The decision to end restrictions is dangerous and premature, unethical and illogical.

Just heard a young woman on TV saying she had both her vaccinations and was glad to go out dancing at a club. She said that she felt that young people had lost a year of their lives. That may be true but hopefully she will have many more years left. For some people they may have lost one of the few years they have left- please consider them as well.

Does anyone know if Johnson really was going to do this great Churchillian speech with Spitfires etc? I only heard about the Spitfire bit today and don’t know if that was just unfounded. If it is true then he really is delusional.

Yes, you have the freedom to go out and get infected with the chances escalating by the day. They have space in ICU at the moment if things go pear shaped. Good luck.

varian

Today is loss of freedom day for so many.

Sadly yes. Many in my own family, either for health reasons, and due to extreme anxiety, or a mix of both.

At the gym early this am, people were wearing masks. Even though the must wear a mask signs were down, the social distancing, sanitising ones were still there. In the spin class outdoors, we had about the same mix as usual, but masks haven’t been compulsory outdoors for a while, the bikes are just very well spaced out.
We aren’t going to try choir indoors for a while yet.

Casdon

Most Health workers are feeling a sense of panic, because we are in uncharted territory. There are now more young people in ITUs and general beds than in the first two waves. A&E departments are very busy again, and there is a lot of disrespect and aggression towards staff from the public who are refusing to wear masks. Some hospitals have already been forced to reduce or cease elective activity again. They are also concerned about the increasing number of people with long covid, the demand is huge and there is no additional manpower. Right across the UK doctors and nurses are lobbying the government to rethink.
It’s a very good job the school summer holidays are starting, let’s hope that will help in England as it is doing in Scotland to bring the numbers down, and that more people opt for vaccination.

This is one of Boris Johnson’s deadliest errors. He takes off the brakes just as cases and hospitalisations are rapidly rising with this more infectious variant.

Yes, the vaccinations have changed the landscape (for the time being……until we create a new variant - which is more likely with increased Covid numbers). We are heading for levels of hospitalisations and deaths that will impact on all our lives. Already routine treatments are being cancelled.

Yes, open up society but keep mitigating factors like masks and distancing where possible. And it needs to be mandated as those more likely to carry the virus will be the ones discarding masks and social distancing.

The moment BJ announced an “irreversible” end to the few restrictions remaining, we all saw others not bothering with masks or distancing.

Today is loss of freedom day for so many.

Freedom Day!

I am sat in my hotel bed room. I shall wear my mask when I enter the public rooms, but I need others to wear their masks to keep me safe.

It doesn’t feel like freedom day to me it feels more like “oh heavens I hope I don’t catch it from selfish, thoughtless people”

When we get home on Tuesday, I shall once again avoid crowded places, which will limit my freedom.

Doesn’t feel like freedom day to me, more like return to semi-lockdown.

AGAA4

Glad I live in Wales. It is not that difficult to wear a mask in shops and on public transport. I don't feel restricted at all but may if everyone was not using masks in crowded places.

This is why I feel more restricted now. It doesn't feel like Freedom Day to me. Not at all.

There are potentially many ways to learn to live with this virus. I don't think we have got it right yet.

This is the point.

There's lots of ways to learn to live with the virus. The exact details don't have to be the same as those for flu because the effects are not exactly the same.

Continuing to wear masks and work from home is one way of doing exactly that. Maybe on a permanent basis when dangerous variants are circulating and transmission rates rising exponentially.

Maybe more effective vaccines will allow another different way to live with it.

There are potentially many ways to learn to live with this virus. I don't think we have got it right yet.

I’d like to know where I said I didn’t care? But of course no one can tell me that because I didn’t say it. What I actually said was that living with Covid is exactly like living with flu. I didn’t say Covid is the same as flu, because I know it isn’t. It’s the way we live with the virus that’s important, in what I said previously. And I’m afraid we are going to have to learn to live with this virus. I wish it were not so, but it is.

Those who are arguing for retaining some elements of lockdown (which I have never said I disagree with because I don’t) seem to think they have a superior knowledge and superior compassion. But they don’t, they just get cross when anyone else disagrees with them. That doesn’t make them compassionate, nor does not agreeing with them make anyone more compassionate. This has got nothing to do with compassion.

Incidentally, as I’ve said before, I’ve had Covid, was hospitalised with it, and was very ill. I think therefore I have a little more experience of Covid. It’s not pleasant, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, and I don’t want it again. I just think under the current circumstances, we all have to do whatever we deem sensible to protect ourselves. Constant streams of negativity are good for no one’s state of mind. The negativity and isolation is most probably what is causing the explosion of mental health issues we are told about.

i don't quite know what's going on here, but one analogy above that i think is accurate is that lifting restrictions now is like running across a busy road instead of waiting for the traffic to halt at red signal.
re Tuberculosis, someone said it's not so dangerous nowadays, but it can be. and i believe there is a law to compel people to take medication in some circumstances, in order to stop the spread of more virulent form. unless that has been repealed, but i think it was formalised in last few years, that patients can be held and medicated against their will if deemed necessary for the public good.
so compared with that, all the hysteria re so-called discrimination against those not having Covid vaccinations seems small potatoes.

Good grief lassie, this is getting weird.

Telling people that they are "het up" is, of course, an excellent way of dismissing their arguments, as, oh I don't know.....hysteria?

If you think its acceptable to tell someone they don't care about other people's health because they have a different idea to you, well that'll be for others to judge.

In an effort to be clever you have gone down the road of making a very silly remark. Don't you think anyone gets "het up"? Are you so fragile that you have to wave a feminist trope so that we all know "it's not fair"? Why? Because you are a woman? That did not, and never would come into anything I said or will say.

Whatever others may judge I just hope it is not the misquote you are trying to hang on me. I should have something to say if it was.

Go back to the discussion Alegrais and stop the personal attacks.

Isn’t it very likely that making face masks voluntary will result in rows and anxiety about whether someone should be wearing one or not?

It really needs to be definite, as in Wales and Scotland.

It just makes no sense to me

Nor me, and a lot of others! .

PippaZ

Alegrias1

I'm so fed up with this mantra that "its not like flu". We know its not flu, its COVID. It is however "exactly" like living through all the diseases you list "PippaZ", to which you might add typhoid, there was an outbreak of typhoid near where I lived when I was a child, and people had to isolate and do all the other things we have to do with infectious diseases.

The use of phrases like "run riot" are just indicative of the level of exaggeration that we're seeing with this. That's not what maddyone said, not at all. Its absolutely unacceptable to tell people that we have to get used to living with this virus that they are devil may care and that they don't care.

You seem to be very het up Alegrais. You object - which you do a great deal. You have been endlessly pedantic about what you think is right; you could at least quote someone accurately. As for you telling anyone what is and what isn't "acceptable", I have yet to stop laughing. I don't think it is acceptable to risk others health for the sake of wearing a mask.

Of course, I could have added many other diseases to the list. We do often have to go through years of protecting ourselves before we can be sure we are safe. Once you would have been in a sanitarium for TB - your whole family would have been at risk. Today we know that we can be with or near someone with this disease. However, we still have to use a set of public health hygiene measures to keep them all safe. It is not over yet. A little thoughtfulness about others will not stop the economy. It will keep others safe and less anxious.

Telling people that they are "het up" is, of course, an excellent way of dismissing their arguments, as, oh I don't know.....hysteria?

If you think its acceptable to tell someone they don't care about other people's health because they have a different idea to you, well that'll be for others to judge.

Hetty58

If I were clinically vulnerable, I'd now feel so horribly let down by the government's advice and lifting of restrictions.

Surely, we're nearly all well used to wearing masks - and really don't mind continuing if required to do so? It just makes no sense to me.

I keep imagining the next wave of victims, the busy hospitals, more preventable deaths, public outrage, a sudden u-turn and future lock down.

It's not a lot to ask is it Hetty? I think many make the fuss they do just to be in the limelight. It's certainly going to be an interesting day tomorrow.

Alegrias1

I'm so fed up with this mantra that "its not like flu". We know its not flu, its COVID. It is however "exactly" like living through all the diseases you list "PippaZ", to which you might add typhoid, there was an outbreak of typhoid near where I lived when I was a child, and people had to isolate and do all the other things we have to do with infectious diseases.

The use of phrases like "run riot" are just indicative of the level of exaggeration that we're seeing with this. That's not what maddyone said, not at all. Its absolutely unacceptable to tell people that we have to get used to living with this virus that they are devil may care and that they don't care.

You seem to be very het up Alegrais. You object - which you do a great deal. You have been endlessly pedantic about what you think is right; you could at least quote someone accurately. As for you telling anyone what is and what isn't "acceptable", I have yet to stop laughing. I don't think it is acceptable to risk others health for the sake of wearing a mask.

Of course, I could have added many other diseases to the list. We do often have to go through years of protecting ourselves before we can be sure we are safe. Once you would have been in a sanitarium for TB - your whole family would have been at risk. Today we know that we can be with or near someone with this disease. However, we still have to use a set of public health hygiene measures to keep them all safe. It is not over yet. A little thoughtfulness about others will not stop the economy. It will keep others safe and less anxious.

11:39 minutes actually. I'll give it another go. But the sanctimony was getting to me.

If I were clinically vulnerable, I'd now feel so horribly let down by the government's advice and lifting of restrictions.

Surely, we're nearly all well used to wearing masks - and really don't mind continuing if required to do so? It just makes no sense to me.

I keep imagining the next wave of victims, the busy hospitals, more preventable deaths, public outrage, a sudden u-turn and future lock down.

If it would help I could gradually transcribe it in order for you to give it your considered and knowledgable critique?

Well that was an interesting perspective of sbout 1 minute.

What about the 59 minutes left?

Whitewavemark2

If you had watched it and was able to critique their theories/summary etc, you wouldn’t have stopped for days.

So yes it is a good guess that you haven't yet spent a valuable hour watching their analysis.

They were talking to the scientific community. There is no need to be circumspect, they were asked their opinion and gave it -honestly.

Well I've watched a bit. When they repeatedly talked about events in the UK I did wonder about whether they actually knew they were talking about England. Then the chap from Israel who was introduced as a professor and had to tell them he was actually a lawyer. Or William Hasletine whose background image was the front cover of his books that he undoubtedly would like us all to buy.

MayBee70, I would tell them to stop using inflammatory language.