2m

[BlodwynPig]

He's already had the vi.....yeah that was bollocks wasn't it

of course it was bollocks - probably come out in his memoirs 2028

but immunity is short-lived apparently so even if he did...

[Cloud]

not defending your government, but it's obvious that not exceeding the NHS capacity indirectly save lives.

Well yeah, but that's a side effect of protecting the (image of the) NHS (to the voting public, the world stage and potential buyers) rather than the primary goal, I feel.

[Barry Admin]

If you're interested in the numbers, according to The Lancet's meta-study every metre above 1m approximately halves the risk of transmission.

0-1m - 12.8% risk
1-2m - 2.6% risk
2-3m - 1.3% risk

Thanks. Still can't get over this tbh.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Only a few weeks ago, people were saying pubs wouldn't open again until next year.

Apart from the government, the pub industry, the brewing industry, journalists and everyone in continental Europe where they were already open or opening.

[olliebean]

I like the way you can hear the cabinet focus-grouping the phrase "one metre plus." Plus? Plus what? Doesn't matter, it's more than one metre. Right but how much more? Doesn't matter, point is it's more than one metre. But we want to reduce it to one metre! Right, which is way we're not saying what plus means. Plus fuck all.

The official guidance is "One metre plus wear a mask or something, I don't know, use your common sense, fucksake do we have to spell out every tiny detail for you?"

That way it's our fault, not theirs, if "common sense" turns out to have steered us wrong.

[Sheffield Wednesday]

"It exists and therefore it will cause excess deaths" is a perfectly reasonable and valid assessment, in the same way that a longer, harsher winter will have an impact we can only attempt to mitigate.

"Economic decisions are taken at the cost of life every year" is an accurate assessment, albeit something which we should actually challenge forcibly to minimise the impact on public health.

"The economic and health impacts of lockdown will be significant, and therefore we need to balance relative risks and impacts" is a perfectly fair and valid conclusion, but this should not be used as a facile zero sum argument to sacrifice public health, by people who demonstrably don't care at all about public health.

No matter the valid arguments to cautiously lift restrictions, the UK government has proven itself one of the very worst first world countries in its strategic planning, implementation and - most significantly - its communication. The only consistent principle has been to defend itself and its sponsors at all costs by silencing and gaslighting dissenters in the press, the scientific community and the public, and by simply lying. This will an arrogant, contemptuous, corrupt and incompetent cabinet whose only 'strength' is an instinct for unprincipled populism.

Any attempt to defend them is suckling on the teat of normality at the cost of vulnerable, impoverished life.

GET TOLD

[chveik]

Any attempt to defend them is suckling on the teat of normality at the cost of vulnerable, impoverished life.

who are you addressing this to?

[bgmnts]

suckling on the teat of normality at the cost of vulnerable, impoverished life.

GET TOLD

Isnt that just general life though?

[Barry Admin]

Just saw this story on the Beeb:

World number one Novak Djokovic said he is "so sorry" after becoming the latest tennis player to test positive for Covid-19.

Grigor Dimitrov, Borna Coric and Viktor Troicki all revealed they had coronavirus after playing at Djokovic's Adria Tour competition.

Djokovic, 33, played fellow Serb Troicki in the first event in Belgrade.

In a post on Twitter, Djokovic said it had been "too soon" to stage the tournament.

"I am so deeply sorry our tournament has caused harm," added Djokovic.

He said the tournament had been organised with "a pure heart", "good intentions" and a belief that they had "met all health protocols".

How utterly unsurprising. This is the sort of thing that's gonna keep happening now, how could it not be? I don't even want to do anything for my birthday, how am I supposed to ask people to get taxis or buses and put themselves at risk? I probably shouldn't have went into Asda and Lidls today either, just for buttermilk and a cheap sandwich toaster for fucks sake. I think I just need to basically hibernate for a while - apart from a short walk each day where I try to avoid everyone, maybe at night actually - and see what happens next.

[Zetetic]

Edit: Ignore, for now.

[Zetetic]

Edit glitch.

[Sheffield Wednesday]

who are you addressing this to?

I'm just saying I've written the definitive response to these disingenuous, faux-pragmatic arguments, so please use as you see fit.

[Sheffield Wednesday]

Isnt that just general life though?

Where is your fight, you obstructive bastard?

[pigamus]

This thread is a load of ignorant vindictive bullshit. I've been using their Post-it Notes for years and they've killed precisely no one.

[BlodwynPig]

Apart from the government, the pub industry, the brewing industry, journalists and everyone in continental Europe where they were already open or opening.

UK perspective. I agree with you if we had had a competent or even semi-competent government. You are a sucker for wanderlust.

[BlodwynPig]

This thread is a load of ignorant vindictive bullshit. I've been using their Post-it Notes for years and they've killed precisely no one.

The term strawman was invented for this post.

[bgmnts]

Where is your fight, you obstructive bastard?

Fight against what?

What are you doing beyond running a fictional halal gaming pub and playing obscure shmups.

Confused.com

[Danger Man]

You forgot the bit where he was pretending to be the manager of a care home.

To be fair, he only did that for a couple of posts.

He's gone insane. Insane I tell you!!!!!!!

[Johnny Yesno]

I agree in general that caution is a good thing and there ought to be genuine concern about the lifespan of the virus and our ability to tackle it. Those shouldn't be conflated though, because we have no choice but to pick ourselves up and return to normal if possible and sufficiently safe.

Everywhere else in Europe has been doing the same for the past 6-8 weeks before us without the number of deaths and infections going up. In fact in these countries they have continued to fall or remained at a low level. That shows to me it is sufficiently safe for the UK to follow suit.

The choice of phrase 'letting people die' is neither fair as a moral judgement nor characteristic of what's happening through social policy, otherwise following that very argument we should go into lockdown every winter when seasonal flu comes knocking and kills on average 10,000-20,000 people in the UK. But we don't, we behave entirely as normal, perhaps glancing at one or two NHS posters that have been pinned up in the bogs at work. Perhaps people think that we should introduce lockdown for flu now? It would at least be consistent with this thinking.

CHECK OUT THIS DUNCE

[Johnny Yesno]

a video from Belgium (or wherever) which showed that Michael Gove was taking out of his hole about the social distancing used in such countries.

https://twitter.com/alfonslopeztena/status/1257638908164288512

[Barry Admin]

That's the one, thank you! I just couldn't find it yesterday.

[MojoJojo]

This.

The plan is the same as it's always been: wild herd immunity at the expense of however many deaths and fucked-up-lungs-for-life it takes.

Out of interest, what alternatives do you think there are?

[BlodwynPig]

Out of interest, what alternatives do you think there are?

1. Good science
2. Excellent communication and explanation of strategy
3. Open and transparent intervention measures
4. Strong leadership and clear rules, not wishy washy 'guidance'
5. Flexible and adaptable planning at a suitable scale

[NoSleep]

Out of interest, what alternatives do you think there are?

Taking the route that NZ did to prevent more deaths (taking the threat to lives seriously) in anticipation of a vaccine.

[MojoJojo]

1. Good science
2. Excellent communication and explanation of strategy
3. Open and transparent intervention measures
4. Strong leadership and clear rules, not wishy washy 'guidance'
5. Flexible and adaptable planning at a suitable scale

They're all good things, but none of them are alternatives to herd immunity. You can't lock down the virus away. It's here until we have herd immunity. Assuming herd immunity is possible, otherwise things get really grim.

[Johnny Yesno]

They're all good things, but none of them are alternatives to herd immunity. You can't lock down the virus away. It's here until we have herd immunity. Assuming herd immunity is possible, otherwise things get really grim.

Well, that's funny because most of the other governments of the world would disagree with you.

And it's not really a herd immunity strategy unless there is a vaccine. Our government's strategy is the let the weak ones die strategy, which isn't the same thing at all.

[BlodwynPig]

Plus, immunity - WHAT IMMUNITY?

Population immunity
Population immunity

The updated overview of the findings of population-based (from random sampling, residual clinical samples or blood donor samples) seroepidemiological studies in EU/EEA Member States are shown in Table. All EU/EEA Member States have low levels of seropositivity, even without adjusting for test sensitivity and specificity, and it is unlikely that population immunity levels reached by winter 2020/2021 with current transmission patterns will be sufficient for indirect protection.

https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/covid-19/latest-evidence/immune-responses

Two studies looking at levels of antibodies in recovered patients showed that natural immunity cannot be relied on

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/immunity-covid-19-rapidly-declines-research-shows/

[Sebastian Cobb]

Anyone who rushes to a pub when they reopen is a fucking idiot imo, and I love a pint.

I also see tech entrepreneurs are forcing app-based ordering and possibly handing over details of customers for 'tracing' purposes. I hope people refuse to use this but suspect they won't.

[MojoJojo]

Well, that's funny because most of the other governments of the world would disagree with you.

And it's not really a herd immunity strategy unless there is a vaccine. Our government's strategy is the let the weak ones die strategy, which isn't the same thing at all.

To be clear here, I am not defending the UK government. They have clearly fucked up. What I'm objecting to is the idea that the "correct" strategy is just to have a lockdown as tight as possible, and that any loosening of rules is callously throwing away lives for cash.

Lockdown doesn't get rid of the coronavirus. There's no way to stop most people getting it in the long term. We can try and protect the vulnerable (which this government has done an appalling job at). Lockdown indirectly kills a lot of people.

[NoSleep]

There's no way to stop most people getting it in the long term.

Why are you ignoring the possibility that a vaccine could save lives? Herd immunity doesn't mean that everybody has to be exposed to the virus. The point of slowing down population exposure to the virus is to make time before a vaccine is developed.