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Post by firefingers on Jul 17, 2021 17:34:52 GMT
So if anyone remembers my cross-nation (Scotland and England) vaccine issue a while ago, fortunately, the actual jabbing side is solved by the walk-in centres, so I can at least get protected asap. My MP did manage to get a response from the Scottish health secretary saying I should be ok.
But now I have a new problem. Apparently, there is no connection on the back end for Scotland to see you've had a dose in England and vice versa. So I won't actually get a vaccine passport, and be stuck taking lateral flows for some time to come. Joy.
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Post by nick on Jul 17, 2021 18:06:15 GMT
So if anyone remembers my cross-nation (Scotland and England) vaccine issue a while ago, fortunately, the actual jabbing side is solved by the walk-in centres, so I can at least get protected asap. My MP did manage to get a response from the Scottish health secretary saying I should be ok. But now I have a new problem. Apparently, there is no connection on the back end for Scotland to see you've had a dose in England and vice versa. So I won't actually get a vaccine passport, and be stuck taking lateral flows for some time to come. Joy. I’m thinking you should get another jab in one of the countries. No harm being triple jabbed - early booster.
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Jul 17, 2021 18:10:05 GMT
I think I would take medical advice before doing that!
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Post by Phantom of London on Jul 17, 2021 20:57:31 GMT
Could it be the only way of this crisis is by herd immunity, so 60-70% of the population to catch this virus? Vaccines is part of that to stop people getting very ill, but vaccinated you can still catch it, and for people to spread the virus, especially the young to get to that herd immunity point? Would there be a benefit from having herd immunity, before the virus can mutate again? I would say a definite no.
This is not a disease like flu, where if you're young and healthy you can basically disregard it as an issue you won't have to face until you retire. This disease can kill you at any age and no matter how healthy you are. The vaccines have greatly reduced the chance of dying but that chance is still there, and if you do survive you could be left with severely impairing long-term health issues. Probabilities multiply. Take a small chance of something happening and give it a large number of opportunities to happen and it ends up being common. You have a 1 in 25 million chance of dying in a road accident per journey, but with 45 billion journeys made in the UK each year that becomes around 5 deaths each day. And with covid-19 it's not a matter of "I was one of the lucky ones so now I'm set for life". Each time you're exposed to it there's a chance you can catch it, and each time you catch it there's a chance you can die. You don't get to roll the dice once; you have to keep doing it. So we need to reduce the number of times you have to do that.
Our best defence against this disease is in controlling its spread. Assume (to make the calculations easy) that 10% of the people around you are carrying it, there's a 10% chance of catching it if you meet someone infected, and if you catch it there's a 1% chance of you dying, then each time you meet someone there's a 1 in 10,000 chance it'll be the meeting that kills you. But if only 0.01% of the people around you are infected — and that's the level we were at when we came out of lockdown — then each time you meet someone there's a 1 in 10,000,000 chance it'll kill you. Those are odds we can literally live with. At that level you might go your entire life without ever being exposed to the real virus. The whole point of the vaccination programme is to make that happen. (In reality it's not quite that simple because if you catch it and survive it acts as a temporary booster shot that improves your chances for a while, but the basic idea is correct. The point I'm making is that the vaccine offers far more protection by controlling spread than by individual resistance.) We didn't eradicate the threat of smallpox by making everyone immune to it; the vaccine was only 95% effective. We did it by increasing resistance enough that the disease struggled to spread, and the same is true of the many other killer diseases that most people never have to worry about. The reason we don't have to worry about measles isn't because we're untouchable as far as measles is concerned but because most people have never had a chance to catch it because they've never met someone carrying it. With enough people vaccinated we can stifle the spread of SARS-Cov-2 as well. We will probably never eradicate it completely but we can reduce it to a level where as far as most people are concerned it might as well have been eradicated. The problem right now is that not enough people have been vaccinated to have the required effect (we're currently at 52% fully vaccinated) and those that have been vaccinated are the less mobile members of society and so have the least effect on the disease spreading. As more younger people are vaccinated the situation should stabilise and then reverse, with case numbers falling. So why are the Government having a ‘freedom day’ and saying we can ditch the masks, if they’re not after herd immunity. It isn't difficult to wash your hands and wear a mask in busy indoor public spaces that don't have controlled entry for just vaccinated people (like the Tube). Not all, just places that are crowded and where Covid certification cannot be used. If you have difficulty with the idea of having to do that long term then you need to take a good hard look at your own selfishness. I am immune suppressed, because of medication, so a vaccine isn’t going to be as effective for me. So agree it is absolutely selfish the people who do not wear them. I agree we should be all wearing masks, so 100% with you on that, The people who don’t wear masks are the ones more likely to be the spreaders, as they more than likely to be vaccine hesitant and do not social distanced and put themselves in situations where they can easily catch it. I also think the police should be more proactive and been heavy on enforcement and issue many fines. The police should’ve clamped down on ‘mask exempt’ and people who falsely wear a exempt badge should be hit with a heavier fine. (Half the staff in Pret A Manger seem exempt) Very few people cannot wear a mask. But then again we have a police force that take 2 hour lunch breaks as in the Manchester bombings and last week couldn’t even police a football match, that could cost us the 2030 World Cup. One thing I have learned in this pandemic is the Police do not police the people who pay their wages, I have lost all faith in them, perhaps they should send out more victim support letters.
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Post by firefingers on Jul 17, 2021 21:05:21 GMT
So if anyone remembers my cross-nation (Scotland and England) vaccine issue a while ago, fortunately, the actual jabbing side is solved by the walk-in centres, so I can at least get protected asap. My MP did manage to get a response from the Scottish health secretary saying I should be ok. But now I have a new problem. Apparently, there is no connection on the back end for Scotland to see you've had a dose in England and vice versa. So I won't actually get a vaccine passport, and be stuck taking lateral flows for some time to come. Joy. I’m thinking you should get another jab in one of the countries. No harm being triple jabbed - early booster. Yeah I obviously don't want to do that right off the bat. But I'll probably check with my GP and if I have no luck by September when I'm back in Scotland I'll get some more vaccine in me I guess. Hopefully there aren't any supply issues, wouldn't want to take someone else's jab, but the vaccine rollout is kind of forcing my hand with a distinct lack of joined up thinking.
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Post by sph on Jul 17, 2021 23:57:10 GMT
Yes, wearing masks after everyone has been jabbed is going to be too excessive. It's easy to say "Oh but it's only for a short time while you're in the shop/on the tube/in the pub etc," but what about people who actually work in those environments and are expected to wear them all day every day. It's not a pleasant experience. We're not doctors or surgeons.
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Post by The Matthew on Jul 18, 2021 3:44:15 GMT
So why are the Government having a ‘freedom day’ and saying we can ditch the masks, if they’re not after herd immunity. Presumably because Boris Johnson is more concerned with popularity than with doing the right thing. He hates making promises and then being seen to break them. He likes to make promises and then blame someone else when they're broken.
The "herd immunity" idea in the sense that the public thinks of it has been thoroughly discredited. I forget who it was but I heard some government advisor say they regretted ever mentioning it to the PM because he grabbed on to it like a drowning man grabbing a lifebelt as a way to save the country without having to do anything that might hurt his popularity with the public. But it was always based on two assumptions: that people who didn't have existing health conditions had nothing to worry about, and that once you were exposed to it and survived you were immune for life. Both of those were quickly shown to be untrue: it can kill a significant proportion of healthy people, and you can catch it multiple times. The natural herd immunity idea isn't viable and never was.
In a sense we are aiming for a type of herd immunity, but it's an artificial herd immunity created by vaccination rather than a natural one created by letting the disease spread. The underlying principle is the same but the artificial way is effective and works without killing half a million people and the natural one isn't and doesn't. But we're not there yet because we haven't vaccinated enough people. The indicator of herd immunity, whether natural or artificial, is that the reproduction rate of the virus stays below 1 and right now it's well above 1.
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Post by poster J on Jul 18, 2021 7:23:50 GMT
Yes, wearing masks after everyone has been jabbed is going to be too excessive. It's easy to say "Oh but it's only for a short time while you're in the shop/on the tube/in the pub etc," but what about people who actually work in those environments and are expected to wear them all day every day. It's not a pleasant experience. We're not doctors or surgeons. In my experience many of you aren't wearing them anyway, but I wasn't talking about that anyway, I was talking about packed Tube carriages and similar. But as I keep saying, it really comes down to how much each individual decides is their social responsibility and care for others. We all have to live with our own conscience.
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Post by talkingheads on Jul 18, 2021 7:31:30 GMT
Johnson and Sunak won't self isolate, presumably sending out the message that nobody else needs to if they get pinged either:
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Post by HereForTheatre on Jul 18, 2021 7:48:08 GMT
It's ridiculous to have to go around for years to come taking measures like mask wearing to mainly protect a tiny minority of people who can't be vaccinated, I sympathize with those who can't have it but nobody can surely expect the whole population to take steps to help protect those few people they may never even come into contact with. As for those who refused it, then there's no reason at all to help protect them, that's their fault.
After all the people who want it have have been double jabbed, then everything should go back to complete normal. It's the best it's going to get. For any other disease you get a jab to help protect you and then go about your normal lives, like we have for hundreds of years.
For clarity I WILL be wearing a mask from Monday and I don't go out anywhere crowded I don't have to, I've not been going to the theatre or anything and won't be until my 2nd Jab in mid august is effective, so i guess probably September , so the accusations of me being some sort of "i don't care" attitude person is completely wrong, but my limit really is when everyone gets their 2nd dose because I don't see how it gets better than that, that's the point where I and everyone else is as protected as they can be and I think we just need to bite the bullet and go back to normality.
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Post by talkingheads on Jul 18, 2021 9:50:43 GMT
A record for the fastest U turn. Imagine if they had the foresight to do the right thing from the start:
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Post by olliebean on Jul 18, 2021 10:28:54 GMT
So why are the Government having a ‘freedom day’ and saying we can ditch the masks, if they’re not after herd immunity. Presumably because Boris Johnson is more concerned with popularity than with doing the right thing. He hates making promises and then being seen to break them. He likes to make promises and then blame someone else when they're broken.
The "herd immunity" idea in the sense that the public thinks of it has been thoroughly discredited. I forget who it was but I heard some government advisor say they regretted ever mentioning it to the PM because he grabbed on to it like a drowning man grabbing a lifebelt as a way to save the country without having to do anything that might hurt his popularity with the public. But it was always based on two assumptions: that people who didn't have existing health conditions had nothing to worry about, and that once you were exposed to it and survived you were immune for life. Both of those were quickly shown to be untrue: it can kill a significant proportion of healthy people, and you can catch it multiple times. The natural herd immunity idea isn't viable and never was.
In a sense we are aiming for a type of herd immunity, but it's an artificial herd immunity created by vaccination rather than a natural one created by letting the disease spread. The underlying principle is the same but the artificial way is effective and works without killing half a million people and the natural one isn't and doesn't. But we're not there yet because we haven't vaccinated enough people. The indicator of herd immunity, whether natural or artificial, is that the reproduction rate of the virus stays below 1 and right now it's well above 1.
I think the reason the original herd immunity strategy was - well, not exactly dropped, but put on the back burner and they stopped talking about it - was because it became clear just how many deaths could be expected under that strategy. The current strategy seems to be, vaccinate until the probable number of deaths is down to a number they think the public will accept, then open up and just let the remaining unvaccinated catch it to get the rest of the way towards herd immunity. They're still not talking about "herd immunity," because the term has become toxified - now it's "hybrid immunity," which means partly from vaccines and partly from natural infection. I feel they may have underestimated how many vaccinated people are going to catch it, and overestimated how many more deaths the public are going to be OK with. I'm also not sure issues such as potential new variants and the legacy of "long covid" have entered much into their thinking at all. I expect Boris Johnson has filed them away mentally in a notional folder labelled "Deal with it if/when it happens."
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Post by karloscar on Jul 18, 2021 10:29:54 GMT
I thought it was odd that Johnson would miss an opportunity to avoid work. Seems things are back to normal, as he wouldn't be able to do the high viz photo op bollox for a while anyway.
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Post by Dawnstar on Jul 18, 2021 12:01:01 GMT
But as I keep saying, it really comes down to how much each individual decides is their social responsibility and care for others. We all have to live with our own conscience. What is so sad is that some people will die due to others' lack of conscience.
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Post by Roxie on Jul 18, 2021 12:53:58 GMT
But as I keep saying, it really comes down to how much each individual decides is their social responsibility and care for others. We all have to live with our own conscience. What is so sad is that some people will die due to others' lack of conscience. That’s the same with a lot of things though. Drink driving for example. Local to me, last year a 6 year old girl was killed walking along the road cos she was hit by an allegedly drunk driver. All actions have consequences and risk is a part of being alive!
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Post by theglenbucklaird on Jul 18, 2021 13:03:01 GMT
What is so sad is that some people will die due to others' lack of conscience. That’s the same with a lot of things though. Drink driving for example. Local to me, last year a 6 year old girl was killed walking along the road cos she was hit by an allegedly drunk driver. All actions have consequences and risk is a part of being alive! Eh?
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Post by Roxie on Jul 18, 2021 13:52:59 GMT
That’s the same with a lot of things though. Drink driving for example. Local to me, last year a 6 year old girl was killed walking along the road cos she was hit by an allegedly drunk driver. All actions have consequences and risk is a part of being alive! Eh? My point is that Dawn was saying some ppl will die due to others selfish actions and lack of conscience - that’s not something exclusive to covid.
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Post by theglenbucklaird on Jul 18, 2021 14:29:37 GMT
My point is that Dawn was saying some ppl will die due to others selfish actions and lack of conscience - that’s not something exclusive to covid. That’s not comparable. I don’t think that’s a great post
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Post by Roxie on Jul 18, 2021 14:56:18 GMT
My point is that Dawn was saying some ppl will die due to others selfish actions and lack of conscience - that’s not something exclusive to covid. That’s not comparable. I don’t think that’s a great post Ok. That’s my opinion though. After everyone has been offered 2 jabs and theres been time for it to be effective, we need to go back to as normal as possible IMO. I’m pro masks now, but if we continue with them once the vaccine is fully rolled out, then what? When does it end? Humans need to be exposed to pathogens to build immunity. The reason there’s an outbreak of winter vomiting virus now and the reason they are expecting flu to be awful this year is cos of lockdowns and masks! Yes, we all have a social obligation, but I draw the line at restricting my life to protect a v small number of people who have been unable to have the vaccine and a larger number who have flat out refused it.
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Post by olliebean on Jul 18, 2021 15:15:11 GMT
What is so sad is that some people will die due to others' lack of conscience. That’s the same with a lot of things though. Drink driving for example. Local to me, last year a 6 year old girl was killed walking along the road cos she was hit by an allegedly drunk driver. All actions have consequences and risk is a part of being alive! Yes, and that's why drunk driving is illegal - which probably deters a lot of people from doing it who wouldn't be especially bothered by their consciences unless/until they actually hit someone.
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Post by theglenbucklaird on Jul 18, 2021 15:25:17 GMT
That’s not comparable. I don’t think that’s a great post Ok. That’s my opinion though. After everyone has been offered 2 jabs and theres been time for it to be effective, we need to go back to as normal as possible IMO. I’m pro masks now, but if we continue with them once the vaccine is fully rolled out, then what? When does it end? Humans need to be exposed to pathogens to build immunity. The reason there’s an outbreak of winter vomiting virus now and the reason they are expecting flu to be awful this year is cos of lockdowns and masks! Yes, we all have a social obligation, but I draw the line at restricting my life to protect a v small number of people who have been unable to have the vaccine and a larger number who have flat out refused it. Come on Roxie, we’re better than that
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Post by TallPaul on Jul 18, 2021 15:46:22 GMT
I find it hilarious how Covid has brought out the worst kind of moral superiority in some people. If I didn't laugh, I'd probably cry with despair.
I'm better, kinder and/or more caring than you because...
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Post by theglenbucklaird on Jul 18, 2021 15:52:34 GMT
I find it hilarious how Covid has brought out the worst kind of moral superiority in some people. If I didn't laugh, I'd probably cry with despair. I'm better, kinder and/or more caring than you because... A good thing? Or a hinderance?
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Post by Deleted on Jul 18, 2021 16:04:42 GMT
I find it hilarious how Covid has brought out the worst kind of moral superiority in some people. If I didn't laugh, I'd probably cry with despair. I'm better, kinder and/or more caring than you because...
I'm similarly fascinated when some asserted black and white terms for what is inherently an ever-changing situation cast almost entirely in shades of gray. I understand the human desire for certainty, but I'm not sure this situation allows for much of it.
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Post by Roxie on Jul 18, 2021 18:34:50 GMT
Ok. That’s my opinion though. After everyone has been offered 2 jabs and theres been time for it to be effective, we need to go back to as normal as possible IMO. I’m pro masks now, but if we continue with them once the vaccine is fully rolled out, then what? When does it end? Humans need to be exposed to pathogens to build immunity. The reason there’s an outbreak of winter vomiting virus now and the reason they are expecting flu to be awful this year is cos of lockdowns and masks! Yes, we all have a social obligation, but I draw the line at restricting my life to protect a v small number of people who have been unable to have the vaccine and a larger number who have flat out refused it. Come on Roxie, we’re better than that Listen. I’m not a bad person because you disagree with my opinion. We all have our own opinions on this and our own ways of coping and no one is right or wrong. Good or bad. No one was more anxious than me when it all started, I was absolutely bloomin terrified and was crying all the time. So don’t think I don’t take it seriously, because I do. But the toll that the restrictions has taken on my mental health has been far worse than anything I think I would have suffered with the virus. I almost lost my job cos I couldn’t keep it together and had to take sick leave for my MH to build myself back up for the first time in a 15 year career. I was on the verge of feeling suicidal last year because I couldn’t see any hope or any way back to ‘normality’. I had to seek counselling, again for the first time ever. So don’t make me out to be a bad person because I think that at some point we have to live with this like we do everything else, because we do. It’s either live with it and crack on, or forever be restricted and locked down and I cannot and will not live like that.
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Post by Dawnstar on Jul 18, 2021 18:52:07 GMT
I find it hilarious how Covid has brought out the worst kind of moral superiority in some people. If I didn't laugh, I'd probably cry with despair. I'm better, kinder and/or more caring than you because... I'm not saying any of those things. I have explained why my particular circumstances are making me have to be extremely careful. I would say I'm more terrified than most people but I don't think that implies moral superiority.
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Post by Roxie on Jul 18, 2021 20:16:51 GMT
I find it hilarious how Covid has brought out the worst kind of moral superiority in some people. If I didn't laugh, I'd probably cry with despair. I'm better, kinder and/or more caring than you because... I'm not saying any of those things. I have explained why my particular circumstances are making me have to be extremely careful. I would say I'm more terrified than most people but I don't think that implies moral superiority. For the record, I think the above poster (im on my phone and lost the threads sorry) was referring to glen who said ‘we’re better than that’ I for one don’t think you’re being superior Dawn! If you’re more afraid than most, that’s fine, we all cope differently and do what we need to do
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Post by Dawnstar on Jul 18, 2021 21:14:25 GMT
I'm not saying any of those things. I have explained why my particular circumstances are making me have to be extremely careful. I would say I'm more terrified than most people but I don't think that implies moral superiority. For the record, I think the above poster (im on my phone and lost the threads sorry) was referring to glen who said ‘we’re better than that’ I for one don’t think you’re being superior Dawn! If you’re more afraid than most, that’s fine, we all cope differently and do what we need to do I wasn't sure if it was directed at me or not so thought I'd explain where I'm coming from just in case it was.
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Post by Phantom of London on Jul 18, 2021 21:33:27 GMT
In 90 minutes the country is going back to normal.
Meanwhile we had 48,161 confirmed cases. I am sure there is many more unconfirmed cases. In Germany they had 985 cases.
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Post by Phantom of London on Jul 18, 2021 22:10:25 GMT
A record for the fastest U turn. Imagine if they had the foresight to do the right thing from the start: This Prime Minister is not for turning.
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