Shielded, what does it really mean?

Yes Hetty, know one or two like this, they don’t seem to understand they may be putting others at risk.

I can't understand elderly 'shielded' neighbours who insist on doing their own shopping, every Monday, 'when it's quiet'.

Local volunteers have offered to do it for them, I've offered to add things to my deliveries - but no, they like to 'choose things' themselves. I'm really scared for them.

PS I am ordering lots more on line, not just food and even that worries me now.

Marydoll, who knows. Maybe some of us with health problems not discussed are,ore fearful.

I think our risk level is almost negligeable that way.

Exactly, Marydoll, so no need to keep separate within the house now if neither of you is going out.
DH is shielding as he has various health conditions though did not get the letter so is not in the most severely vulnerable group. I am going out for solitary walks but not to shops. The only people I have seen and spoken with close up are my daughter and her daughter, who are behaving the same way as me, but we keep 2m apart when we meet to share a delivery of food items. I think

If neither of you have been out, remained inside your own home and not been in contact with anyone at all, you should be safe.
How are you going to catch the virus?

I too had a hospital appointment on March 17th. The day my husband was taken to hospital and in isolation for a week, I rang and explained I couldn’t make it, told I would get another appointment but since then nothing and also since then not able to get out, within a week he was discharged TG andsheilded, The Letter states keep distances from anyone else in the household, and not to share a bed.

The problem with the shielding letters is that they were based on best assumptions at the start of the crisis, but have never been adjusted as we learnt more about CV19 and its risks so people are having to make their own assessments.

If youre black/Asian and have comorbitidies you may want to ramp up your strict shielding now that we know more about the disease. Whereas if youre white with just one well managed comorbidity, personally I would go out to exercise.

The lists need to be altered. The hierarchy of risk is not what we initially assumed it would be

The shielding letter advises if you are sheilding and another member in the household/ partner etc is working or has to go out to shop , you must eat separately, use separate bathrooms etc, basically lead separate lives if possible.
I'm sure for many this is not possible.

However, if your partner has decided to sheild with you and hasn't been out of the house, nor had contact with anyone else, there is no need to stay apart.

My husband made the decision to sheild with me, so as not to compromise me, we have not been in close contact with anyone since then and no-one has been over the doorstep.
We are extremely fortunate that my daughter leaves shopping in the back garden and we have managed to get a few Tesco deliveries. We are fine, but I do understand for some some it's very difficult.

Early in the morning, we have gone across the empty field behind our house and back, never met a soul. It's like an an extension of our garden.
I was advised to sheild before the official lockdown, so it's been a very long lockdown.
All my hospital and GP appointments have been postponed, as it's deemed too risky for me to go.

It is what it is and I envisage the sheilding continuing beyond the suggested date. I just have to accept it.

The letter sent to those on the sheilding list tells us we “have the highest clinical risk of mortality and morbidity” .
If that doesn’t scare you into adhering to the advice, nothing will.
There is no advantage being on a list like that !

Daddima
It's plain that none of them, in your photo, are 2 metres apart.

I honestly think that the washing, disinfection and/or 48-72hr leaving outside of bought/delivered goods is OTT but that's only my view, I wouldn't deride anyone else if that is their choice.
I'm happy just to wipe the tops of cans and bottles with a damp cloth, which I would do in any case.
I do sometimes wonder what percentage of the population actually do keep strictly to the orders/advice/guidelines set by Government.

Elegran I could have written your posts! Only in my case it has only been 2 1/2 years and in the last 12 months I have made a conscious effort to try to do more on my own, if nobody else was free, and to say Yes wherever possible to invitations. I am lucky to be mobile, happy to drive, happy to get trains and undergrounds, able to afford outings and in good health.
Yet I can be desperately lonely.
There are so many who are older, frailer, less able to get out, and dependent on the goodwill of neighbours or friends.
And I fear we now know what is in store for our declining years.
I don’t want to sound “sour grapes” but some of the younger generation, moaning about lockdown or tearing their hair out in self isolation ain’t (as they say) “seen nothing yet”.

MawB When my son asked me how I was coping with not seeing anyone, I replied that I had had eight years of practice, since being widowed! That was rather an exaggeration, because I did see family and friends and I did go out and about, but it wasn't easy - sometimes in winter, when without a car I didn't want to brave bad weather and treacherous pavements, and my family had their own problems of distance and work, I could easily go two or three weeks without face-to-face contact. That hadn't occurred to him!

In fact, it was only around last Christmas that I instigated regular phone calls to/from each of my family, on specific days - and they each asked separately whether I had some health reason for doing so. No, not particularly - just a realisation that I was getting older and more alone.

Elegran over 70s even without underlying conditions are on the vulnerable list. I get a priority delivery slot with Waitrose based on my age. There is specific advice for the ‘clinically vulnerable’ category on the NHS website.

I am 81 and neither shielded nor, apparently, vulnerable. I have no chronic ill-health conditions (apart from a tendency to run out of puff rather fast) so I don't get any "special treatment" but I have no wish to get the virus, for my own benefit and because NHS staff are run off their feet even without looking after me. Also, I suspect my lack of puff could make me vulnerable to the effects of the virus on the lungs.

In the absence of any direct official advice to me, I am using my own common sense. I have not been further than the pillar box at the end of the road for six weeks. My exercise is walking around the ground floor rooms of my home for fifteen minutes a day, and doing some gardening. I have not gone to the shops, I take my chances getting delivery slots from supermarkets like anyone else.

I haven't seen my children or grandchildren face to face for six weeks, except for one occasion when my son collected a prescription for me and we talked six feet apart for a while.

I speak to a neighbour occasionally over the garden wall, and on Thursdays evenings I stand in my front garden and shout greetings to other neighbours. Each day I speak to someone or other, (or two, or maybe three) on the phone, either family, friend or one or more of the dozen people on my Covid-chat contact list.

I haven't found it too stressful - in fact it can be quite pleasant to have no deadlines, no consulting the diary to check that I haven't forgotten I have to be somewhere.

Without the internet, my horizons would be narrower - like those of some elderly neighbours who haven't caught up with technology, and rely on the unholy trinity of the official Boris line, yellow press sensationalism, and what the channel moguls have decided to show on TV.

Megs what I don’t understand from your OP is that if you are both living as shielded, then why you don’t sleep together etc. I thought that the advice on keeping separate was for a household with for example one shielded person living with a person not shielding eg going to work, going out shopping. I have a shielded friend and her partner has chosen to live as if he were also shielding so they share the bed, bathroom etc and live ‘normally’ inside. Other posters seem to be saying the same thing. Can anyone clarify please?

Thanks everyone for various opinions, I know Shielding is nothing to do with age, Everyone over70 should be STAYING HOME AND STAYING SAFE, my daughter in law just mid fifties is Shielded because she has had a kidney transplant and takes immunosuppressants, but is usually in excellent health and is isolated with her husband and daughter , so because my husband is also on the vulnerable list and shielded we can’t meet up with any of them. On the other hand my next door neighbour of 87 goes out shopping every week and seems to have people round occasionally.
We were offered the food parcel but have managed so far with previously well stocked freezer and online shopping, I have heard it’s very good and helpful.

I’ve had numerous texts and two letters , I have been completely shielding since 20 March, certainly not gone for walks, I wish! Kept in my house and garden, thankgod it’s a big house, using dif bathrooms to my husband, only seen people through windows, it’s very hard, but I’m not complaining! If this is what I have to do to keep safe then so be it,

Listening to Esther Rantzen on Any Questions she made the point that what you describe NflkDumpling has been the way of life for many many elderly and infirm people for years. The loneliness suffered by many solitary old people has by and large, been, if not ignored, at least seen as no big deal.
How do people manage in flats or bungalows with no outside space? Or up steps which they cannot negotiate? Or if they are too unsteady on their feet to feel confident enough to leave their house?
They put up with it.
They have no alternative.

I don’t know how Shielders living in flats with no outside space are coping. Or single people living at the end of a quiet cul-de-sac in a small bungalow. That trip to see our boat saved my sanity and we have a garden! We live fairly centrally in a market town and there’s a lot of people walking past all the time. It’s nice to feel we’re not the last people on earth but I am a bit envious. They get to walk and go to the shops. And they moan!!

Rufus The Letter was sent to those with compromised immunity. I believe it went on NHS and doctors records. In our case it’s DH’s medication which makes him more vulnerable. Not just being over 70 - that just adds to it! Severe diabetes too and rheumatoid arthritis plus the medication for it messes up the immunity, so that puts you on The List.

I don’t think there’s any penalties for breaking Shielding. The government have really bent over backwards to avoid any definite rules and leave as much as possible to discretion. But many are complaining about this as it leads to too much confusion. The alternative would be needing written permission to travel as in France - but that wouldn’t go down well either! An Act of Parliament was passed so the police can issue on the spot fines if people are sitting around in the sun as they’re only supposed to be out for exercise but around here they ‘advise’ more than anything. Sort of “Cummon, move along there now please”!

I am also shielded. I have not gone outside the front gate since I had 'the letter’ (several letters and texts actually). My husband and I are both retired and over 70 and been married for 40+ years. We are actually both in good health (I manage my medication at home, it keeps me well) but my husband has chosen to isolate himself with me so doesn’t go out either, we were not prepared to socially isolate after so many years of being physically close.

The first letter was followed up by a second one from my immunologist explaining the 3 risk groups, 1 the Extremely vulnerable group, 2 Moderate risk group and 3 Group with risk equivalent to or only marginally higher than that of the general population. I was informed that groups 2 and 3 needed to follow the recommendations and restrictions for everyone but only patients in the group 1 category need to be shielded.

We rely on online shopping deliveries and some kind volunteers who collect our medicines from the chemist and leave them on the doorstep. We join in family WhatsApp groups, Facetime, Google Hangouts etc., I follow various fitness classes online and recently had a fitness bike delivered.

We have been out on our front drive to clap for the NHS on Thursdays and have spoken to our neighbours at a distance some half a dozen times since the start of lockdown. That's it.

I have been sticking to the rules but I can at least cuddle my husband. However, he is retired and can isolate with me. I feel so sorry if you are unable to do that and how much worse it must be for those on their own in poor conditions. I really don't know how they manage.

Bloomin’ ‘eck Daddima, they’re never all two metres apart!

The police came to check our little gathering last evening and we were all well apart and spaced out along the sides of the road to ensure we didn’t block the road for any cars (there was just the one).