Coronavirus (COVID-19)

[Hillonearth]

You can't see it.

You can't hear it.

You can't taste it.

You can't smell it.

It's too small to sense by touch.

But stay alert for it anyway, right?

FFS.

[Granny Danger]

Do I think the message could be clearer?  Yes.

Do I think part of this is the government trying to pass the buck?  Yes.

However I think that sensible people can still act sensibly and reduce the risk of spreading Coronavirus.  Even when the restrictions are relaxed and we go back to work I will be limiting my social contact both within and outwith the work environment.  Most of us will.  We will have to wait and see if that is enough.

We were never going to eliminate social contact and transmission, it was always going to be about reducing it to a manageable level.  If people start acting like idiots infections will undoubtedly spike again.

 

[Moomintroll]

2 minutes ago, Granny Danger said:

Do I think the message could be clearer?  Yes.

Do I think part of this is the government trying to pass the buck?  Yes.

However I think that sensible people can still act sensibly and reduce the risk of spreading Coronavirus.  Even when the restrictions are relaxed and we go back to work I will be limiting my social contact both within and outwith the work environment.  Most of us will.  We will have to wait and see if that is enough.

We were never going to eliminate social contact and transmission, it was always going to be about reducing it to a manageable level.  If people start acting like idiots infections will undoubtedly spike again.

 

Correct GD, however there are two types of people who will not follow this Common Sense approach.

[Dunfermline Don]

Do I think the message could be clearer?  Yes.
Do I think part of this is the government trying to pass the buck?  Yes.
However I think that sensible people can still act sensibly and reduce the risk of spreading Coronavirus.  Even when the restrictions are relaxed and we go back to work I will be limiting my social contact both within and outwith the work environment.  Most of us will.  We will have to wait and see if that is enough.
We were never going to eliminate social contact and transmission, it was always going to be about reducing it to a manageable level.  If people start acting like idiots infections will undoubtedly spike again.
 

Therein lies the problem. There are too many idiots and selfish people out there who think the laws don’t apply to them. We need strong leadership from above and enforcement where necessary.
Unfortunately for the UK we have Boris!

[Granny Danger]

Just now, Dunfermline Don said:

Therein lies the problem. There are too many idiots and selfish people out there who think the laws don’t apply to them. We need strong leadership from above and enforcement where necessary.
Unfortunately for the UK we have Boris!

There comes a point when you have to move from “this is how things should be” to “this is how things are”.

I’m a bit wary of the “personal responsibility” argument because it can be skewed to suit political agendas, but for me the best thing, arguably the only thing, I can do at this juncture is to practice that and to ask my family and the people who work for me to do likewise.  Though for my employees I can only insist they do so within the workplace environment once we return to work.

 

[101]

10 hours ago, craigkillie said:

I'm generally very much in favour of essentially moving towards binning private cars and encouraging people towards public transport, but the only way it can work is if it comes hand in hand with policy change in a number of areas, but particularly in terms of the concept of what public transport is. At the moment it essentially operates on the same rules as business, where routes only operate if they are profitable, and only at times which are profitable, not if they are useful, which aren't the same thing. Train and bus services in most of Scotland are awful, and nearly everything is routed through cities rather than being designed to connect towns.

They also have to make it as easy as possible for people to ditch their cars. I live right next to a train station (it was one of the reasons I chose the area) and can easily commute via train - it's also about 70 minutes walk/25 minutes run if I want to, which I probably will post-corona. However, my wife has a healthcare job where she is required to drive around to people's houses, often with large heavy pieces of equipment. Her work (a local council authority) do offer pool cars, but for some reason these are located in an industrial estate 15/20 minutes walk from the office, and are generally not well maintained or even cleaned regularly. Therefore, for obvious reasons she and her colleagues generally take their own cars to work, even those who live quite nearby.

She is desperate to buy an electric car soon, but we only have on-street parking and the local area has dreadfully low provision of charging points, so again people are being discouraged from doing the "right" thing.

You can get an electric charging point essentially free of charge from Transport Scotland https://energysavingtrust.org.uk/scotland/grants-loans/domestic-charge-point-funding

I do agree all new builds now should have an electric charger in the drive way or on the street outside.

[Bairnardo]

Surely no one is surprised by what's happening now? This is the Tories starting to Tory.

That being said, you also have to take into consideration the possibility that we are using a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. The statistics are going the right way, and without knowing the true infection rate we will never know if the lockdown actually made much difference. So its probably worth trying a smaller hammer.

Without any guarantees of a vaccine, controlled build up of immunity within the limits of hospital capacity to treat those who get it bad is pretty much our only realistic option, unless anyone thinks its realistic to live like this indefinitely which it isnt.

What we need now is folk just to be considerate and patient and careful. Probably wont happen though.

[mizfit]

So when are we predicting the next spike in cases? I’m going for 3 weeks.

[Benjamin_Nevis]

If the talking haystack lifts the lockdown, or even relaxes it to allow travel, I do hope the Police in the borders are going to be stopping loads of fuckwits in campervans heading for the highlands, preferably with large fines. 

[mizfit]

If the talking haystack lifts the lockdown, or even relaxes it to allow travel, I do hope the Police in the borders are going to be stopping loads of fuckwits in campervans heading for the highlands, preferably with large fines. 

Personally I hope they beat them senseless with 2m long batons.

[Benjamin_Nevis]

12 minutes ago, mizfit said:

Personally I hope they beat them senseless with 2m long batons.

 

Seems reasonable tbh

[Wee Willie]

1 hour ago, doulikefish said:

Its going to be like the red weather warning a few years ago "im far too important to stay at home" says senga the receptionist charlie windsor the self-entitled sod

Utter chaos incoming 

 

12 hours ago, madwullie said:

Absolute nutcases 

The land of the free

[bennett]

1 hour ago, Aufc said:

Had a bizarre experience the other night. There is a caravan park about 3 minutes walk along from my estate with some serviced apartments in front of them. Beside this there is an area of land which currently has three diggers sitting there doing nothing. As my son loves all things construction we often go down here for a wander and a play about.

On this occasion this old bird came out from caravan park and told me i shouldn’t be there as it was private property. I told her it wasnt and she said i was going to give them all coronavirus (it is mostly older people who live there). I told her i was no where near any of them so that wouldnt happen. She then said she hoped i got coronavirus and if that happened my son would end up in intensive care. She said i was a great example to my son after i told her to go f**k herself. We then argued some more and she was shouting at me to piss off whilst i called her an idiot.

People are fucking nuts

I tend to just to ignore the this is my property/private land mob, no point in giving them the excuse to say that you were abusive towards them.

If you have a right to be there, you don't have to explain anything. 

3 hours ago, Sherrif John Bunnell said:

The grant is based on the rateable value of the premises given by the assessor. (similar to a Council Tax band)

Most premises with a rateable value up to £18,000 are entitled to a £10,000 grant, rateable values from £18,001 to £51,000 are entitled to the £25k grant, although that grant is limited to properties used for retail and hospitality .

So a plumber working out of a ramshackle old shed with a £500 rateable value could be getting £10K, but a hotel with a rateable value of £51,001 wouldn't get a penny.

Joe Public can look up the rateable value of any building on the SAA website, so that will give you a fair idea of who is getting what grant. https://www.saa.gov.uk/

 

Explains Magees lack of posting, he's living it up and bevvying his grant.

[madwullie]

1 hour ago, Granny Danger said:

There comes a point when you have to move from “this is how things should be” to “this is how things are”.

I’m a bit wary of the “personal responsibility” argument because it can be skewed to suit political agendas, but for me the best thing, arguably the only thing, I can do at this juncture is to practice that and to ask my family and the people who work for me to do likewise.  Though for my employees I can only insist they do so within the workplace environment once we return to work.

 

The govt are basically ditching all responsibility for this, so it looks like it comes down to the individual to protect themselves and their families as best as they can for their own personal circumstances. It's not great by any manner of means, but here we are. Imo we should really have a proper lockdown for a few extra weeks to make sure we get the virus to manageable levels and have the infrastructure in place to test trace & isolate as we come out slowly. For some unknown reason, this is too hard for the UK govt to accomplish though, so all we can do is protect ourselves. 

I certainly won't be at the pictures, a restaurant, the football or probably even inside my dad's house for the foreseeable future. 

I also think that despite opening etc, most restaurants etc are going to really really struggle. People will be very wary of going near them, they will have to have distancing measures implemented inside meaning capacity is slashed, and people in general are pretty fucking skint after the kicking they've taken over the last 7 weeks, so probably won't have too much disposable income. 

I do think it's going to take a vaccine until we approach anywhere near what we would consider to be normal. 

Edited May 10, 2020 by madwullie

[Moomintroll]

1 hour ago, Dunfermline Don said:

Therein lies the problem. There are too many idiots and selfish people out there who think the laws don’t apply to them. We need strong leadership from above and enforcement where necessary.
Unfortunately for the UK we have Boris!

You cannot blame the Tories for the thick arseholes who will ignore the lockdown instructions because f**k the Police. I stay near Liverpool and see it every day.

 

[madwullie]

1 hour ago, Bairnardo said:

Surely no one is surprised by what's happening now? This is the Tories starting to Tory.

That being said, you also have to take into consideration the possibility that we are using a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. The statistics are going the right way, and without knowing the true infection rate we will never know if the lockdown actually made much difference. So its probably worth trying a smaller hammer.

Without any guarantees of a vaccine, controlled build up of immunity within the limits of hospital capacity to treat those who get it bad is pretty much our only realistic option, unless anyone thinks its realistic to live like this indefinitely which it isnt.

What we need now is folk just to be considerate and patient and careful. Probably wont happen though.

The govt has made such an arse of it though, that it's looking like the only weapon we have in case of a large spike in deaths / infections, is other, possibly more targeted lockdowns. The only question is if there's a number of deaths that will make them implement these, or if they'll just go balls out take the carnage and only lockdown if the nhs is being overwhelmed. 

Edited May 10, 2020 by madwullie

[madwullie]

2 minutes ago, Perkin Flump said:

You cannot blame the Tories for the thick arseholes who will ignore the lockdown instructions because f**k the Police. I stay near Liverpool and see it every day.

 

They have to share the blame. The tories cut police numbers and could have but didn't give out really harsh fines on those who take the piss. 

People should have a bit of societal responsibility and behave in such a way that protects others, but they're c***s. 

[Granny Danger]

1 minute ago, madwullie said:

The govt are basically ditching all responsibility for this, so it looks like it comes down to the individual to protect themselves and their families as best as they can for their own personal circumstances. It's not great by any manner of means, but here we are. Imo we should really have a proper lockdown for a few extra weeks to make sure we get the virus to manageable levels and have the infrastructure in place to test trace & isolate as we come out slowly. For some unknown reason, this is too hard for the UK govt to accomplish though, so all we can do is protect ourselves. 

I certainly won't be at the pictures, a restaurant, the football or probably even inside my dad's house for the foreseeable future. 

I also think that despite opening etc, most restaurants etc are going to really really struggle. People will be very wary of going near them, they will have to have distancing measures implemented inside, and people in general are pretty fucking skint after the kicking they've taken over the last 7 weeks, so probably won't have too much disposable income. 

I do think it's going to take a vaccine until we approach anywhere near what we would consider to be normal. 

I agree with much of this, including people being wary about socialising in public.   One thing I’m not sure about is people’s personal finances.

Don’t get me wrong, there will be some people hit really, really badly but the majority will either still be working or furloughed on 80% or full pay.

Also folk who go out regularly will have saved quite a lot because of the lockdown.

The aggregate effect, therefore, might not be as bad as you suggesting. 

[bennett]

4 minutes ago, Perkin Flump said:

You cannot blame the Tories for the thick arseholes who will ignore the lockdown instructions because f**k the Police. I stay near Liverpool and see it every day.

 

A half arsed lockdown which came far too late, we can blame them for that,

 

A prime minister who was telling people that it was ok to shake peoples hands and downplaying the risk, we can blame for that.

[sparky88]

6 minutes ago, madwullie said:

The govt has made such an arse of it though, that it's poon like the only weapon we have in case of a large spike in deaths / infections, is other, possibly more targeted lockdowns. The only question is if there's a number of deaths that will make them implement these, or if they'll just go balls out take the carnage and only lockdown if the nhs is being overwhelmed. 

If the NHS is being overwhemed, it is already too late for a lockdown, given that there's a three week gap between getting covid19 and dying from it. I don't think we will see a full lockdown again. Especially as there's some evidence they don't make a difference - sweden, Iceland etc.

Edited May 10, 2020 by sparky88