ANGER

maddyone ' We, like the rest of the world, are learning on the hoof.'

No, our government (not 'we') had the advantage of observing the (experimental) measures and results of others. The most disadvantaged were countries where the virus hit first.

They acted too slowly - on the wrong advice, ignoring that of the WHO.

There is no consistent scientific advice to act on, anyway. There are various 'experts' with opposing views, so a range of advice to choose from.

I'm so sick of hearing the 'acting on scientific advice' they repeatedly parrot. You can't blame the advice itself.

You need to blame their choices. How can you defend them when they've caused unnecessary loss of life!

I think any government would struggle with what has happened in the last weeks. I do believe our government delayed too long before enacting the lockdown, and for that I blame the advice they received and acted upon. However whatever the persuasion of the government I believe it would be impossible for them not to struggle. The level of this pandemic is like nothing in living memory. We, like the rest of the world, are learning on the hoof.
And I believe it is far too soon to begin talking about exit strategies, although it will certainly be being discussed by the government.

Perhaps Sir Kier Starmer is wondering if they really have any cohesive strategy.

I understand that POGS and I expect Starmer does
I don’t expect I’ll be out and about in anything like a normal way until September. There’s talk of schools being back by August. We do need strategies for short medium and long term. I’d be surprised if the Aren’t under discussion and would welcome more open discussion.
I recognise care is needed, we don’t want panic ?

I am quite sure an exit strategy is being developed; looking at other countries who were afflicted before us, looking at what works and what does not.

Iam 64 et al who want an ' Exit Strategy'

The problem I have with Starmer saying he wants the government to publish an ' Exit Strategy ' is the fact he was being interviewed about a week ago when he started with this Exit Strategy business. , I think it was on Sky News, and when questioned with something along the lines of ' what if the government published an Exit Strategy and things changed, the data changed'? '

Starmer said. ' Well the Exit Strategy would have to change accordingly'.

That makes no sense and it makes me think it is loose talk. I think at the moment it would not be feasible to produce an Exit Strategy and to be honest I would have little faith in one anyway as we are nowhere near to that happening.

Unless the ' Exit Strategy ' consists of factual content it will have no meaning but ties the Government , Civil Service, NHS etc. etc. to producing ' possibilities/maybe' s' at a time their resources are stretched to the limit and their focus should be on the here and now.

Can I just repeat - Keir Starmer isn’t demanding we exit lockdown. He’s asking the government to set out its current plans. Obviously they can’t be set in store but we need to have debate. We only need to look at the shifting sands approach initially, herd approach, whoops no that may Be wrong, social distance a bit but no problem with Cheltenham races etc. Serious shortages of PPE.
The government will be discussing an exit strategy, why won’t it be open .

Luckgirl
I absolutely agree with you about our borders not being closed, the lack of quarantine for people entering the country, and no testing or contact tracing. It’s appalling that none of this was done. Our government was slow and in my opinion complacent and I primarily blame the scientists who advised on ‘herd immunity.’

MaizieD - indeed so.

We were fed one economic theory as fact and the voters fell for it. Iniquitous.

why were the public not up in arms about the underfunding of the NHS and public services?

Some of the public were up in arms about the underfunding of the NHS and public services. Unfortunately they were considered to be looney lefties who couldn't understand that the sole function of any service is to make a profit for the person/company running it.

The other factor was that the public was convinced that a national budget is the same as a household budget and that expenditure on public services was somehow 'wasting' taxpayers' money. The tories, post 2010, using that analogy, managed to convince 'the public' that the way to improve the national economy was to starve it of money...

We are supposed to be civilised and enlightened in the 21st C. That being so it's time we took a good look at exactly what we want from 'society' and our governance. Maybe we could identify some different priorities...

I feel a bit like a pawn in a game - and one that I will lose no doubt.

We are powerless to do anything about the situation in which we find ourselves. We can all rant and rave (as indeed I have done) about the handling of this crisis, but we can do nothing, absolutely nothing.

At the beginning when it reached Europe...........
- why no closing of borders?
- why no quarantine of all incomers?
- why no contact tracing? - such a basic strategy.
- why no testing?

Going back further............
- why were the public not up in arms about the underfunding of the NHS and public services?
- how did we finish up with a government that cared not one whit about public services?

It has been a pig's ear from start to finish. And it is people like us who will pay the price - locked in till a vaccine is found. I had "the letter" this morning from the NHS - a bit late, but there it is. Stay at home for the foreseeable future.

We should never have found ourselves in this situation. We live on an island which is ideally situated to keep the population safe, but failed to do so.

But getting angry now is too late - we are wholly impotent.

Care homes should use some of their profits to purchase PPE/tests for staff - not be relying on NHS to supply them

Couldn't agree more Maw.

WFH not WHF!

in fact the public started to lockdown itself ahead of government advice

If only Daisymae !
It was that first weekend after we were advised to avoid crowded places, beauty spots, parks and beaches when the population thronged out in force!
It was being treated like a Bank Holiday weekend, fuelled buy the glorious weather, the fact that Monday morning had effectively been cancelled for school children and a large percentage of the workforce who would be staying in their PJ’s to WHF
We are reaping the consequences - 3 weeks later from that madness.
We were too slow to lock down - there should have been no “advisory period” or blind eyes turned to the odd pub which stayed open the following weekend when they were officially closed. Just as Italy created a window of opportunity for N Italians to leave Lombardy during the 48 hour period of notice they were given we did too little too late.
20/20 hindsight is a wonderful,thing, but why do we (people in general) never learn.

Nothing straight forward about this situation.

Maizie crossed posts I think.
I’ll have to pay more attention to the economists advocating exit strategies, I’m not so focused as you and others on links etc so for that I apologise. It’s simply that when watching news reports on television I pick up on the main story rather than the names. You may very well be right because certainly members of government and the Cabinet are pondering the staged end of lockdown, such as possibly schools opening in May. But I do know that worries about the economy have been consistently raised, often by journalists. My feelings are that no end of lockdown, staged or otherwise, should be contemplated until we have the death rate and infection rate under some sort of control.
As I said in my post of 12.05, we were too slow to act, I don’t think we should be too quick to end lockdown. This is because I, like others, value lives above the economy. So apologies for lack of names, other than government.
I have seen today that a group named SAGE advise the government on scientific and health matters, but the government refuse to name the people who sit on that group, possibly to protect them from the public. Maybe it is the same with economists, because as sure as eggs are eggs, they will have advisors on the economy.
Sorry to not be much help.

I agree Hetty it’s far too soon to talk about exit strategies. We need to get on top of the death rates first. Thank you Iam for providing the name. I’m sure that Keir Starmer will prove to be an effective and diligent Leader of the Opposition, but now is not the time to be pushing exit strategies. We are nowhere near ready yet to even think about coming out of lockdown. No one, the press, the Leader of the Opposition, the economists, should be pushing our government towards ending the lockdown. We were far too slow entering lockdown in my opinion, and we’ve not yet been locked down for four weeks even. Other countries have been locked down for 12/13 weeks before loosening the lockdown.
We need to start listening and taking notice of other countries and stop being so worried about the economy. At what price is a good economy? Twelve thousand deaths? Fifteen thousand? Twenty? Thirty? A hundred thousand? No, save lives first. Then the economy.

Thank you for your post, maddyone.

I wonder if you could clarify this statement, though. Perhaps give us some examples. Because my impression is that it isn't economists who are calling for an early end to lockdown, but politicians, such as Patel and Raab, and right wing neo-liberals such a Hannan. Perhaps you could give us some names of economists who are pushing this?

Therefore I blame ............, the economists (still advocating money before lives)

I think the sheer hopelessness of the government's handling of this crisis so far should point very strongly to the need for a clear and carefully thought out exit strategy. Otherwise we'll just get another load of confusing ad hoc decisions.

As someone else had noted, it doesn't have to be immediately implemented, just planned for.

Then there can be a five day delay in weekend deaths being included in the figures - so far too soon. It's good to start discussing it, of course, but there are so many unknowns.

Daisymae, it's too soon. We haven't had time yet to see the results of lockdown. Infection, incubation, 5-6 days of illness, then possible breathing problems, pneumonia, hospitalisation and death - were talking around four weeks or more.

Well said Saisymae. The person asking the government to publish an exit strategy is Keir Starmer. As leader of the opposition, its his job to ask questions and hold the government to account. So far, so good for Starmer. He isn't attacking the government, he's being constructive and to ask what the exit strategy is, doesn't demand we stop the current isolation, it ensures there will be a proper debate about the proposals.

The article states that the government ignored the advice to lockdown in fact the public started to lockdown itself ahead of government advice. It perfectly reasonable to publish an exit strategy now. Does not have to have a start date, but there does need to be a plan

Absolutely maddy, a very belated and lax lockdown compared to other countries.

Im curious where the “experts” were getting their vastly different information compared to the countries that did lock down quickly after watching Italy, Spain and China.

I think the suffering that will result from economic disaster will be far greater than the effects of the virus. The virus will not go away, so herd immunity is the only option until a vaccine can be found. It's a tragic lottery and we are all at risk, even younger members of our families. But the effects of an economic crash will cause untold long-term suffering and be very hard to undo. So my vote is to get the economy up and running as soon as possible.