Lockdown’s Last Lingerings - (Covid since L2 ended)

[Oldddudders]

One day recently, Sherry's cousin Sarah, a senior nurse, was part of a team that jabbed more than 1100 people in one day. Excellent!

 

Meanwhile, in the whole of France, last Thursday saw a magnificent 338 people injected. Across the border in Germany, 180k people have been injected in a week. 

 

Macron is not impressed. 

[Nearholmer]

1 hour ago, Reorte said:

Binary thinking is a real issue

Spot-on with your characterisation, and people will then change which box they put things in for very personal reasons. We are all prey to ‘confirmation bias’ too, so will tend to ‘see’ things that confirm the position we already hold, while being ‘blind’ to evidence in the opposite direction. Add in the odd ‘shock jock’ journalist, or a populist politician, and even the most neutral and nuanced thing can suddenly turn into “taking sides”.

 

Weird old things, us human beings.

[Reorte]

I wonder if they'll start giving the number of vaccinations carried out on the Covid dashboard?

 

[adb968008]

So..

 

30mn by April 4th.. enough for everyone over 50.

That confirms that, 2nd doses run between cApr 4th and cJuly 4th.
leaving 37mn, mostly under 50 without a vaccine.

 

Unless of course, it ramps up beyond 2mn per week.

 

but if kids arent a risk, why close schools, as most parents are under 50.. if under 50’s dont need a vaccine ?

 

Theres a gap in the story were not yet party to.

dont plan on summer holidays this year, if you've got kids... theres more covid to come yet.

 

 

Edited January 3, 2021 by adb968008

[Reorte]

37 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

but if kids arent a risk, why close schools, as most parents are under 50.. if under 50’s dont need a vaccine ?

They're certainly not at risk, but I keep hearing contradictory claims about whether they pose a noticeable risk of passing it on to others.

[Nearholmer]

There are two things to consider:

 

- the degree to which children are likely to pass it one to another in school; and,

 

- the degree to which, if they do catch it at school, they are likely to pass it on to others outside school.

 

There is research going-on into both questions, and the answers look likely to vary according to the age of the child, in that their systems change significantly, and become more adult-like, as they grow older. From what I can glean, this is why there is a difference of approach between primary and secondary schools.

 

The other thing to consider is that schools aren't being run as normal, there are a lot of precautions in place to reduce the likelihood of spread. But again they differ between primary and secondary schools, and in the case of secondaries the kids get the oportunity to be incautious outside supervision at the edges of the school day, whereas the vast majority of primary kids are accompanied* to and from school.

 

The reason for contradictory claims is, I think, because a lot of the research work hasn't been finished and published.

 

But, where the new strain of virus has taken hold, it makes sense, to me at least, to close all schools on a precautionary basis until things are better understood, or until daily testing is available at secondaries.

 

Speaking as a well over 50 dad, I take a lot of notice of all this stuff, because I want my children to go to school, but very definitely don't want to be catching the bug!

 

*Off at a slightly grumpy tangent, the primary school gate was a place where social-distancing, mask-wearing etc, was pretty flaky for a long while. I got seriously annoyed about it at one stage, because some of the younger parents were frankly rubbish at it, which was exceedingly disrespectful to the grand-parents, older parents, and the several parents that are undergoing immuno-suppressive cancer treatments. Thankfully, everyone got the plot after several weeks (well nearly everyone).

Edited January 3, 2021 by Nearholmer

[lapford34102]

1 hour ago, adb968008 said:

but if kids arent a risk, why close schools, as most parents are under 50.. if under 50’s dont need a vaccine ?

 As a retired teacher I generally support keeping education going in schools if possible but I hope someone somewhere is taking the age profile of school staff into consideration. A serving teacher in their 40's died of Covid over Xmas though no idea of the specific circumstances.

Stu

[rockershovel]

13 hours ago, rocor said:

 

A bottom up while spaced out in a large hall, could be a method for performing mass inoculations in the shortest possible time.

 

.. now I can’t unsee that....

[rockershovel]

6 hours ago, lapford34102 said:

 As a retired teacher I generally support keeping education going in schools if possible but I hope someone somewhere is taking the age profile of school staff into consideration. A serving teacher in their 40's died of Covid over Xmas though no idea of the specific circumstances.

Stu

 

... I shouldn’t think so, for a single moment. I don’t know of any other employment sector doing so, either. I would think that “-ism” issues apply. 

 

[ess1uk]

We’ve not had our bins emptied since Xmas eve, rumour has it that all the bin operatives are self isolating 

[rockershovel]

28 minutes ago, ess1uk said:

We’ve not had our bins emptied since Xmas eve, rumour has it that all the bin operatives are self isolating 

 

Ours were due Thu 31st and were actually emptied on Sat 2nd Jan. I heard the story about “self isolation”, don’t know its source 

[gordon s]

Surely that’s normal every year. Our collection date slipped two days in late December and will still be two days late this week. It won’t be until the 12th January when all returns to normal. 
 

Very easy to check if you to collection days on your local council web site. Of course you may well be right, but it’s easy to assume the worst....

[rockershovel]

42 minutes ago, gordon s said:

Surely that’s normal every year. Our collection date slipped two days in late December and will still be two days late this week. It won’t be until the 12th January when all returns to normal. 
 

Very easy to check if you to collection days on your local council web site. Of course you may well be right, but it’s easy to assume the worst....

 

No, the published dates weren’t achieved. Bins left out on the roadside for several days, all along the road. 

[Oldddudders]

My rubbish was collected on Christmas Eve and NY Eve, as it is every Thursday. My fortnightly recyc (everything but glass goes) should have been collected on NY Day, but was collected on the 2nd, instead. I live in a very rural area, but these services seldom falter for any reason.

 

I have just seen an online vid of Matt Hancock saying that two weeks after the initial Pfizer jab, 89.5% immunity has been acquired. If that claim is substantiated by senior medics, then the controversial 12-week gap before the second jab - so more can get their first dose sooner - does sound sensible. 

[Pete the Elaner]

2 hours ago, rockershovel said:

 

Ours were due Thu 31st and were actually emptied on Sat 2nd Jan. I heard the story about “self isolation”, don’t know its source 

 

No. It has been Christmas for refuse collectors too & they have days off too.

 

I was speaking to a collector on Saturday & I found it quite enlightening to see things from his point of view.

He told me that the amount of rubbish was far higher than usual, which he attributed to more people staying at home. This was making it difficult for them to catch up. This resulted in more unloading trips than usual, which was slowing down the collection rounds.

He also pointed out that the higher number of parked cars in the area (many parked inconsiderately) was making it increasingly difficult for the cart to get close to the collection areas. This may not apply to your area, but it does make the collection round as a whole slower. How many other areas does each vehicle cover in a day?

 

Our normal collection day is Wednesday but we received a newsletter detailing that after the Christmas break, the collections days would be Saturday, Friday then Thursday before returning to normal.

It seems that most failed to read this because there was a huge heap of bin bags in our collection area from last Wednesday.

[boxbrownie]

Our collections are the same every day of the year regardless, the ONLY exception is Christmas Day itself.......don’t you just love private enterprise! 

 

As if we cannot wait a few days and the company cannot adjust the rotor.......too lazy me thinks.

[john new]

As a former manager of a waste collection service one reason for the change around holidays is tip opening hours. If you can’t offload you delay collecting it. That has nothing to do with whether the service is in house direct labour or contracted out. 

 

Whether modern ways of working across society are fair on operatives is a totally different ball game, ask anyone who is, or has family, working in retail.

[rockershovel]

15 minutes ago, john new said:

As a former manager of a waste collection service one reason for the change around holidays is tip opening hours. If you can’t offload you delay collecting it. That has nothing to do with whether the service is in house direct labour or contracted out. 

 

Whether modern ways of working across society are fair on operatives is a totally different ball game, ask anyone who is, or has family, working in retail.

 

It’s most unusual for refuse collection to miss dates around here. They have a four-day x 10 hour working week, so a full day for overtime plus Sat, which they did on this occasion but certainly isn’t usual. 

[gordon s]

I could talk for hours on bin days. It's often the sole subject of conversation in Seniors Golf........

 

Highlight of my week....

 

 

[chrisf]

46 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

Our normal collection day is Wednesday but we received a newsletter detailing that after the Christmas break, the collections days would be Saturday, Friday then Thursday before returning to normal.

 

Newsletter?  You were lucky!  Round here we rely on telepathy backed up by the council webshite.

 

Chris

[John M Upton]

Well, around here the first Monday morning of the new year, roads busy as ever, so is the local Co-Op.  Key Worker/SEN/Vulnerable secondary school kids are back (everyone seems to have forgotten them in the furore, they have been at school the entire time since March) and my one goes back to Primary School tomorrow after todays inset day.

 

Only difference there is school run is now required to wear masks on the school premises and maintain distance between family groups, the latter being somewhat lacking towards the end of last term.

[adb968008]

No issues with our bin collection.

We live in a high council tax area though.

That means we have bad service all year, and nothing at christmas.

 

Foxes love christmas around here, brown food bins are useless, they know how to knock them over, empty the contents and spread it all over the road.

if you dont move it, the rats are next.

 

 

 

Edited January 4, 2021 by adb968008

[monkeysarefun]

Don't you leave a 6 pack out for them at Christmas there? 

 

Maybe its just an Australian custom but it ensures they do the run even on Christmas morning and for the rest of the year you get VIP service, I've had them stop the truck, come down the driveway and take my bin back for emptying on the odd day I've forgotten it's bin night.

 

It's day one of mandatory mask wearing here and there were zero cases reported in the state so that worked pretty quickly!

Edited January 4, 2021 by monkeysarefun

[Nearholmer]

I live in the same city as Pete, and the bin collection is always pretty good, and the guys are helpful if you talk with them.

 

We are, thankfully, on weekly collections, whereas as my BiL/SiL who live about 200m ‘over the border’ in the rural district council area, are on a decidedly iffy fortnightly service, with less recycling.

[BoD]

2 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

 

I have just seen an online vid of Matt Hancock saying that two weeks after the initial Pfizer jab, 89.5% immunity has been acquired. If that claim is substantiated by senior medics, then the controversial 12-week gap before the second jab - so more can get their first dose sooner - does sound sensible.

Many, if not all, of the surgeries/vaccination centres around here are giving the second jab as planned.   At least for those who have already had their first jab.  It wasn’t particularly done as a matter of principle but of practicality.  Cancelling the appointments of 1000 elderly, vulnerable people (who have already been told how vital it is that they come to their second appointment) and getting new appoints out to another 1000 people was just not possible in the within the given time.