  What I do not believe is that we will be having lock downs in 2030.  

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