Covid becoming just another bug

Biscuitmuncher

All you mask lovers, what good did they actually do?

Actually, kept me covid free in the middle of a covid outbreak in the boarding school I was working in. I wear FFP3 masks. Sat directly next to 3 students for an hour each, who tested positive the next day (3 individual one-to-one lessons). Took a 4th student for his PCR test in a car wearing my FFP3 mask. He also tested positive. Worked in the school's boarding house throughout the outbreak.

The other staff member who thought masks were unsafe (limited his oxygen, didn't actually offer any protection) got covid and was quite ill. Whereas I, older and much less healthy, stayed covid free.

Gagajo I agree with you on FFP3 masks but most do not wear these
Surgical masks may help but certainly not infallible in protecting against covid

Gagajo, please can you advise on where to buy FFP3 masks?Also what do they cost?

I buy them online. Last time I got them, they came from Amazon, from Germany I think. They WERE quite expensive. I think about 45 for 40, plus I had to pay 15 in tax.

I do think though, that I'm not spending money on the other things I once would have. And the past of 40 has lasted me quite a long time, because I don't actually go to risky places much now.

*last pack

Here in France you cannot enter any shop or public place without a mask and its compulsory outside in some towns;
we just live with it as normal now.

Biscuitmuncher

All you mask lovers, what good did they actually do?

They do as much good as medical staff wearing masks when they operate on you. If you look at the fall in rates of flu etc during the pandemic, perhaps we should carry on wearing them.

Biscuitmuncher always keen to ask questions, but remarkably unwilling to answer any.

Has she ever answered even one of the many questions put to her? She has certainly never answered any I have ever asked.

Clearly running scared.

M0nica

Biscuitmuncher always keen to ask questions, but remarkably unwilling to answer any.

Has she ever answered even one of the many questions put to her? She has certainly never answered any I have ever asked.

Clearly running scared.

You are correct. Just lobs in a ( anti mask anti vax). comment and disappears

I do wear a mask in crowded places but I don't understand this

"used my mask while entering, not while playing again used while leaving. Then we went off to M&S for clothes, stopped for lunch in M&S cafe again I used mask, only removed while eating"

How does this even make sense? Does covid know what you are doing whilst in the building and only attack at certain moments ??- but it seems a very common way of doing things

Caleo FFP3 masks aren't all expensive. Anywhere selling dust masks will have them.
Try screwfix for example or just google FFP3 masks. There will be lots of options. We have used them all along.
Here's an article from the Metro.
www.google.com/amp/s/metro.co.uk/2021/01/27/what-are-ffp3-face-masks-are-they-reusable-and-where-to-get-one-13976291/amp/

pandapatch Hands up, I got it wrong, stupid me, but after 18 months of getting it right, mask wearing, hand washing, sanitising and not seeing any of my family all that time I took a risk, mind you not sure how I could have eaten wearing a mask! and that was my point, wearing a mask does help.

Not Sapaghetti, I don't think dust masks do the job that covid masks are supposed to do Because dust masks have valves that let out exhaled air, whereas we need covid masks that filter inhalations AND exhalations. Dust masks are good for filtering inhaled air but they don't filter exhaled air.

Mask wearing still compulsory here in Scotland but our daily figures continue to rise as they are elsewhere.

Biscuitmuncher, I hope you are aware that despite precautions we still have the most cases in all of Europe. Over 35000 per day. Why are we not in lockdown? In New Zealand they go into lockdown when they only have 250 cases. Boris should call another lockdown and perhaps the numbers will go down.

We still have the highest number of cases in Europe, over 35000 per day. In New Zealand they have lockdown when they only have 250 cases a day. We desperately need another lockdown. Boris should call one, even if people don't like it.

I find it so hard when people are dismissive of mask wearing. Yes they can be annoying and no expensive spray, fairy liquid or special face fitting ever stops my glasses misting up. But like a few respondants I too continue to wear a mask even our local High Street , particularly as here in Devon with so very many visitors this year our figures for Covid have shot up. For some reason even with signs in supermarkets tourists on the whole do not wear masks and bring in large families to shop with them and reach across people to get what they want. My guess is they're tourists wearing sandals and shorts in the cold and wet we had a week or so ago. I think the lack of flu last winter was more people being vaccinated and so much time in lockdown . I am truly dreading this winter.

Sorry, I thought the first message just died!

In every supermarket I have been in recently the majority have been wearing masks. Also at the seaside the other day small shops and takeouts had signs up asking people to wear masks. People were complying with requests. I will continue wearing one. Remember...flu was near non existent last winter...probably due to mask wearing and of course hand sanitizing

We desperately need another lockdown.

That is the last thing we need Annaram1

We have huge numbers of people vaccinated. We've known about this disease for 18 months. We know how to handle infection control. This is as good as its going to get. If the only thing left is to lockdown, we've failed drastically and this country is done for - literally, no exaggeration.

They lock down in NZ because they have nothing else. Until they get the proportion of people vaccinated to a reasonable level they have no way of limiting the number of people who will get seriously ill and die from this, except to confine them to their houses. That worked to begin with, its not a strategy for the future for the UK.

We are one of the worst countries here in N.I for Covid infections which doesn't surprise me with the lack of mask wearing when I'm out. My mask is still on and will be for the foreseeable. Last year was the first year in a long time that I didn't get the flu, never mind Covid, so biscuitmuncher it's working for me.

Boz

I wear a perspex face shield. Not as suffocating as a mask and you can wear your lipstick and smile at people.

Me too Boz. I can’t breathe in a mask even with the plastic bridge underneath to give more space inside.
I continue to wear the visor whenever I go into public places.

Annaram1

We still have the highest number of cases in Europe, over 35000 per day. In New Zealand they have lockdown when they only have 250 cases a day. We desperately need another lockdown. Boris should call one, even if people don't like it.

No way. We need to stop being silly and make mask wearing compulsory again. Personally I think certain large gatherings should lock down but please not schools.
All the talk of double vaccine passports required at football matches, do people seriously believe that will be properly checked ??

Alioop

We are one of the worst countries here in N.I for Covid infections which doesn't surprise me with the lack of mask wearing when I'm out. My mask is still on and will be for the foreseeable. Last year was the first year in a long time that I didn't get the flu, never mind Covid, so biscuitmuncher it's working for me.

I didn’t even get a cold now I come to think of it.

I hope that the government doesn't pussyfoot around, as they usually do, about boosters. Countries such as France and the USA are already rolling them out. I know that, in the UK, they are going to be given to the most critically vulnerable, such as people with suppressed immune systems. However, I would think that all older people, at least, will need them to prevent a repeat of previous death tolls.

Maybe it will eventually become like flu jabs, ie free for oldies and available for everyone else for a small cost at pharmacies.

Not forgetting, of course, people in poorer countries who haven't had a single jab yet. I feel guilty about them every time I find myself wishing that we were getting another one to boost our immunity. Hypocritical, I know.