Politics of fear and its side effects

Surely, if you can wear a mask indoors - you can also wear one outside? I know it's not necessary or compulsory, but I would always use one outside a doctors, vaccination centre or hospital.

She didn’t feel safe. She said she was afraid, She left.
That was it,

She didn’t go near him. She didn’t accuse him of anything. She didn’t speak to him or about him. She didn’t actually have anything to do with him.

She just didn’t stay where she didn’t want to be.

She’s not the only one who could be accused of over reacting.

So, are you worried about the mental health of the woman who ran off screaming or worried about how upset your husband was? Or both? Do you think that people shouldn’t be expected to wear masks outside because it discriminates against people who can’t wear masks?

Agreed M0nica, it must have been very stressful for your husband.
I was I the post office, I was standing in the queue, when a customer at the counter, was making very angry remarks about people in the shop who were not wearing masks, a woman turned to me and said she should not be shouting that as the person/persons maybe exempt, I just replied I agreed with her.
So much hysteria around.

Peaseblossom and others. You all seem to forget is that there was a reason DH cannot wear a mask. He is in a fragile state, mentally and physically, following major heart surgery, followed by a serious infection that was antibiotic resistant and required three operations to physically scrape the infection out of his body.

If this lady was freaked out by seeing him at some distance from her. How do you think it was for him, struggling for breath and having a woman shrieking and running away when he joined the queue? The stress of the event affected his breathing and left him struggling. It drew peoples attention to him in a most unpleasant way and it is remarkable that he did not also make a run for it, but he wanted to have his third vaccination so he gritted his teeth and stayed there.

It is so easy to imagine all sorts of scenarios that make this unknown woman the victim. Why? Wasn't my DH just as much the victim and just as much likely to be badly affected mentally as she was?

Could I suggest that there are elements of old fashioned sexism here. The woman, it is assumed, is always the victim, if the 'aggressor' ia a man. If DH was not exactly an aggressor, he is expected to cope with this situation while the woman who caused it is understandably collapsing unable to cope with the deep stress she has been caused. Hmm

It's assumed by many, including the OP, that caution is due to a fear of Covid. That may be true for some, but in my case it's a very strong sense of responsibility for others that drives caution.

I know I'd just never forgive myself if I infected somebody else and they died. I wouldn't be able to view it as 'accidental'. It would be reckless.

We're advised to test one hour before contact. Omicron can multiply so rapidly that we can be infectious very soon after a negative test. Tests are only 80 - 90% accurate anyway.

I don't want the vulnerable to shut themselves away for years and become mentally ill - just so that I can continue a 'normal' life. I'm not that selfish. I'm not the Covid equivalent of a drunk driver. I'm much better than that.

Urmstongran, I can't see that the death rate will fall just yet. In fact, I'd think the opposite far more likely

Most people have socialised/mixed/had much more contact over Christmas, so I'd expect the death rate to rise dramatically by mid to late January.

That's assuming a delay from infection to death of four weeks - but of course, it does vary. Time from infection to (any) symptoms can be from two to fourteen days, too, averaging maybe six, so mid January could be the peak time for deaths.:

'Time between symptom onset and death from COVID-19 ranges from 2 to 8 weeks, with reported median times of 16 or 19 days'.

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveytechnicalarticle/wavesandlagsofcovid19inenglandjune2021

Calistemon

Riverwalk

Yes very distressing for your husband if he thought he'd triggered her actions.

For future, to reduce potential stress for him could he wear a visor if it's medically possible.

I didn't go to the hairdressers for over a year because they were wearing visors but tipping them back to be able to see according to a friend!
They weren't wearing masks last time either so I cancelled my appointment this week.

I'm not terrified, just exercising caution.

Yup! This is why I now have long hair.....even though it’s a bugger to condition and comb through.?

DH said the last time at the barbers one member of staff wasn’t wearing a mask at all.

I agree, Peasblossom

I'm very sorry to hear about your sister.
We lost someone too, not from Covid but as consequence of the situation brought about by Covid.

I saw exactly the point that you were making, Peasblossom, and I think it's a very good point.

My point is that for ever person who died with Covid, who Franbern thinks shouldn’t be included in statistics there may be an equal number who died with another cause on the the certificate, who would still be alive if they had not contracted Covid.

There has to be criteria for statistics. 28 days of death has been chosen. If one lobby can change the criteria to get the result that supports their point of view, then those with a different view can also change them.

It’s just manipulating things to prove your own point.

I think many people may have died as a direct or indirect consequence of Covid, outside the specified 28 days.
That includes people who could not get a GP appointment, even a phone appointment, therefore could not get the medication they needed to treat an infection and died.

They'd still be here if it had not been for Covid.

But she wouldn’t have needed the heart surgery if Covid hadn’t destroyed her heart valves.

She’d still be here.

I’m sorry Peasblossom, but your sister didn’t die of Covid, she died from heart surgery. When thousands of obese people die from a stroke or heart event, it doesn’t say obesity on the death certificate, it says heart attack or stroke. Obesity causes those problems to arise, Covid causes certain conditions to arise ( I still have scarring on my lungs from the Covid pneumonia I had) but the resulting conditions were the cause of death, not Covid. I understand why you feel it was Covid, but it wasn’t.

Cause of death?

My sister caught Covid. Her heart valves were damaged. She was operated on some months later to replace the valves. She died less than 24 hours later.

Cause of death was not registered as Covid.

But it was.

Well, I fall into the category if people that have been uber careful since the start of the pandemic and am still being so and I have to say it’s quite upsetting to be described as sanctimonious and judgemental.

Peasblossom

Franbern

Two of my daughters work in Mental Health, one within the NHS. and the other as an Educational Psychologist with school-aged children. Both have reported on the continuously and extreme rise in serious mental health problems that have come about over the past two years. Both are totally over-stretched now at work, unable to deal with the tsunami of cases.

Both are totally opposed to any form of Lockdowns saying that the that cure is now more dangerous than the disease.

Long, long after the current Pandemic is a thing of the past, our society will still be trying to deal with the fallout of the serious mental health problems it has produced, aided and abetted - even encouraged- by the government and SAGE.

Death and bereavement cause a multitude of mental health problems too.

It’s reasonable to assume there would have been a rise in mental health problems as a result of the pandemic, whether we had locked down or not, don’t you think?

Hmm, ..... Think that death has always been with us. Not a new thing. Even in our modern, first country world, deaths from pneumonia and flu cause sad family deaths every year let alone from the diseases like cancer, cardiac, etc. etc,

There is little doubt that many if not most of the mental health problems now are as a result of very deliberate scare-mongering.

Last year, I saw a neighbour carefully spraying all round the outside of her garage door!!!! People washed their food shopping in bleach!!!! Washed down and disinfected their garden gates, My son an d DiL (she is one of the very panicky), last summer carefully put on their masks when walking through the local park with no-one else there but us!!!
Parents refusing to send their children to school and, to me even more frightening, a very large number of children being scared to go to school.

The reason that there is real pressure on the NHS at present is not because of the number of patients, but due to the fact that so many staff are having not to go to work as they are having to isolate.

Three of my g.children (all year 7 in different parts of the country), are recovered from covid - no idea which variant. Obviously due to their age, all three unvaccinated. Not only have none of them been actually ill, just slightly grotty and unwell, but none of the adults or siblings they live with have (all vaccinated - including one father who is EV), have caught it.
The worst that has happened to them is that one has lost his sense of taste, which he finds most annoying over christmas!!! The shingles that one of them got made them far more unwell.

I do wish they would stop putting out number of positive tests. Cannot see any point to these. First of all, how many of them are for the same people testing themselves each day?. As far as I am concerned the only number that matters are how many people are needing to go into hospital due to covid symptons. And as for that figure of deaths within 28 days of a positive test ..........Okay, great for showing how many people died WITH Covid (maybe), but NOT how many deaths FROM covid.

I think we are constantly presented with the worst case scenario.
Whenever the outlook seems a bit positive we're told it's too soon to tell.?
- We're constantly told that 'true' numbers of cases are 000s more than officially reported, but these extra 000s are never taken into account when hospitalisation numbers are percentaged to numbers or infection.?
- All this testing serves mainly to put ££ millions into the pockets of the manufactures (cynical, moi?).
- The numbers self-isolating seem way out of proportion to the severity of the illness, and it is these numbers that are causing the staff shortages yet this is glossed over.??‍♀️
- Last year's Nightingale hospitals, built at top speed and scarcely used because no staff, are now decommissioned. This year army field hospitals are to be set up. Do they think we've forgotten?

The poor woman in the car park in the OP is an extreme case, but not surprising.

Well seems death rate will soon fall below 100 a day average.
The rates for the last week are: 92, 94, 103, 72, 80 and 26. Whatever yesterday is, I bet the average 7 days is below 100.

Jenny Harries and Neil Ferguson promote continuously the worst case scenarios! Beggars belief why we listen to them as they are always wide of the mark, scaring us half to death.

I think this might be a good place to put this, an explanation of modelling.

The whole article is worth reading.

Scientific models are not set in stone; they are open for inspection, updated with new information and, as errors are discovered, they are corrected. To date, the actual outcomes have been within the range of scenarios. For example, in the autumn, Scotland mandated mask-wearing with exceptions that some ignored, while England made masks voluntary but many wore masks anyway. What actually mattered to case numbers is what people did, not the legislation; no model can capture this perfectly.

www.theguardian.com/world/commentisfree/2021/dec/26/tensions-are-rising-about-pandemic-modelling-but-we-gloomsters-are-saving-lives

Thank you Maddyone we will do soon hopefully Tuesday. I hope you get to see your mum and family that are possible at the moment. Zoom has be a lifesaver over this time for many.

I think we have to discriminate between the different variants rather than just talk about COVID-19. On the evidence to date, in South Africa and the UK, Omicron does not have the same impact on as many people as earlier variants. We are also better protected now. If this remains the case, I think we have to get back to a more normal state of affairs. It is important for people's wellbeing and very important for the economy. Otherwise, our stop-start economy, already into over-borrowing and stagflation, could deteriorate further. Ultimately, it is economic activity that pays the piper for us all.

It was mentioned earlier that scenarios and forecast are not meant to be taken as gospel. Sadly, too often they are and reported as such without any reference to the level of confidence in the conclusions. Experts speak lucidly and knowledgeably about the subject, where we have been and we we are but when it comes to foretelling the future, we have to retain a degree of scepticism. They may be right, especially if the future is similar to the past, but often enough, they are not.

What a distressing incident M0nica but while we can feel every sympathy, we cannot legislate for those with extreme MH or emotional issues.
Covid has surely highlighted and aggravated many MH problems but I am not prepared to attribute blame to any government agency or the media for how some people react to stress in trying times.

Franbern

Two of my daughters work in Mental Health, one within the NHS. and the other as an Educational Psychologist with school-aged children. Both have reported on the continuously and extreme rise in serious mental health problems that have come about over the past two years. Both are totally over-stretched now at work, unable to deal with the tsunami of cases.

Both are totally opposed to any form of Lockdowns saying that the that cure is now more dangerous than the disease.

Long, long after the current Pandemic is a thing of the past, our society will still be trying to deal with the fallout of the serious mental health problems it has produced, aided and abetted - even encouraged- by the government and SAGE.

Death and bereavement cause a multitude of mental health problems too.

It’s reasonable to assume there would have been a rise in mental health problems as a result of the pandemic, whether we had locked down or not, don’t you think?

I hope you get to see your grandsons soon rosie.

Our family think more restrictions may be brought in next week, so it’s watch this space. It’s a very difficult situation for the government, because restrictions wrecks businesses. So long as the numbers in hospital can be coped with the balance is probably on the economy. But who knows, I haven’t got a crystal ball.

We’re planning a quiet new year, hopefully we’ll be able to see mother in the care home, and our sons and families, and we’ll zoom call our daughter in New Zealand.