Coronavirus

[Vincent Vega]

Is this the moment things start to backfire on the seemingly Teflon Johnson? Boris the butcher letting his Johnson variant run wild, killing thousands more of the citizens he’s meant to be protecting, and letting thousands more develop debilitating illnesses.

[Barrington Womble]

11 hours ago, SasaS said:

They didn't have to use special covid hospitals and people where not dying on the hospital steps and neighbouring streets, I guess.

 

I am trying to understand what the UK government is trying to do now, with allowing it to go to possibly a 100k cases a day, they obviously must think the NHS can handle two or three times the current pressure, and that people who will not get vaccinated and are already not respecting any restrictions would not do it anyway even if they are not lifted, so what is the point of punishing the rest. Just let it burn out through the younger population so it has nowhere else to go by early September.

 

Don't think they don't care what happens to people, they care much less what effect it will have abroad, which is in line with their politics so far, based on British exceptionalism and fair amount of arrogance, and which is why Britain is at the moment the least liked nation on the continent.

I would argue the NHS didn't cope. We didn't use covid hospitals because we had neither the staff or the bathroom facilities, we just cancelled everything else and put billions in the pockets of Tory donors, family and friends. The NHS failed the moment they stopped treating other people. And this is not just about hospital levels. It's been almost impossible to get a doctor's appointment for 18 months and if you do get one, it is likely over zoom or the phone where it's much more difficult to diagnose issues and you don't catch silent killers like blood pressure issues like you would if you attended the gp in person as they just test your BP anyway. 

 

So really the NHS responded to covid and their staff went through hell, and it played out on TV ok, which is all the government cared about. But the health of every single other issue aside from covid has been neglected for 18 months. And as we let this virus rip through the population again, it will continue to hurt everyone requiring the NHS. 

 

Now I'm of the opinion that now vaccine levels are getting towards the end game, we need to have a plan and a path out of this mess. Lockdowns are to keep us safe till the cavalry arrive, and we have that now with the vaccine. In my opinion this plan probably includes more efficient testing and an undoubted increase in NHS capacity. We live with every other health problem on the planet and there's no other silver bullet to follow the vaccine, so we have to live with covid. We need to have the capability to treat all health issues and we seem reluctant to accept covid will continue to use NHS resources well beyond "freedom day". It absolutely mental we're just rolling the dice yet again with absolutely no help for the NHS arriving now or in the future. The NHS has very far from coped and is continuing to fail on a daily basis because of this fuckwit government. 

[SasaS]

10 hours ago, Rico1304 said:

Different to what you said then. NHS to government. 

I don't know what you mean, I think I said the NHS should be able to cope with current level of hospitalizations, based on numbers comparison with what health care in other countries are coping with and what the NHS already faced in previous waves. Government should know what the parameters are when they are making decisions.

 

10 hours ago, No2 said:

They're trying to say we were out of Covid restrictions first. First to roll out vaccines, first to vaccinate the nation, first to exit lock down, everything that went on in between won't make it onto side of bus.

Yes you are probably right. But it does not appear all that unreasonable if you look at numbers in some other countries, like my Malta comparison, and if you are confident cases would not transfer into hospitalization and deaths at the rate they did previously. And if you follow the logic that a certain section of society would spend the summer spreading the virus anyway. How would that affect other, less vaccinated countries is quite clearly not highly on their list of concerns.

[Section_31]

12 minutes ago, Sugar Ape said:

Something else to consider with patients taking up ICU beds. But somehow having more of these patients means we can treat more people for other illnesses. Ok. 
 

 

 

 

 

Thing is though, this is all well and good, but what's the alternative? Perpetual lockdowns made sense when we were developing a vaccine, and to a smaller extent they make sense while we're still double jabbing people but after that, then what? As I don't see many alternatives.

[Vincent Vega]

It’s unbelievable that Johnson has launched his ‘Freedom Day’ amidst rapidly rising cases and just as parliament is about to go into recess for six weeks. Allowing the country to drift amidst soaring case rates and hospitalisations with no parliamentary scrutiny.

[Barrington Womble]

1 minute ago, Section_31 said:

 

Thing is though, this is all well and good, but what's the alternative? Perpetual lockdowns made sense when we were developing a vaccine, and to a smaller extent they make sense while we're still double jabbing people but after that, then what? As I don't see many alternatives.

Years of neglect of the NHS is the root issue. The NHS never copes with a bad winter and has been creacking at the seams since austerity has slowly brought the service to it's knees and add the kick in the balls to staffing that brexit has brought. So now we need to get on with things, the underfunding of the NHS through another decade of despicable Tory cuts, exposes us all because we now have another health issue to deal with. It just can't cope. Because it didn't cope with what we had before. 

[Barrington Womble]

3 minutes ago, Vincent Vega said:

It’s unbelievable that Johnson has launched his ‘Freedom Day’ amidst rapidly rising cases and just as parliament is about to go into recess for six weeks. Allowing the country to drift amidst soaring case rates and hospitalisations with no parliamentary scrutiny.

It seems like the play book since the cunt became PM

[No2]

2 minutes ago, SasaS said:

I don't know what you mean, I think I said the NHS should be able to cope with current level of hospitalizations, based on numbers comparison with what health care in other countries are coping with and what the NHS already faced in previous waves. Government should know what the parameters are when they are making decisions.

 

Yes you are probably right. But it does not appear all that unreasonable if you look at numbers in some other countries, like my Malta comparison, and if you are confident cases would not transfer into hospitalization and deaths at the rate they did previously. And if you follow the logic that a certain section of society would spend the summer spreading the virus anyway. How would that affect other, less vaccinated countries is quite clearly not highly on their list of concerns.

I probably read your on piece but I don't think you can use Malta as a comparison in any meaningful way, it's a tiny island and has the same population as Liverpool, 4 times the Maltese population use the London tube everyday. You can try things there and put the lid back on if it doesn't work out. England is a different beast altogether, once it goes wrong everyone is fucked, it can't be a coincidence that these variants have been British, Brazilian, Indian and South African, huge populations for the virus to do its thing. Once it gets out of control in areas of huge density it could do anything (again), in places like Malta, Ireland or Iceland that just isn't likely. 

[Anubis]

26 minutes ago, Vincent Vega said:

Is this the moment things start to backfire on the seemingly Teflon Johnson? Boris the butcher letting his Johnson variant run wild, killing thousands more of the citizens he’s meant to be protecting, and letting thousands more develop debilitating illnesses.

You would hope so. But we’ve been here before and  looking around me there is a significantly large percentage of our population who don’t appear to give a fuck.

[Section_31]

4 minutes ago, Barrington Womble said:

Years of neglect of the NHS is the root issue. The NHS never copes with a bad winter and has been creacking at the seams since austerity has slowly brought the service to it's knees and add the kick in the balls to staffing that brexit has brought. So now we need to get on with things, the underfunding of the NHS through another decade of despicable Tory cuts, exposes us all because we now have another health issue to deal with. It just can't cope. Because it didn't cope with what we had before. 

This is a contributing factor but the virus is going to spread unless you close your borders or stay in lockdown, I don't see how else you can deal with a virus except for vaccines, which by any measure has gone well. 

 

Whatever happens after everyone who wants a double jab has had one, whatever the case count looks like after that, that's the world we're going to have to live in.

 

People just endlessly tweeting the latest case numbers, hospitalizatons etc ain't gonna change that fact. The reality will be we've either got to get on with life and accept the added risks, or spend one month out of every three sat at home not being allowed to walk more than three miles from your home under pain of arrest.

 

It gets to a point where life isn't worth living anyway, which sadly I think quite a few people over the past two years have come to think.

[Captain Turdseye]

28 minutes ago, Vincent Vega said:

Is this the moment things start to backfire on the seemingly Teflon Johnson? Boris the butcher letting his Johnson variant run wild, killing thousands more of the citizens he’s meant to be protecting, and letting thousands more develop debilitating illnesses.

Nah, he’s a loveable oaf. Doing the best anyone could in the circumstances. Imagine if that cunt Corbyn had been in charge. We’d all be dead now. 

[Vincent Vega]

9 minutes ago, Anubis said:

You would hope so. But we’ve been here before and  looking around me there is a significantly large percentage of our population who don’t appear to give a fuck.

Yeah, unfortunately huge numbers of people in this country don’t give a fuck until it affects them, or one of their family or friends.
 

There’s also a huge number of people who are just pig ignorant. I saw a report on the BBC news the other day on Starmer going out to meet people in areas Labour lost at the last election. He was in Blackpool and there were a dozen people there and half of them had absolutely no idea who he was. Imagine not knowing the leader of the opposition when he’s been in the job for 15 months and is on the news several times a week.

[Bruce Spanner]

15 minutes ago, Barrington Womble said:

It seems like the play book since the cunt became PM

Other parliaments have scrapped their recess’ due to the state of emergency.

 

You can almost guarantee that thought never entered the feckless cunts head.

 

He’ll have his trotters up somewhere nice without a second thought for what he’s leaving behind.

[Barrington Womble]

9 minutes ago, Section_31 said:

This is a contributing factor but the virus is going to spread unless you close your borders or stay in lockdown, I don't see how else you can deal with a virus except for vaccines, which by any measure has gone well. 

 

Whatever happens after everyone who wants a double jab has had one, whatever the case count looks like after that, that's the world we're going to have to live in.

 

People just endlessly tweeting the latest case numbers, hospitalizatons etc ain't gonna change that fact. The reality will be we've either got to get on with life and accept the added risks, or spend one month out of every three sat at home not being allowed to walk more than three miles from your home under pain of arrest.

 

It gets to a point where life isn't worth living anyway, which sadly I think quite a few people over the past two years have come to think.

Which is my point. This government are trying to solve a complex issue with a simple solution. Just give everyone the vaccine and it'll be sound. Except it won't, because we're not prepared for the load on the NHS that letting this virus run wild will bring. We're not in control of the impact.of variants from letting in run wild. And we've never closed our boarders in anyway meaningful to keep the virus out, which is why it gained such an early foothold a year ago and delta has been so "succesful" here. So I firmly believe we need to be focused on living with the virus, but that doesn't include a plan of "fuck it, it'll be alright". This virus is going to continue to impact the NHS, impact the health of people getting to work and non-attendance impacting all of our services and the ability of our companies to trade. We don't have a plan for this and it's absolute fucking neglect that we don't. The vaccine is part of the answer, but this is a more complex issue than just that and the plan needs to be broader than that. And as @Vincent Vega rightly points out, now is not time for a plan, it's time to fuck off on holiday. 

[SasaS]

17 minutes ago, No2 said:

I probably read your on piece but I don't think you can use Malta as a comparison in any meaningful way, it's a tiny island and has the same population as Liverpool, 4 times the Maltese population use the London tube everyday. You can try things there and put the lid back on if it doesn't work out. England is a different beast altogether, once it goes wrong everyone is fucked, it can't be a coincidence that these variants have been British, Brazilian, Indian and South African, huge populations for the virus to do its thing. Once it gets out of control in areas of huge density it could do anything (again), in places like Malta, Ireland or Iceland that just isn't likely. 

Not to be a total pedant, Malta has four times the population density of England and when it comes to shutting down, it would, in theory, be equally difficult to do it as in a bigger country, since the number of people doing the shutting down is proportional to the overall population. It's international impact is much smalller, that is true.

 

 

[Scott_M]

The wife and I are going for a day of this. 75k capacity. If they can check everybody's vaccinations / health on the way in, why can everywhere else? 

 

[Vincent Vega]

Interesting analysis from The Guardian on how Tory MPs are feeling in regards to how the government is performing on the pandemic and other issues.

 

Tory jitters mount at political drift of Boris Johnson’s government 

Analysis: lack of substance in PM’s ‘levelling up’ speech adds to growing discontent as summer recess nears
 

Boris Johnson’s levelling up speech in Coventry on Thursday was billed as the moment the prime minister would set out the substance behind the central idea of his premiership.

 

In the event, he announced £50m for community football pitches and 15 more local high street upgrades, and mused about the potential benefits of “mayors” for counties, asking the public to email him if they had a better name. There was much characteristic enthusiasm but little policy meat.

 

Some southern MPs were reassured by his message that he doesn’t want to “level down” affluent areas. But for other jittery Conservatives the lack of substance was a worrying sign of broader political drift at the heart of government.

 

“I was very, very surprised at how poor Johnson’s speech was,” said Tim Bale, professor of politics at Queen Mary, University of London. “I would have thought that was an opportunity to set out the government’s stall and go back to the manifesto that won them the election in 2019. 
 

“The fact it was so poor suggests they really haven’t made much progress in thinking about how they are going to deliver those promises.”

 

With just a few days to go until the House of Commons breaks up for the long summer recess, many of the prime minister’s backbench troops are ending the political term frustrated and restless.

 

Whether on Covid restrictions or overseas aid, he has seen shifting groups of rebels repeatedly take bites out of what should be a comfortable majority of 80. And he has irked other backbenchers by finding himself on the wrong side of the culture war over footballers facing down racism.

 

Johnson’s initial equivocation over whether it was acceptable to boo the England team for taking the knee at the start of matches – a stance also taken by the home secretary, Priti Patel – left Downing Street stranded on the wrong side of public opinion.

 

Johnson did eventually fall in behind Gareth Southgate’s team and their right to make the anti-racist gesture – but he appeared angry and rattled at prime minister’s questions on Wednesday when Keir Starmer attacked him for failing to back the players from the start.

One backbencher said colleagues had been complaining furiously on MPs’ WhatsApp groups about the botched handling of the issue, which had left them having to defend themselves against allegations of racism.

 

Will Tanner, director of the Conservative thinktank Onward, told the Guardian’s Politics Weekly podcast it was a mistake for the government to engage in a “war on woke”.

 

This approach, closely identified with Johnson’s aide Munira Mirza and her husband and fellow Tory adviser, Dougie Smith, has seen the Tories wade into issues such as the removal of statues over slave links in the hope of tempting Starmer’s Labour party on to treacherous ground.

 

“I think the government would do well to reflect on just how popular that politics is and how small the constituency is for the anti-woke kind of partisanship, which I’ve always seen as a kind of quite big distraction from the fundamentals that voters really care about,” Tanner said.

 

Johnson’s determination to cut Britain’s aid budget has been another source of contention in his party – though polls suggest it is popular with the public. A recent YouGov survey showed 54% of people were in favour of the cut to 0.5% of national income, with 28% against.

 

But former prime minister Theresa May, who voted against a three-line whip for the first time in 25 years, told Johnson he was breaking, “a promise to the poorest people in the world”.

 

In the event, 24 Conservatives voted against the government, giving Johnson a comfortable majority – but only after he and the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, had hit the phones to MPs to win them over.

 

Downing Street saw the government’s victory as a show of strength rather than a sign of weakness, with government sources suggesting a large majority makes rebels feel they have a free pass.

 

A senior government source insisted No 10 was “acutely aware of the concerns of the parliamentary party” but had no intention of changing direction on the basis of this or any other rebellion.

 

But the rebels included a string of former cabinet ministers – Andrew Mitchell, May, Damian Green, Jeremy Hunt – some of whom have also raised concerns about other aspects of government policy, including Johnson’s radical planning reforms.

 

Alongside the rows over specific policy issues, there is a gnawing sense among some backbenchers – particularly in potentially vulnerable southern seats – that voters are becoming queasy about Johnson’s brand of Conservatism.

 

One senior MP who canvassed in the recent byelections said: “We picked up a bit of it in Chesham and Amersham and a bit in Batley and Spen but it wasn’t by itself: it was the attitude to aid, it was the chumocracy stuff.”
 

“You bundle it all together and you’ve got a party of Alan B’Stards,” he added, referring to Rik Mayall’s 1980s portrayal of an immoral, money-grubbing Tory MP.

 

Another senior Tory cited Barack Obama’s campaign manager David Axelrod, who warned against loading too many “bricks on the wagon” – meaning potentially negative points for voters. “How many bricks can you hold until the wheels come off?” they asked, warning that the Conservatives risk looking “mean-spirited”.

 

Downing Street remains relaxed, believing they have more to gain in Labour-held seats in northern England than they are likely to lose in the south. But Bale warns: “People in those red wall seats have lent votes to the Conservatives: the relationship with the Conservatives is still pretty transactional.

 

“I’m not sure a bypass here or a town centre spruce-up there is going to do it. People have all sorts of other hopes and fears the government promised to address in 2019: about health, about education, about law and order.” Sunak’s spending review in the autumn will make the government’s priorities in these areas much clearer.

 

On Covid, meanwhile, a different group of renegade backbenchers, including Steve Baker and Mark Harper, have harried the government towards pressing ahead with the 19 July reopening.

 

Their scepticism effectively killed off the idea of mandatory Covid certificates for entering crowded venues, too, because the government believed it could not get the idea past the Commons without Labour support – though ministers are now urging businesses to implement the scheme anyway.

 

As the parliamentary term nears its end, Johnson and his chancellor are scrambling to put the finishing touches to a social care package they hope could address claims the government lacks a purpose. But some of their colleagues believe they could still be blown off course – yet again – by the pandemic.

 

MPs have sensed a narrowing in the polls and the ebbing away of the vaccine bounce. “Public memories are extremely short,” said a senior moderate MP. “I think if we have to reimpose masks then we can just about survive. But if we have to ever close businesses again then the plummet in support we saw last Christmas will be nothing. It’ll be like that on steroids. And colleagues would revolt. The PM is finished. We’re all finished.”

[Davelfc]

Just had my negative PCR test result, but I still have to isolate. 

 

Fucking ridiculous. 

[Bjornebye]

24 minutes ago, Poster said:

Just had my negative PCR test result, but I still have to isolate. 

 

Fucking ridiculous. 

Glad it’s negative. 

[Davelfc]

8 minutes ago, Bjornebye said:

Glad it’s negative. 

Thanks, as I don't have any symptoms I'd have been ok with an immune booster shot that a positive result would have given. Not so happy about the extra days isolating it would have meant though. 

 

If I've read things correctly then if I'd have been in this situation after 16th August, as I'm double jabbed I would not have to isolate anyway. Anyone messaging me about 'freedom day' on Monday is going to be told to fuck off. 

 

I can't really complain, my daughter says she feels like shit with the covid and her work telling her to work from home, she has spent the last couple of days in bed with it. 

[Anubis]

It’s positive that it’s negative. Happy you’ve not got it. I hope your daughter gets through it ok.

[Preston Red]

Had to go for a PCR this morning as the wife developed a cough yesterday evening after feeling weary yesterday afternoon. I was meant to be going on the stepson's stag do today but now can't as I'm now isolating until the results appear. I feel absolutely fine so hopefully I'll get through but if the Mrs has it then that's me isolating for the second time in three weeks

 

While I'm totally brassed off with not being able to get out on the stag do, it's better to stay away than potentially spread it around a group that has a couple of lads with babies and pregnant wives/girlfirends.

[Curly]

2 hours ago, Captain Turdseye said:

Nah, he’s a loveable oaf. Doing the best anyone could in the circumstances. Imagine if that cunt Corbyn had been in charge. We’d all be dead now. 

If Corbyn had been in charge at the start of the pandemic, and things had gone exactly as they have to this point, he wouldn’t still be in charge now. Not a chance

[Harry's Lad]

25 minutes ago, Preston Red said:

Had to go for a PCR this morning as the wife developed a cough yesterday evening after feeling weary yesterday afternoon. I was meant to be going on the stepson's stag do today but now can't as I'm now isolating until the results appear. I feel absolutely fine so hopefully I'll get through but if the Mrs has it then that's me isolating for the second time in three weeks

 

While I'm totally brassed off with not being able to get out on the stag do, it's better to stay away than potentially spread it around a group that has a couple of lads with babies and pregnant wives/girlfirends.

Good luck mate, I hope you're both ok.

[Sugar Ape]

2 hours ago, Section_31 said:

 

Thing is though, this is all well and good, but what's the alternative? Perpetual lockdowns made sense when we were developing a vaccine, and to a smaller extent they make sense while we're still double jabbing people but after that, then what? As I don't see many alternatives.

I answered this last time you said something similar about locking down forever, with a lengthy post and you didn’t reply but this is what I think and it doesn’t involve perpetual lockdowns. 
 

Who is even saying anything about perpetual lockdowns. There are a fuckload of options between ‘perpetual lockdowns’ and ‘freedom day’ with no restrictions. 
 

We keep some measures until we’ve vaccinated enough people (we’ve only done a little over 50% of the UK population) and unlock when cases are low so track and trace actually has a chance of working. Not when cases are skyrocketing and hospitalisations are also rising exponentially. 
 

So we ‘learn to live with it’ when we are in a good place to do so, and right now we aren’t. I think it’s a bit weird that your response to a post saying rising covid cases are causing heart and cancer operations to be cancelled is to basically say “ah well, what can we do? No other option”. 
 

We expect an exit wave but this isn’t that. An exit wave generally starts when you exit and not before. We’re going to have the exit wave on top of this (though I’m hopeful a couple of weeks of scorching weather might dim that somewhat). 
 

Looking at your subsequent post you say it gets to a point that life isn’t worth living but absolutely no one is taking about locking down again. Let’s say we mandate masks in shops and public transport again, work from home if you can and a covid passport for nightclubs. Why would any of that make your life not worth living?
 

Sorry mate but you seem to see things as either lockdown or complete ‘freedom’ when I think it’s pretty obvious we should be doing neither but keeping some light restrictions to control the spread until we see what happens when we vaccinate enough people. 
 

I honestly don’t see how anyone can look at the fuckups by the government since this started and not think we should proceed very, very cautiously. This isn’t going to go away if people stop tweeting about hospitalisations or cases.