Not saying anything more after this, as this is a moderation thread, and probably not saying any more on Covid full stop, as there seems to be a clear desire for 2+2 to only promote one side of any story on this, but to answer these two:
Quote:
Originally Posted by MrWookie
It's not going to crash if you stay on the current course, no. Your proposal to change course and open up with minimal social distancing restrictions is insane, and that most definitely can lead to overwhelming the NHS. That is exactly what happened here. Exactly.
I don't know where "here" is (Canada I want to say?), so I can't comment on how well your health service is/was prepared to cope with something like Covid, or the general state of play in terms of the population. All I know is that given the current situation in the UK in terms of:
- previous rates of virus growth
- previous levels of NHS usage
- increased knowledge of the severity of Covid at all levels indicating that it is nowhere near as dangerous as first feared back in January/February, primarily due to not having any clue as to quite how many are asymptomatic
- the levels of protection that are already in the general public from the bodies' own general defences and cross-protection from other coronaviruses, which were previously known either not to exist, or the extent of said protection was substantially underestimated
- the percentage of people that have already come into contact with the virus;
That in the UK at least, there is every reason to believe that society could reopen as a whole with just minimal restrictions, i.e. wash your hands, proper Covid security for hospitals/nursing settings (although given half of care homes have already had outbreaks, this is partially shutting the door after the horse has bolted), if you're finding working at home useful, encourage companies to keep allowing people to do it for some or part of the time, if you really need to shield, give support to allow people to do that more effectively. There'd be an upward trend in cases, but proportionally less hospitalisation increases, and nowhere near the level of an upward trend to anything like the level where there's a risk of NHS overload. Coupled with an immediate cut to the 24/7 government/media fear output, we can limit the unprecedented non-Covid health crisis, which is already happening and will already dwarf the number of deaths from Covid - the continued policy of looking at Covid in a vacuum with no regard for anything else is incredibly dangerous.
Quote:
Originally Posted by d2_e4
Forgive me, I might be missing something here, but are you saying that the rate of infection peaked before the measures to contain the rate of infection were implemented, and using that as evidence that the measures were unnecessary?
The government's own data and minutes from the government's own committees both indicate that R had gone below 1 in mid March, a good week before Boris shut the country, I'm just repeating that.