Well that's the next thing that needs to be looked at then
Current Affairs Coronavirus Thread - Serious stuff !!!
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Are you saying infectious people should be in work? How would that work if you have a COVID positive surgeon operating on a cancer patient?
People carrying a virus, which increases the risk of serious illness and death to those with health conditions, working with people at risk of serious illness and...
It's almost like it sounds it's a bad thing. A very bad thing indeed.
yeah I know, I don't follow that bit of his spiel. He is good for assessing the info though.
Also, I'm pretty sure his Ivermetcin thing is more about looking at other alternative treatments. He stresses how important it is to get vaccinated regularly but for breaking down reports etc it's useful info.
I don't think @navidson was saying that
They're saying we can't have people isolating for 10 days unless they are definitely infectious.
So that has to be measured by daily testing etc. Can't just have people isolating unless absolutely required.
I think that’s what’s happening though. With such high infection rates, lots of NHS staff are testing positive and as such need to isolate.
Due to patient welfare, they have to be overly careful and cautious.
What happens when no operation takes place?
My father passed away after waiting on a heart operation that was delayed numerous times due to Covid - I wish everyday that he could have been operated on earlier.
I'd take that risk
I know, and that excessive caution in turn could lead to more deaths. It's a really difficult situation. And I don't see how locking down right now improves things. In the immediacy, it doesn't.
That's why it's so important to start using any real-world data possible with Omicron and establish just how dangerous is is.
Would NHS staff be forced into 10-day isolation for a cold? No, they would not. So, if it is established that Omicron is definitely less severe and more like a cold than the severe respiratory issues caused by the initial COVID strains, maybe the 10-day isolation period needs to be re-assessed?
I know it's all ifs, buts and maybes at this point but we can't just carry on like this. It's mad.
You have my sympathy.
I think getting back to the original point raised by Pete.
Omicron variant on its own does not appear to present a greater risk of death, however due to its nature it has the capability to seriously disrupt the NHS and put a lot of people at unnecessary risk. That is why it needs to be taken seriously.
The point you raise is valid and I’m sure I would feel the same if it was a member of my family in a similar situation. However in a pandemic situation the NHS has been forced against everything it stands for to prioritise treatments based on resources it has available.
It’s utterly horrid what happened with your dad. Thoughts are with you and yours.
in this polarised atmosphere where management and politicians don't think they will be backed, it is very difficult for command decisions to be taken within a bureaucracy with any degree of risk attached. So everyone hedges their bets and passes the buck. And we end up with this massively suboptimal scenario of lockdown. In a more confident society (say here 20 years ago) you would be running trials, experimenting with the minimum isolation periods etc)
Really sorry to hear that mate. Absolutely horrendous situation that I can’t imagine what it must have been like to deal with.
Sadly I don’t even think it’s a risk that would have been allowed to be taken as surgeons, doctors, nurses aren’t allowed to operate in those situations. Obviously in non-covid times there would hopefully be more than enough cover to get that operation done but if the people are sick they can’t work.
The NHS are currently dealing with a triple whammy of issues which is limiting their ability to deal with what is happening. They are dealing with a huge backlog of patients on top of the covid cases. They are having to run and manage the booster program which has recently been pushed into overdrive. And they are having to deal with an already under strength workforce being depleted by workers being off sick.
This is why we need to try and get this under control as quickly as possible. Hopefully omicron will continue to be relatively mild and we can deal with it. But I think it’s better to be overly cautious than just let it run wild and potentially create way more situations like what you had to go through with your dad.
My only issue is what ‘getting it under control’ involves. The only real way to do that and alleviate the nhs backlog would be to lockdown for about 4 months and even that wouldn’t do the trick. But anyway, that’s not a decision I have to make
So I just think away from that, if there are things we can do, like getting away from this 10-day isolation period, then it has to be done
Well unless they change the rules associated around the isolation to match the (lower) severity of the strain (if it does prove to be lower).
Like I said, you wouldn’t have staff previously isolating for a cold. so it’s why the real-world data is so important. If - and if isn’t proven yet obviously as it’s a week or so away at least - Omicron does prove to be less severe, and there’s not a sharp rise in hospitalisations etc, then surely we need to look at reducing the extremity of the restrictions/responses?
I don’t mean stuff like masks. I mean for example isolation periods. Can they be 5 days? Can it be that key workers just get a pcr to clear and have to follow up with daily tests?
If the strain is less severe, then it makes no sense to have responses that match the seriousness of previous strains. So yes it is a wait and see on that severity, but surely that has to be the answer?
Hoping that this drop also factors in the age skew of cases in younger age groups.
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