Current Affairs Coronavirus Thread - Serious stuff !!!

[Chris O'Connor]

Yes agree. Can't stand it.

I also hate those lists of 'fun things to do during lockdown' which essentially involve cooking or watching a film.

I was looking at the one involving getting really fit and had identified one hour next Sunday when I'll really have a go at it.

....then dscovered the clocks go forward next weekend so I'll just have to lose that 'fitness' hour after all.

 

[grandjoeblue]

Well you better get used to it, because no one's flying abroad for the foreseeable future.

May isn't that far into the future?

 

[SussexToffee]

Hate that also, as soon as Boris put a chain and padlock on the country, everyone on Facebook was posting “Lockdown streaming tips”, like albums on Spotify and films on Netflix.

Making banana bread is just so random. Lockdown isn’t “fun” and the things that are supposed to be “fun” are getting tedious now. Never found the idea of watching a person dancing around in front of their webcam “fun” at all. It’s supposed to be “lifting the sprits and morale”, more like making me drive myself insane.

.... another one to add..... “Write a song about lockdown, post a video of yourself performing it on YouTube and watch it trend with hopefully a local news slot”.

No thank you, and don’t even get me started on that one with a whole family singing about lockdown to the tune of a Les Miserables song.

 

[peteblue]

Well you better get used to it, because no one's flying abroad for the foreseeable future.

I certainly will not be leaving the country until 2022.....

 

[roydo]

.... another one to add..... “Write a song about lockdown, post a video of yourself performing it on YouTube and watch it trend with hopefully a local news slot”.

No thank you, and don’t even get me started on that one with a whole family singing about lockdown to the tune of a Les Miserables song.

Why do you go looking for them if they annoy you so much?

I got annoyed by the 5 Live coverage of Covid after the first few days, so turned it off. Other than live comms on footie, havnt listened to it since then.

 

[davek]

May isn't that far into the future?

That wont happen.

 

[NilSatisOptimum]

good luck with that, they’ll have nothing to get outraged over

Well indeed they enjoy lies, who dose not.

However, if I were to be slightly non political partisan, I would suggest this would be the perfect opportunity for our Government to talk about COVAX, and big that up in every media interview today as this particular story rumbles.

The caveat to all that is Britain being global not in words but in action. What others do with AZ is entirely up to them, however, make the point about any over supply, over and over again as countries pause, it goes straight to COVAX.

Of course that's the irony, nationalism the racists it encompasses and global Britain, hence the continuing bitterness and falsehoods towards the EU.

 

[grandjoeblue]

That wont happen.

I'm not saying I support it but by June flights will be happening to the whole of europe. Its all confirmed in the road map.

 

[SussexToffee]

Why do you go looking for them if they annoy you so much?

I got annoyed by the 5 Live coverage of Covid after the first few days, so turned it off. Other than live comms on footie, havnt listened to it since then.

Watching the news in the early days of the outbreak and they did a whole item about them on the local BBC News.

Haven’t watched the news in ages now, but it still keeps coming up on Facebook news feeds all the latest updates. I recently put up a status update that I’ll be leaving Facebook alone, as all the Covid updates are driving me nuts. All I got back was “If anything happens, you won’t know”. That is pure folly, as if something does happen, someone will tell me themselves.

Oh yes, 5 News and that newsreader who’s too close to the camera. Really cheap looking production and their Covid reports and “fun” items on it were infuriating from the start, like a man building a train station in his garden. It took me about a week or two and I no longer watch it.

Last night I cleared my iPhone cache and bookmarked the only sites I need to look at daily. No BBC News updates, no gimmicky news items, no scaremongering...... just sites that give figures like PHE England, Worldometer and .gov.

 

[davek]

I'm not saying I support it but by June flights will be happening to the whole of europe. Its all confirmed in the road map.

That wont depend on the UK, that will depend on European nations.

The United Kingdom Virus prevalent on mainland Europe now is currently blocking any attempt to return to a late spring / summer Christmas. The tourism industry in some countries will, of course, want UK tourists let in, but the populations as a whole will be looking at that in horror - mass vaccine roll out here or not.

 

[NilSatisOptimum]

I'm not saying I support it but by June flights will be happening to the whole of europe. Its all confirmed in the road map.

Hope so, some of last year's staction was bleeding awful, they won't be missed.

 

[peteblue]

So, come Thursday or whenever, the EMA will either reconfirm that AZ is safe, say further analysis is required or pull the plug on it. If they pull the plug, then the ‘pause’ countries Politicians will pat themselves on the back and their people who have had the jab will go into panic mode. If they say further analysis is required, the ’pause‘ politicians will again pat themselves on the back and their people will become vaccine sceptics. If they say the AZ is safe and should continue, the Politicians can accept the decision, give themselves credit for being cautious but having a population who now haven’t a clue what to do. If they say it’s safe but the Politicians do not accept the decision, the vaccine rollout programme will go into free fall.....in between all of this people will continue to catch Covid and die. There is no upside to this .......

 

[grandjoeblue]

That wont depend on the UK, that will depend on European nations.

The United Kingdom Virus prevalent on mainland Europe now is currently blocking any attempt to return to a late spring / summer Christmas. The tourism industry in some countries will, of course, want UK tourists let in, but the populations as a whole will be looking at that in horror - mass vaccine roll out here or not.

I think it might not be every country is open for business but some will definitely open. About 5 or 6 have already confirmed they are open. Turkey have came out and have said that you won't even need to take a test or be vaccinated to go there.

 

[peteblue]

I'm not saying I support it but by June flights will be happening to the whole of europe. Its all confirmed in the road map.

Flying can cause blood clots......

 

[Neiler]

Covid is a very infectious and serious virus with devastating effects especially on the vulnerable groups. Pausing or delaying vaccination is not without very serious consequences for very vulnerable people. While it's crucial vaccines are safe it's also crucial there's some common sense on the comparative risks between the vulnerable being infected and large death rates versus any slight precautionary concerns with a vaccination.

The reaction across a swathe of countries to statistically insignificant levels of blood clots is quite baffling. When one country stops the AZ vaccine rollout as a precautionary measure others have followed almost without thought. A very low level of blood clots will occur for a multitude of reasons with or without the vaccine, there is no real spike and no proven connection. The levels compared to number of vaccinations are tiny and not entirely unexpected, the reaction totally disproportionate. It's almost being ultra, ultra careful without balancing any of the risks of stopping. The halting of any vaccine has consequences for people's attitude long term, no matter if it's all clear, the damage is done and irrevocable. The negativity that will spread can't be collected back and bottled up, its out there forever.

The European vaccination program generally has been following the slow, stop, extremely slow and stop pathway anyway, seemingly more intent on playing politics, taking legal action against vaccine suppliers and spreading negativity and fear amongst its people. While this has taken place on an individual country by country basis it's just another step being taken on a well trodden Europe wide pathway.

My understanding is the reason they’re worried these are clots are in the brain that are generally rare enough, rather than the more usual clots that are common in the legs or lungs and also they are happening in younger health care professionals and public servants were you generally get fewer and rarer events like this.

So comparing common clot stats with this-is not really comparing like for like, need to be comparing brain clots in this age cohort of vaccinated v non vaccinated people of the same age to see if there’s something going on. Which i believe will be the focus. So the logic is there and i dont see a reason to take a risk really, especially as most countries are still going through their vulnerable & older cohorts with multiple co-morbities. Yet a possible trend has been alerted in younger health care professionals and public servants now in Norway, Austria and Italy.

I'm hoping it all comes back thumbs up, but i can understand the caution - i don't think a few days of pausing is that big of a deal, almost all countries have the capacity to do 250k jabs a day, but EU countries certainly haven't had that supply yet, so catching up will be straight forward, AZ have proven an unreliable partner to a lot of countries, so a pause itself may help AZ with a bit of breathing room.