When will this shit end?

[RobertProsineckisLighter]

2 minutes ago, Ozanne said:

Labour have called for several changes through this pandemic such as:

- extension of furlough

- circuit break lockdown

- clarity for businesses in regards to opening up

- extension of eviction ban

- cancellation of Christmas relaxations

- Test and Trace into the hands of the NHS

- Vaccination for teachers during half term

- Free school meals for kids

You might not agree with them but those are just a few of what Labour have been calling for. 

I do believe Labour would have done some of those things in the list e.g. free school meals, furlough, eviction ban etc... all of which should absolutely be done. 

Other that the circuit breaker not much of what labour have suggested is that different from what the government have done, they would have just have done it for longer. 

2 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

Labour's in a tricky situation with this pandemic...but post pandemic is when they really need to say what they're for. I think Starmer is going to start outlining policies and stuff next week as he is under pressure to do so...but will people listen? will anyone be interested? They just want to know when schools are back and when pubs are open.

Totally agree - and I think at somepoint they are really going to have to come up with something alternative that's not as 'scary' as what Corbyn was putting forward. Interesting times indeed.

[efcfanwirral]

10 minutes ago, steviewevie said:

Labour's in a tricky situation with this pandemic...but post pandemic is when they really need to say what they're for. I think Starmer is going to start outlining policies and stuff next week as he is under pressure to do so...but will people listen? will anyone be interested? They just want to know when schools are back and when pubs are open.

 

3 minutes ago, Ozanne said:

They really do, how dare they oppose a government when they are the opposition. Or they aren’t opposing enough when they vote for the government restrictions. 

Same as the above some people will moan Starmer hasn’t offered any policies then next week some will say why do we care we are in a pandemic.

Problem with policies is that they will be pointless and useless, as nobody knows what's going to happen. Say the South African variant sets us back another year, any economic promises he makes will be worthless but they'll still get dragged out as "broken promises" come manifesto time. 

[zahidf]

1 hour ago, Ozanne said:

I’ve tried mate but some just don’t want to see it, to get anywhere you have to put in your post every other paragraph that they are doing well with the vaccine program. The usual defence comes out of ‘no government could’ve done better’ ignoring the fact that many have and ‘the pandemic isn’t over yet’ likening the deaths of over 100k people to a football game. It’s so disrespectful to the families that are grieving.

We can still learn from the many mistakes that have gone been made as country, acknowledge that this government has been one of the worst in the world at handling the pandemic and do that whilst we are in said pandemic.

If you are genuine defending the government now ask yourself this, if this was Corbyn after he’d won’t the 2019 election would be saying the same thing? I doubt it very much. The Tories are playing politics on easy mode whilst everyone else plays on hard. 

Its interesting: would a corbyn govt have got a good vaccination programme together? He wouldn't have instructed Bingham.  And would have had an ideological objection to big pharma

Also, I see it as people trying to look at things unlocking more positively. I think automatically saying THOUSANDS ARR GOING TO DIE BECAUSE OF THE PLAN without specifying a different timescale is doom mongering a bit.

[RobertProsineckisLighter]

22 minutes ago, aj6658 said:

Well you do sound like an apologist for this government, 

"some of those deaths would have happened anyway" - But what of all the deaths that wouldn't of happened if we made better decisions?  New Zealand has 25 deaths. 25! They are also having gigs, parties and sports events. Still waiting for the reasons you think we are so different to NZ that we could never achieve what they have.

Can you provide examples of decisions that the government made that saved lives? These decisions should be ones which wasn't a U turn (E.g. Schools)  or a large delay in coming to the decision (e.g. circuit breakers). The only ones I can think of are sorting out the vaccine supply earlier than the EU and extending to 12 weeks (high risk play). The good decisions now don't balance out the numerous previously.

Think it sad that it is acceptable that government makes political decisions. We didn't need to open for Christmas. 25% of the deaths occurred in January. 

Every time the government has locked down has saved lives it's wouldn't if it did nothing like some nations - but they should have saved more 

The biggest life saving decisions the government have made are all around the sheer amount of money it pumped into vaccines and way it acted decisively on buying loads and loads of doses. If they had all failed then, well that's a different story. These were made early in the pandemic and at the time there were mumblings of discontent around buying up so much stuff that might not work as well as hoped (like the rapid testing). 

The Christmas thing, it's not like we opened up and went wild it was relaxed for one day, a lot of the damage from January was caused further back that Xmas... One of the biggest mistakes was the (soon to be scrapped) Tiers is rarely discussed but with a few exceptions all the areas badly affected this winter were the ones that were in the lower tiers before and following the November lockdown.

I think the biggest problem is looking at places like New Zealand and seeing what they did, isn't necessarily an option that would work for us. 

Edited February 13, 2021 by RobertProsineckisLighter

[Fuzzy Afro]

52 minutes ago, zero000 said:

 

Seeing stuff like this on Twitter is making my blood boil.  There will be an acceptable number of deaths from covid, just like we accept the risk from Flu. It’s also not true that people don’t experience long term damage from flu. 

 

There seems to be a constant stream of criticism from the left without any actual answers about how we come out of the pandemic.  Any semblance of normality returning is seen as the government being reckless, without considering the alternatives. 

 

 

1 minute ago, zahidf said:

Its interesting: would a corbyn govt have got a good vaccination programme together? He wouldn't have instructed Bingham.  And would have had an ideological objection to big pharma

Also, I see it as people trying to look at things unlocking more positively. I think automatically saying THOUSANDS ARR GOING TO DIE BECAUSE OF THE PLAN without specifying a different timescale is doom mongering a bit.

I don’t think Corbyn would have locked down earlier in the first wave FWIW.

 

He’s have been following the same scientific advice from Whitty and Vallance who were of the opinion that a full lockdown was unhelpful. 
 

I think the point where Corbyn WOULD have done better would have been a slower reopening last summer. Having said that every European country suffered a second wave so I’m not convinced that opening up too quickly was the main or only cause of a second wave. 

[BobWillis]

50 minutes ago, zero000 said:

 

Seeing stuff like this on Twitter is making my blood boil.  There will be an acceptable number of deaths from covid, just like we accept the risk from Flu. It’s also not true that people don’t experience long term damage from flu. 

 

There seems to be a constant stream of criticism from the left without any actual answers about how we come out of the pandemic.  Any semblance of normality returning is seen as the government being reckless, without considering the alternatives. 

 

What is this utter nonsense about flu not causing health problems after you’ve beaten the worst of it? 

Real flu, not ‘I’ve got a bad cold that I’m calling the flu’, causes just as many long term issues as covid can. 

[zero000]

4 minutes ago, aj6658 said:

Maybe the vaccine delivery got a bit of flack at the very beginning but all I've seen since is praise. Ill. be honest, I didn't think 15m would be possible but in all fairness, everything the government did to that point was a failure. 

 

Not sure the exact case numbers but you will still have alot of people being hospitalised if we were to open in the next month. 

 

Personally (and I think you will hate my position) is to maintain lockdown till March just so we can vaccinate those at risk and so when we come out its a guaranteed downward spiral. Also with the SA variant, its easier to handle if were locked down. This is coming from someone who has really struggled with this latest lockdown but I think once its over, we won't have another lockdown or increases in restrictions. The issue was previously, we were too quick which caused further problems. 

 

I’m not against maintaining the lockdown until March at all. I can understand the rationale for decreasing restrictions slowly and steadily. 
 

I do however think we need to have a sensible and rationale discussion about risk and what we as a population are willing to consider. Phrases like “acceptable deaths” are seen as being something the uncaring Tories are banging the drum for. The reality is more subtle and we all need to accept a level of risk and uncertainty, in order to live our lives with meaning and purpose. That will mean accepting a certain level of deaths, because COVID-19 isn’t going to be eliminated. 

[Toilet Duck]

25 minutes ago, efcfanwirral said:

I personally think healthy debate can be emotional too and that people are sometimes a bit too sensitive to tone. But I guess it does affect some people 

Been meaning to ask you for a bit, what are your thoughts on the definition of long covid and the reporting around it?

To me it sounds like there are two versions, one that leaves people floored and unable to get out of bed for months, and one that has a definition of "ongoing symptoms after a certain time" which can include a cough for example, which regular diseases can leave lingering for a bit. There seems to be no talk of the severity levels so there's no real way to know which is which in the numbers.

But people seem to be freaking out and assuming everyone comes under the first group, when presumably the vast majority are the second? 

We don’t really have an accurate case definition for it yet, but you’re correct, all sorts of things seem to be being classed as “long Covid” at the moment. Some of it is post-viral fatigue, some of it is self-reported symptoms of varying veracity and some of it seems to have an underlying auto-immune component. Lots more work to be done really!

[Ozanne]

13 minutes ago, RobertProsineckisLighter said:

I do believe Labour would have done some of those things in the list e.g. free school meals, furlough, eviction ban etc... all of which should absolutely be done. 

Other that the circuit breaker not much of what labour have suggested is that different from what the government have done, they would have just have done it for longer. 

Totally agree - and I think at somepoint they are really going to have to come up with something alternative that's not as 'scary' as what Corbyn was putting forward. Interesting times indeed.

You asked what Labours proposals were and I gave you some. Yet you respond with the government did those things, they did then after pressure from the opposition. Labour have played a part in shaping policy decision. This government need to be dragged kicking and screaming into restrictions.

7 minutes ago, zahidf said:

Its interesting: would a corbyn govt have got a good vaccination programme together? He wouldn't have instructed Bingham.  And would have had an ideological objection to big pharma

Also, I see it as people trying to look at things unlocking more positively. I think automatically saying THOUSANDS ARR GOING TO DIE BECAUSE OF THE PLAN without specifying a different timescale is doom mongering a bit.

The Corbyn scenario is an interesting one for me. If there had been 100k deaths with a Corbyn government he would be crucified by most of the media. There would be none of front pages showing Corbyn looking sad and hanging his head at the podium. Corbyn got slaughtered over offering free broadband I shudder to think what the headlines for him with 100k deaths would’ve been.

[zahidf]

1 minute ago, Ozanne said:

You asked what Labours proposals were and I gave you some. Yet you respond with the government did those things, they did then after pressure from the opposition. Labour have played a part in shaping policy decision. This government need to be dragged kicking and screaming into restrictions.

The Corbyn scenario is an interesting one for me. If there had been 100k deaths with a Corbyn government he would be crucified by most of the media. There would be none of front pages showing Corbyn looking sad and hanging his head at the podium. Corbyn got slaughtered over offering free broadband I shudder to think what the headlines for him with 100k deaths would’ve been.

Probably but I'm more interested in how his government would react policy wise in a different way. Would it be better or worse? And why? 

[duke88]

This thread was really useful for keeping up with everything, it’s just become a permanent argument now.

[Ozanne]

1 minute ago, zahidf said:

Probably but I'm more interested in how his government would react policy wise in a different way. Would it be better or worse? And why? 

We did get a slight idea from the beginning as he was still leader at the time (feels like an eternity ago!) We would've got a more caring approach at the beginning take his last PMQs for example he started off by thanking cleaners, a group of people in his words that don't get enough thanks. He would've prioritised testing for social care staff which was something at the time he had referenced quite regularly. He regularly talked about proper and more PPE for key workers so that would've been looked.

I believe his response certainly in the beginning would've been better, I don't know Corbyn's character but I feel very confident in saying that when the virus was spreading in the early stages he wouldn't have skipped 5 COBRA meetings and gone on holiday, he wouldn't have dismissed the virus saying we need to 'take it on the chin' and said that ridiculous thing about 'shaking COVID patients hands'. He comes across as a genuinely caring human being so I think his governments initial response would've been treat the virus more seriously as such the public messaging would've reflected that and lives could've been saved that way.

[jparx]

5 minutes ago, duke88 said:

This thread was really useful for keeping up with everything, it’s just become a permanent argument now.

Hmm I don’t get why it’s getting worse. Last April/May when we were at the absolute worst point the thread was much more friendly. Seems the closer we get to the end the more argumentative people get. Bizarre.

[august1]

7 minutes ago, duke88 said:

This thread was really useful for keeping up with everything, it’s just become a permanent argument now.

No it hasn't!

[Ozanne]

 

A thread.

[august1]

2 minutes ago, jparx said:

Hmm I don’t get why it’s getting worse. Last April/May when we were at the absolute worst point the thread was much more friendly. Seems the closer we get to the end the more argumentative people get. Bizarre.

I think fatigue and being fed up after 12 months of this is causing all the madness.

[duke88]

Just now, jparx said:

Hmm I don’t get why it’s getting worse. Last April/May when we were at the absolute worst point the thread was much more friendly. Seems the closer we get to the end the more argumentative people get. Bizarre.

I guess there was nothing to argue about back then. Everyone was agreed on lockdown more or less. Now we’ve got to make decisions, there’s some very entrenched views on when we open up.

[steviewevie]

26 minutes ago, BobWillis said:

Real flu, not ‘I’ve got a bad cold that I’m calling the flu’, causes just as many long term issues as covid can. 

does it? I'm sure people can have some long term complications, but as bad as covid?

[JB15]

9 minutes ago, jparx said:

Hmm I don’t get why it’s getting worse. Last April/May when we were at the absolute worst point the thread was much more friendly. Seems the closer we get to the end the more argumentative people get. Bizarre.

I think it’s become more party political rather than talking about the virus and the management of it. 
 

politics is becoming like sport where you cheer for your boys no matter what. Leads to some just arguing to protect their team. It’s crap

[Reckoner]

4 hours ago, Chapple12345 said:

I think it's mostly her always focusing more on the negatives, even if theres a glimmer of hope for something improving she'll seemingly find a way to shoot it all down

That's understandable, and a bit of hopeium is good to keep the motivation up in what is a long tough slog, but you've still got 15k cases a day, 750 deaths (both 4th worst) , and the papers are filled with stories about pubs reopening and lockdown being near its end. I hope they have learnt their lesson, but your on your 3rd lockdown due to coming out too early previously so it's also understandable that people are concerned that the drums are beating again at a point that feels pre-emptive. 

 

[gooner1990]

22 minutes ago, duke88 said:

This thread was really useful for keeping up with everything, it’s just become a permanent argument now.

I’ve noticed that too, and it’s the same core group participating! 

[jparx]

2 minutes ago, august1 said:

I think fatigue and being fed up after 12 months of this is causing all the madness.

I get that to a degree, but equally we’ve got so many reasons to be positive at the minute. Whether you think we should open up tomorrow or next year, we’re still at the point where we know we’ll get there eventually.

[zahidf]

24 minutes ago, Ozanne said:

We did get a slight idea from the beginning as he was still leader at the time (feels like an eternity ago!) We would've got a more caring approach at the beginning take his last PMQs for example he started off by thanking cleaners, a group of people in his words that don't get enough thanks. He would've prioritised testing for social care staff which was something at the time he had referenced quite regularly. He regularly talked about proper and more PPE for key workers so that would've been looked.

I believe his response certainly in the beginning would've been better, I don't know Corbyn's character but I feel very confident in saying that when the virus was spreading in the early stages he wouldn't have skipped 5 COBRA meetings and gone on holiday, he wouldn't have dismissed the virus saying we need to 'take it on the chin' and said that ridiculous thing about 'shaking COVID patients hands'. He comes across as a genuinely caring human being so I think his governments initial response would've been treat the virus more seriously as such the public messaging would've reflected that and lives could've been saved that way.

And vaccines?

[zahidf]

4 minutes ago, jparx said:

I get that to a degree, but equally we’ve got so many reasons to be positive at the minute. Whether you think we should open up tomorrow or next year, we’re still at the point where we know we’ll get there eventually.

I think its because now the end is in sight, people are getting a bit frustrated 

Also, everyone i know is finding this lockdown a LOT harder 

[steviewevie]

33 minutes ago, Ozanne said:

The Corbyn scenario is an interesting one for me. If there had been 100k deaths with a Corbyn government he would be crucified by most of the media. There would be none of front pages showing Corbyn looking sad and hanging his head at the podium. Corbyn got slaughtered over offering free broadband I shudder to think what the headlines for him with 100k deaths would’ve been.

yeah, this. Boris just gets away with it, because he's good old Boris. If Corbyn had been PM the level of hate and bile aimed at him if anywhere near the same death rates would be pretty extreme. Also hard to know how labour would have done with the vaccines...didn't labour promise a brexit 2nd referendum if they had won?! Imagine if we had had that last summer?! Would have been fun.