Current Affairs Coronavirus Thread - Serious stuff !!!

[Brennan]

(Not aimed at you before I start)

Why? People don’t want to live in fear. It’s a horrible narrative that’s formed in the past few weeks that we should be afraid of everything and everyone. Up until today there’s been more people killed on the road than there has by this virus, yet people still get in their cars and drive to the supermarket to panic buy crap they don’t actually need.

This country, perhaps even the world, seems to have been overcome by this very odd notion that individuals need to become these ingratiating beings for the good of others. Sorry, but it’s not my responsibility to curtail what I do for the fear of infecting someone by proxy somewhere down the line. Follow decent hygiene and all the rest, fine but to say I should be happy to give up my liberties and way of life so that someone at risk doesn’t become critically ill 6 or 7 infections down the line? That’s mental. It’s up to them to look after themselves. It’s like taking cars off the road, booze off the shelves and anything more Calorie loaded than a carrot.

I don’t give a flying one if your granny is 91 and has asthma. Tell her to stay the eff in her house until the threats gone. The rest of us can carry on living.

Very sad you feel this way really.

 

[witchdoc187]

It is. At the moment. But people prepare for disaster. It's not unreasonable. Truck drivers get sick, any transportation is not immune for that matter. Any weakness in the chain and everything grinds to a halt.

Is it warranted? Who knows. Within two weeks we could all be back chatting about the season. Are you that comfortable in knowing that is all going to fly over. I don't know, best to edge on the side of caution. Just in case.

If I didn't bulk buy this week I'd be out of food and water tomorrow on a normal week and the local supermarket has locked it's doors. So considering we have a 3 year old it makes sense for us to get extra food and water. I imagine there's others in the UK thinking the same who normally just shop week to week. Why would you not want to be prepared? If only to avoid massive queues for whatever scraps are left?

 

[NilSatisOptimum]

Does anyone think Corona will keep mutating until it becomes even more contagious and deadly and basically decimates the global population, bringing about a post-apocalyptic society of survivors who must fight for access to resources?

Hang on there a bit. I'm still worrying myself over who I should feel more sorry for the rhesus monkey or the Tory voter, maybe they are the same I just don't know!

 

[roydo]

It is. At the moment. But people prepare for disaster. It's not unreasonable. Truck drivers get sick, any transportation is not immune for that matter. Any weakness in the chain and everything grinds to a halt.

Is it warranted? Who knows. Within two weeks we could all be back chatting about the season. Are you that comfortable in knowing that is all going to fly over. I don't know, best to edge on the side of caution. Just in case.

Oh sure, things could get tricky. But the planning behind it all is borderline witchcraft. And yeah, I am slowly buying a few bits and bobs on top of our usual shop, like you, just to be cautious.

 

[Wolf8312]

So what. Many people already have it. I suspect many people have already had it earlier in the year before China finally admitted it. Testing doesn’t cure anything, it just feeds the number crunching. If you are not ill stop worrying. If you get a fever and then are ill then you’ve got it and depending on the severity will either be at home recovering or in hospital, either way testing will do nothing except confirm and add to the numbers. If you are ill and haven’t got a fever then you either have the flu, a cold or an allergy...

Interesting thing is back in December when I travelled home from China. I was struck at the time by how few people were on the plane. I mean it was a jumbo jet at the height of new year, for the Chinese and there were empty seats everywhere. I wonder now if there were indeed travel restrictions (y'know people not getting visas etc) of some sort.

 

[LinekersLegs]

Thank you. I also have a 3 year old son and my nearest decent sized supermarket is about 20miles away and has already closed its doors

Parents live in Spain so can appreciate the worry. Even though we share same lack of rainfall here in California I’m not that concerned about the taps not working in this particular emergency.

Although I will confess to having already got a large stockpile of water in the earthquake/fire kit so that might be skewing my comfort levels! I also added some wine and spirits to the store - purely medicinal of course

 

[zzr45]

I've got 2 elderly parents both with heart conditions. My wife's mum has an auto immune disease so excuse me for being worried.

I hope more restrictive movement orders get issued soon and the it's game on for the army or police to beat the [Poor language removed] crap out of ignorant fuckheads like you.

That’s lovely mate. I hope you look after them over the next few weeks and look after yourself to ensure that you can continue to do so.

If there’s restrictive travel movements then I’ll follow them, don’t you worry. Until then I’ll live my life. Cheers.

 

[Barnfred 55]

Just heard numerous medical experts from universities in London say on the radio that banning public gatherings is unlikely to halt the spread of the disease, with you more likely to catch it crammed into a pub to watch the behind closed doors matches or crammed in the supermarket trying to get a 50th roll of toilet paper, purely because those are closed environments. Yet, despite this advice, there's a clamour from the armchair experts to ban such gatherings, with the actual experts saying the only real value from doing so is to not tie up the emergency service resources usually required to support such events.

For clarity, I don't think anyone is suggesting that Trump isn't a complete whopper, but I'm not sure the British approach is in any way comparable to the American approach, due in large part to the greater availability of testing, and the support that is designed to encourage people to self-isolate when they do get something.

I've said before about whether people have changed their behaviour as a result of all of this navel gazing, and to be honest, if you were thinking of going to a football match or running the marathon at the moment then more fool you.

I think a lot of people don't realise yet that we are dealing with 2 emergencies here. One is a health emergency, but the second is an economic and logistical emergency on a scale probably not seen since the last world war.

The government need to manage both of these at the same time and it will invariably involve balancing one with the other. It's a terrible conundrum as peoples lives are at stake, but when the health situation does improve people will need jobs to return to, and the likelihood is many of those jobs won't be there.

Every decision that is made will have consequences. For instance, closing schools causes a problem with child minding, with people staying off work or children going to stay with vulnerable grandparents who should really be isolating. Cancelling sporting events, like the Grand National and football matches, bring their own problems. The company that own Aintree racecourse, for example, used to bring in 95% of it's annual income from the 3 day Grand National event, I doubt they could survive the cancellation. Friends of mine own a hat shop in Liverpool and 50% of their sales are in the run up to Aintree. Many football clubs outside of the premier league cannot survive without the gate receipts and match day income.

When the big shut down comes, which it inevitably will at some stage as the government has already stated, then our already vulnerable High Street is going to find it hard, with many small business's, in the hospitality sector especially, failing. The travel industry will also be hit hard. The longer the shutdown, the more business's will go under.

Pensions and investments will be hit massively, and whilst they will no doubt recover over the next 5 years or so, that won't help the poor guys who are coming upto retirement now.

As I understand it, the people advising the government on this are trying to take into account all these factors plus the impact on the emergency services. They are trying to time events to ensure that the shutdown, when it inevitably comes, will have the minimal effect on our long term economy whilst enabling our medical services to cope with the numbers that require hospitalisation. The fact that more people may possibly die as a result of their decisions makes their jobs that much harder.

It's all well and good criticising government for making the wrong decisions or listening to the "wrong expert advice", but nobody at this stage really knows what's good advice and what isn't. Hindsight will give us a better indication, but even then it's inevitable that all governments around the world made mistakes in the handling of this virus, and all evidence would therefore be open to interpretation. For all governments, and ours is no different, it'll be a case of damned if you do and damned if you don't.

Personally I'm just glad it isn't me having to make those decisions.

 

[peteblue]

Lads, no need to fall out....well apart from having a go at those selfish idiots panic buying......

 

[Mutzo Nutzo]

That’s lovely mate. I hope you look after them over the next few weeks and look after yourself to ensure that you can continue to do so.

If there’s restrictive travel movements then I’ll follow them, don’t you worry. But the fact that you have to wish someone else would beat the effing crap out of me suggests you’re a bit of a fanny that couldn’t do it himself. I’m sorry about that.

Lad I would proper burst you given the opportunity

 

[zzr45]

Lad I would proper burst you given the opportunity

Nah. You wouldn’t.

 

[tsubaki]

It is. At the moment. But people prepare for disaster. It's not unreasonable. Truck drivers get sick, any transportation is not immune for that matter. Any weakness in the chain and everything grinds to a halt.

Is it warranted? Who knows. Within two weeks we could all be back chatting about the season. Are you that comfortable in knowing that is all going to fly over. I don't know, best to edge on the side of caution. Just in case.

TBF supply chain issues are - at least as long as the stuff is still being produced and is available - something they can easily get round with effective coordination.

This crisis is going to put loads of drivers (mainly cab and Uber, but also delivery businesses) out of work and available; put them to work moving stuff around, delivering to those self-isolating etc. This is a golden opportunity for construction / transport upgrades to be done as well.

 

[Nymzee]

I dont understand why anyone in the UK buys bottled water anyrate. Maybe some areas have horrid water I guess, but down here its sound, and yet bottles of it fly off the shelf.

Even if their tap water is rank a water filter isn't expensive.

 

[witchdoc187]

Parents live in Spain so can appreciate the worry. Even though we share same lack of rainfall here in California I’m not that concerned about the taps not working in this particular emergency.

Although I will confess to having already got a large stockpile of water in the earthquake/fire kit so that might be skewing my comfort levels! I also added some wine and spirits to the store - purely medicinal of course

We can't drink tap water here.

 

[Abraders]

One thing that seems to be taken for granted is that people will actually self isolate and do the right thing.

I hadn`t considered this until I spoke with my mate who is a cabbie and he said there was NO WAY he`d be self isolating if he displayed any symptoms, as he couldn`t afford to be off the road for any length of time.

He said most of the lads who work for his firm were of the same opinion.

There must be many many more people who are in the same boat and will just ignore all advice and carry on due to financial necessity.

What a mess.

Including and not limited to myself and everybody whom works in hospitality.

My works' team isn't even big enough to cover one or two or us going into self-isolation, let alone would they encourage it or support us financially through it.