Current Affairs Coronavirus Thread - Serious stuff !!!

[Agent Blue]

He hasn't avoided scrutiny and it should be at the end of this when we should vent our frustration with this government.

Fair point mate.

 

[roydo]

Whats happening with the UK lockdown lads?

Wasn't it for an initial 3 weeks announced on the 23rd of March. Three weeks are up today. Is it technically over tomorrow, or will the government make an announcement today or later in the week?

Sorry if there was an extension i missed.

Nothing official yet, but a general concensus that another few weeks are nailed on.

 

[ToffeeTim]

Whats happening with the UK lockdown lads?

Wasn't it for an initial 3 weeks announced on the 23rd of March. Three weeks are up today. Is it technically over tomorrow, or will the government make an announcement today or later in the week?

Sorry if there was an extension i missed.

It'll just continue.

It technically has to be reviewed before Thursday, but what's to say the review isn't just a tick box exercise to roll over the measures for another 3 weeks.

I don't think anyone expects any changes.

 

[Walken]

Firstly, there are a huge number of possible reasons why countries acted as they did. We're party to practically none of them.

Secondly, it seems likely that this will go for some time, so to use your football analogy, we're judging the game after 25 minutes rather than 90.

I'm happy to accept that they will make mistakes but are nonetheless best placed to gauge responses without uninformed commentary from me at every step.

What football analogy?

 

[Spadge Vernacular]

Bruce this feels like the equivalent of ‘show me your medals “ . Like nobody can have an opinion unless they’ve been a success in that field . Of course experts know more than lay people but they also make mistakes and it seems a bit mad that everyone simply has to not question or challenge them because they don’t have a phd or 20 years in the field.


Frankly some of it seems like common sense , so it doesn’t feel like a coincidence when after weeks experts seem to be saying what know nothing plebs we’re speculating on weeks ago . Also perhaps that’s why several imminent virologists seem to be putting forward many of the same points I’ve seen raised in here , I’m assuming they’re entitled to their view on it ?

obviously experts will know more than people like me , as I’ve said before pretty much everybody does but even off the top of my head I definitely heard schools were the safest places for kids two days before we closed them or that Jenny harries say mass gatherings were fine and there are certainly more examples . It seems completely fair to me to question that kind of ‘leadership ‘ whether you are a virologist or a internet nobody .

There is a significant gap between an opinion and an academic position.

 

[ToffeeTim]

I can see your reasoning here pete but you must be concerned by the flip flopping. Because as much as anything that’s what’s worried me . Mass gatherings are fine , no they aren’t ; schools are safe , no they aren’t they’re shut for months actually we might open them and herd immunity is the way to go , actually we never mentioned herd immunity .

I’d feel a lot happier if the message or planning was consistent. I’ve no issue with a plan evolving but this certainly doesn’t feel like this .

There are people already bored and starting to find it tough to follow the regulations. Theres already far more cars and people about than there was at start of the lockdown. If we had introduced this 2 or 3 weeks earlier I reckon the situation would be far far worse.

I was very sceptical at the time when they held off on clamping down by warning that the timing of measures was crucial. But now I'm starting to see where they were coming from. In my opinion we are definitely not ready to come out of the social distancing measures, but if we'd had 5 weeks now rather than 3, the clamour for relaxing the measures would be huge. Lockdown is clearly the right solution right now but it's not a longer term or permanent solution. So it's a very tricky decision down the line for when we need to relax things.

 

[peteblue]

I can see your reasoning here pete but you must be concerned by the flip flopping. Because as much as anything that’s what’s worried me . Mass gatherings are fine , no they aren’t ; schools are safe , no they aren’t they’re shut for months actually we might open them and herd immunity is the way to go , actually we never mentioned herd immunity .

I’d feel a lot happier if the message or planning was consistent. I’ve no issue with a plan evolving but this certainly doesn’t feel like this .

The immediate change of plan did concern me as I felt that we were being bounced into a different path by the media. I think it resulted in a much changed approach. I am happy with what we are doing with lockdown but was also happy with the initial let’s lockdown at the correct moment approach. We seem to be playing the politically safe let’s do whatever everyone else is doing game. It may be right, it may be wrong, I just don’t know. I don’t like this constant criticism and second guessing of the CSA,CMO and Government. If I were to fall ill I would rather be met at the hospital by the CMO than other academics, experts in unrelated fields, or someone from GOT......

 

[JimmyJeffers]

Not many democratic governments will survive this. Johnson is lucky that he has a big majority and has only just been elected. Four years is a very long time in politics and in the event they do lose the next election it's unlikely to be CV-19 that has been their undoing.

Unless of course senior government officials are found guilty of gross misconduct or even criminal actions in the handling of the virus. Johnson's own position would be untenable and public opinion could possibly bring about an election

Portugal, Denmark, New Zealand. 3 democratic governments off the top of my head whose leaders are more popular than ever due to showing leadership and decisive actions. Doubt they will be toppled any time soon

 

[Neiler]

Nothing official yet, but a general concensus that another few weeks are nailed on.

Fair play, we went for another month of lock down last week until the beginning of May, my guess would be the UK would do something similar, given we share the same natural localized habitat (and border) in western Europe and are both surging.

We both have the added advantage at the moment of looking at how other countries in Europe are lifting resections and learning from what is going well and maybe not so.

Jeepers i could do with a hair cut, but probably a few weeks off heading to Austria for one.

 

[Methuselah]

The thing is, there is no manual for Covid-19. Many countries are doing things differently. At some point, when it's over, the various methodologies will be analysed and the manual will be written. At the moment, no one has much of a clue about what is the best approach. Trial and error (unfortunately) will provide the answer.

 

[Harryflashman]

There are people already bored and starting to find it tough to follow the regulations. Theres already far more cars and people about than there was at start of the lockdown. If we had introduced this 2 or 3 weeks earlier I reckon the situation would be far far worse.

I was very sceptical at the time when they held off on clamping down by warning that the timing of measures was crucial. But now I'm starting to see where they were coming from. In my opinion we are definitely not ready to come out of the social distancing measures, but if we'd had 5 weeks now rather than 3, the clamour for relaxing the measures would be huge. Lockdown is clearly the right solution right now but it's not a long term or permanent solution. So it's a very tricky decision down the line for when we need to relax things.

im not arguing with any of that and I think the lockdown is maybe pushing at the seams but decisions were made abd they seem counter to much of Europe .

Would cancelling Cheltenham have made any difference ? I’ve no idea I know personally someone whose died who was there and a neighbour who went returned and was ill and his wife has now been in hospital for about 9 days . Is there a link , well you’d think so and obviously that could be a minor anomaly but if it’s not that’s extended nationally it’s a huge impact isn’t it ?

 

[LouReedwalkonthewildside]

Not many democratic governments will survive this. Johnson is lucky that he has a big majority and has only just been elected. Four years is a very long time in politics and in the event they do lose the next election it's unlikely to be CV-19 that has been their undoing.

Unless of course senior government officials are found guilty of gross misconduct or even criminal actions in the handling of the virus. Johnson's own position would be untenable and public opinion could possibly bring about an election

After it looking like in all reality Trump would get re - elected, it now looks like he could be the biggest casualty.

 

[Tubey]

After it looking like in all reality Trump would get re - elected, it now looks like he could be the biggest casualty.

I'd be gobsmacked if Trump doesn't win comfortably.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

lol

Sorry but that's an abysmal way of viewing things.

It's like saying there's absolutely no point in studying the reign of Henry VIII because you've never been a king and therefore can have no valid view on it.

Or there's no point in having a view on a movie because you've never been an actor/director.

Stupid. Sorry but that's stupid. When we chat football on here, it's not because we think we know as much as Ancelotti - obviously his experience makes him much more qualified to make football decisions than we ever could - but it's because we have a reasoning, functional brain and can therefore assess the merits of a decision he makes. No expert is infallible. Ancelotti makes mistakes. Everyone does.

With Chris Whitty, we have a body of evidence to suggest strongly that he made an error and got it wrong. That's all I'm highlighting - by doing so, I'm obviously not saying I'm more knowledgeable than Chris Whitty overall in his field; I'm simply saying that he got something wrong and providing evidence as to why and how he did.

There was an interview a little while ago between Peston and Jonathan van Tam where not only was Peston so blatantly out of his depth, but he had absolutely no clue just how out of his depth he was, and continued blathering over van Tam. All of us have in many instances the same platform to air our ill-informed opinions as Peston does, and it's created this Dunning Kruger on steroids world where we believe because we have the ability to air our views, and the dirge of Question Time style clapping reinforces our ignorance via likes and retweets, that our opinions are just as valid as someone like van Tam. They're not. They're really not.

By all means read up on stuff and become as well informed as you can be. By all means chat about stuff on here if it helps you to pass the time (heaven knows, I do enough of that). None of that is what irks me. What irks me is the belief that any of us numpties on here can sit behind our computer and lecture Whitty, van Tam or any of those actually doing stuff on what they should be doing differently. We have absolutely no clue at all.

Bruce this feels like the equivalent of ‘show me your medals “ . Like nobody can have an opinion unless they’ve been a success in that field . Of course experts know more than lay people but they also make mistakes and it seems a bit mad that everyone simply has to not question or challenge them because they don’t have a phd or 20 years in the field.


Frankly some of it seems like common sense , so it doesn’t feel like a coincidence when after weeks experts seem to be saying what know nothing plebs we’re speculating on weeks ago . Also perhaps that’s why several imminent virologists seem to be putting forward many of the same points I’ve seen raised in here , I’m assuming they’re entitled to their view on it ?

obviously experts will know more than people like me , as I’ve said before pretty much everybody does but even off the top of my head I definitely heard schools were the safest places for kids two days before we closed them or that Jenny harries say mass gatherings were fine and there are certainly more examples . It seems completely fair to me to question that kind of ‘leadership ‘ whether you are a virologist or a internet nobody .

I've no problem at all with people having an opinion. As I said above, I enjoy bloviating on these threads as much as the next man, but it's surely important to remember that we are just letting off hot air in here. Hopefully it's helpful to do so, whether in terms of letting us pass the time or learning some new stuff, or simply joshing about with internet weirdos we've grown quite fond of. They're all perfectly valid ways of spending our time imo. Where I draw the line is lecturing people who are on the front line of this issue on what they should be doing differently. That's quite frankly insane.

 

[Bruce Wayne]

What football analogy?

Didn't you mention slippy G?