All out?

[T00ts]

The food parcels have been stopped before people could make other arrangements. It is the government who sent out the emails NOT the people affected GPs. Who came to the decision those people are not for some perverse reason are no longer in the at risk category should be made public.

Do you mean that ever since we were deemed vulnerable people have been sitting back expecting the taxpayer to provide for ever? That's unreasonable. Deliveries are much easier but presumably the vulnerable have had plenty time to get to grips with the essentials. Most of the supermarkets have now given priority to shielded customers, it only takes a phonecall. AS far as I am aware the parcels were a bit pointless anyway.

[papasmurf]

Doesn't it only relate to free food parcels and the land army that seemed to disappear as soon as it was called? The supermarkets are now pretty geared to providing slots - more with special ones for the shielded than there were at the beginning. All the special arrangements are not seen as necessary any longer.

The food parcels have been stopped before people could make other arrangements. It is the government who sent out the emails NOT the people affected GPs. Who came to the decision those people are not for some perverse reason are no longer in the at risk category should be made public.

[T00ts]

More bastardry from the Tories, ( big ongoing row, this appears be the only article about it.)



Apologies for the newspaper link:-



More at link:-



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/27/phone-texts-notify-cancer-transplant-and-asthma-patients-they-are-off-shielding-list">https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/ ... lding-list">https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/27/phone-texts-notify-cancer-transplant-and-asthma-patients-they-are-off-shielding-list



People with cancer, liver disease or severe asthma have been dropped from the government's coronavirus shielding list by text message before their doctors have been able to speak to them.



The decision to remove people with various health conditions from the shielding programme in England has caused upset. The text also informed people they would no longer qualify for government food parcels.



Many who received the messages last Friday believed they were fake. But the government has since confirmed the texts are correct and are official government communications.

Doesn't it only relate to free food parcels and the land army that seemed to disappear as soon as it was called? The supermarkets are now pretty geared to providing slots - more with special ones for the shielded than there were at the beginning. All the special arrangements are not seen as necessary any longer.

[papasmurf]

It would seem that a number of people have received legitimate text messages to advise them that they are no longer in the shielding group.

No explanation of why etc has been given.

More bastardry from the Tories, ( big ongoing row, this appears be the only article about it.)



Apologies for the newspaper link:-



More at link:-



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/27/phone-texts-notify-cancer-transplant-and-asthma-patients-they-are-off-shielding-list">https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/ ... lding-list">https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/27/phone-texts-notify-cancer-transplant-and-asthma-patients-they-are-off-shielding-list



People with cancer, liver disease or severe asthma have been dropped from the government's coronavirus shielding list by text message before their doctors have been able to speak to them.



The decision to remove people with various health conditions from the shielding programme in England has caused upset. The text also informed people they would no longer qualify for government food parcels.



Many who received the messages last Friday believed they were fake. But the government has since confirmed the texts are correct and are official government communications.

[Nalaar]

It would seem that a number of people have received legitimate text messages to advise them that they are no longer in the shielding group.

No explanation of why etc has been given.

[Javert]

Hunt has already admitted that their focus was on a flu pandemic (Spanish flu eg). Covid19 is no flu.

Yes but that's not really an excuse as such - first, they didn't have to make that assumption - flu is not the only virus around, and actually the last 2 pandemics in the last 20 years were not flu but were both Corona type viruses.  Therefore they should explain why they stuck to the assumption of flu.



Secondly, there is quite some evidence (of course to be examined in detail later) that they blindly stuck to their assumptions based on a flu pandemic even when they had the information in their hands that this virus behaves differently to flu, for example in the way it infects people and the level of infectiousness - one difference being that children are massive spreaders of flu, whereas with a Corona type virus like this, it's generally significantly more infectious than flu, but children actually don't play a big role in that.



In other words the accusation is that they refused to modify their approach quickly enough.  My personal suspicion is that this is because they did not want to rely on "foreign" information from other countries - information which actually turned out to be very accurate.

[Javert]

I'd love to know how you can calculate that. If the government of the day had been advised to lockdown earlier, continue quarantine etc etc etc, no doubt they would have done. I am pretty sure that whoever was in power would have been advised the same way and would have responded the same too.

Not sure if you watch the government "press conferences" each afternoon.  They are increasingly propaganda sessions, but nevertheless that seems to be where they announce things.



The scientists there have stated several times that they give the government information about what they think might happen, if the government takes certain actions, and that usually this is triggered by the government saying "can we do x" or "what is likely to happen if we do y".



This information, as all science, is usually couched in probabilities and confidence ranges - for example - if you re-open the schools, "our best estimate is that it will add 0.3 to the R0 of the virus for a few weeks and then fade back again to a prolonged 0.1 increase" (this is not a real advice I'm just giving a general example of what they would say).



The crucial point is that it's the government that then makes policy decisions based on that advice.  If the government chooses to do something that the scientists could will kill 5000 people in the next 3 weeks, that doesn't mean the science advice was right or wrong - in the end it's the government's responsibility to justify their decisions based on the range of science advice given.  Something they have totally failed to do, and rather tried to give the impression that the scientists are making these decisions - something that the scientists are wisely pushing back on (when not gagged).



Still - their strategy seems to have worked on many people who now think that it's the scientists that are making these decisions.

[T00ts]

A report commissioned by Labour which was about preparing for a pandemic which came out before the 2010 general election was ignored by the Tories as were three subsequent ones commissioned by the Tories.

The Tories had underfunded the NHS since 2010, closed 60000 hospital beds and had not buffer stored PPE despite the four reports stated that was needed.

Hunt has already admitted that their focus was on a flu pandemic (Spanish flu eg). Covid19 is no flu.

[T00ts]

Published this morning:-



https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/vulnerable-isolate-several-more-months-4173774">https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornw ... hs-4173774">https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/vulnerable-isolate-several-more-months-4173774



The clinically vulnerable may have to self isolate for "several more months" as they continue to shield themselves from the COVID-19 coronavirus, Environment Secretary George Eustice has said this morning.



Asked about ways to make life easier for those who are shielding, the MP for Camborne and Redruth in Cornwall said: "Well it is something that we are looking at because we completely recognise that those who are shielded and clinically vulnerable who have been told to isolate and not to see friends and family at all, that is going to start taking its toll on them and we want to be able to find ways to be able to do that.



"But it is very, very difficult because they are clinically vulnerable and nobody obviously wants to visit family in that group and find that they've given them the virus.



"So we don't have answers yet, that's why they have to remain shielded for the time being, possibly for several more months."

Thanks  - that's what I was looking for!  :hattip

[T00ts]

I calculate it's between 50% and 75% the Tories' fault. Britain would have been hit by covid-19 whatever sort of government we had. We have to estimate what the statistics would have been if our government had adopted 'best practice' based on what was apparent in the early weeks of the pandemic. If everyone entering the country had been tested and/or quarantined and lockdown had been introduced 2 weeks earlier than it was, a lot pf people would be alive today who have died and a lot of suffering would have been avoided.

I'd love to know how you can calculate that. If the government of the day had been advised to lockdown earlier, continue quarantine etc etc etc, no doubt they would have done. I am pretty sure that whoever was in power would have been advised the same way and would have responded the same too. It would not be normal Tory policy to decimate the economy on the cusp of us leaving the EU, whatever advice they finally succumbed to must have been pretty dire. We have the science to blame for a lot of it now with their dire warnings but add to that the fine job the media have done in frightening everyone to the point of paranoia.



According to the intelligentsia of the common man it should all have been done differently. Isn't hind sight a great thing? The science has spoken at each stage as if their knowledge was definitive and at each stage it has been proved ever so slightly wrong. The Government bowed to their 'superior' knowledge but in the process an awful lot of common sense was lost. They should have far more women in the cabinet, all men around a table definitely lack something essential!

[papasmurf]

 quite a bit of the problems are to do with lack of preparedness,

A report commissioned by Labour which was about preparing for a pandemic which came out before the 2010 general election was ignored by the Tories as were three subsequent ones commissioned by the Tories.

The Tories had underfunded the NHS since 2010, closed 60000 hospital beds and had not buffer stored PPE despite the four reports stated that was needed.

[Javert]

Ooooooh there you go again! You are as bad as Pappy - everything is the Tory's fault. I should think Corbyn (who by the way is over 70 and was photographed in close contact in the park with a stranger for a photo op - looking like an idiot) would have been so good in the crisis, and Kier Starmer must be on his knees every night thanking God that he isn't in the hot seat at this time.

If Labour or anyone else was in power they should be getting the same scrutiny as anyone else.  



We can't be sure whether Corbyn's Labour would have handled the pandemic better.  Instinctively I suspect that would have completely messed it up in different ways, and actually, quite a bit of the problems are to do with lack of preparedness, which even Boris Johnson finally admitted on Wednesday in parliament, noting that preparedness for the pandemic is the responsibility of the government.



Boris Johnson specifically said yesterday in the press conference that nothing changes for shielded people.  



However it's worth noting as pointed out above, that the shielding of the extremely vulnerable is purely strong advice from the UK gov't - there is no law backing this up, so basically it's up to you whether you follow the shielding advice or not.

[Borg Refinery]

Published this morning:-



https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/vulnerable-isolate-several-more-months-4173774">https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornw ... hs-4173774">https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/vulnerable-isolate-several-more-months-4173774



The clinically vulnerable may have to self isolate for "several more months" as they continue to shield themselves from the COVID-19 coronavirus, Environment Secretary George Eustice has said this morning.



Asked about ways to make life easier for those who are shielding, the MP for Camborne and Redruth in Cornwall said: "Well it is something that we are looking at because we completely recognise that those who are shielded and clinically vulnerable who have been told to isolate and not to see friends and family at all, that is going to start taking its toll on them and we want to be able to find ways to be able to do that.



"But it is very, very difficult because they are clinically vulnerable and nobody obviously wants to visit family in that group and find that they've given them the virus.



"So we don't have answers yet, that's why they have to remain shielded for the time being, possibly for several more months."

Makes sense, I don't even know what to suggest for you guys, very sorry that people & the govt don't look after you the way they should..



As an aside, It is curious watching people defending the Tory 'let them conk it' strategy whilst admonishing the Tories for it. 🤔

[papasmurf]

Published this morning:-



https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/vulnerable-isolate-several-more-months-4173774">https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornw ... hs-4173774">https://www.cornwalllive.com/news/cornwall-news/vulnerable-isolate-several-more-months-4173774



The clinically vulnerable may have to self isolate for "several more months" as they continue to shield themselves from the COVID-19 coronavirus, Environment Secretary George Eustice has said this morning.



Asked about ways to make life easier for those who are shielding, the MP for Camborne and Redruth in Cornwall said: "Well it is something that we are looking at because we completely recognise that those who are shielded and clinically vulnerable who have been told to isolate and not to see friends and family at all, that is going to start taking its toll on them and we want to be able to find ways to be able to do that.



"But it is very, very difficult because they are clinically vulnerable and nobody obviously wants to visit family in that group and find that they've given them the virus.



"So we don't have answers yet, that's why they have to remain shielded for the time being, possibly for several more months."

[B0ycey]

Ooooooh there you go again! You are as bad as Pappy - everything is the Tory's fault. I should think Corbyn (who by the way is over 70 and was photographed in close contact in the park with a stranger for a photo op - looking like an idiot) would have been so good in the crisis, and Kier Starmer must be on his knees every night thanking God that he isn't in the hot seat at this time.

To be fair Toots, apart from the Japanese or the Swedes, I'd complain about all governments approaches at the moment and that would have included Labour because I think everyone needs to take care of their own safety and live by the advice given to you. And the government should only get involved in advice and making sure social distancing and other measures are in place and adhered to like how they make sure you wear a seat belt when driving. Not keeping everyone lockdown regardless of risk and destroying the economy and over scaring people with how deathly this is. We have parents worried about their children going to school when only three children below 15 have died and all three had underlining health issues for example.