Politics of fear and its side effects

We are still waiting to see our grandsons Maddyone one tested positive last Saturday so waiting for him to become clear
Booked a restaurant for New Year’s Eve but was cancelled last year so waiting to see if Boris does the same this year

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.

M0nica

I dislike the sanctimonious and judgmental attitudes of all those who are at the more cautious end of the opening up process. I have every respect for their views, even though I do not agree with them.

I think they should accord the same respect to those of us who are further down this opening up process, who are not taking risks, who are taking every precaution, but, consider that it is possible to engage with the world more than they do.

Honestly, I thought your opening post was very judgemental.

You were so indignant about what this lady had done to your DH. A long sanctimonious paragraph about how he had done everything right. How she had made him distressed.

You and your DH are over reacting too. Distressed? She did nothing to him. She did not speak to him. She didn’t accost him. She didn’t express an opinion out loud about him. She didn’t try to prevent anyone getting their vaccine.

She didn’t feel safe (and you have no knowledge why) she didn’t say it was because of your DH. He assumed that. She had no contact with him. So she left the queue albeit somewhat noisily.

What on earth was there in her actions for you to rush to social media to judge and condemn her.

Except a sanctimonious and judgmental attitude?

I think that goes both ways though doesnt it, calling people excessively timid etc is hardly kind. I see nothing kind in many of the posts about those who are worried.

I agree with Monica and rosie. It is possible to engage with the world and remain as safe as possible. I have every reason to wish that I won’t become as ill again as I was last January, but I have lived my life as near as possible to normality as I could all through the summer. We were eating out in pubs and restaurants, we went on holiday to Somerset, Greece, and the Isle of Wight. We have always associated with our family since lockdown ended and I see friends from time to time for walks, coffee, lunches. I shop normally but never stopped wearing a mask or sanitising my hands and trolley. We do avoid crowds, although my husband has been working as a volunteer at the vaccination Centre. In the summer I even took my grandson to the cinema a couple of times, but I chose morning, not busy times to go. Since winter arrived and especially Omicron, we have not gone out to eat, and our sons have scaled back on socialising because we were trying to preserve out Christmas celebration at our son’s house, and today, this afternoon at our house. We were nine yesterday and again today. I also want to avoid testing positive because I need to be able to visit my 94 year old mother in her care home. So we do what we can, we avoid what seems more likely to cause infection. Monica and rosie are correct. You assess the risk, take appropriate precautions, and try to get on with your life.

M0nica

I dislike the sanctimonious and judgmental attitudes of all those who are at the more cautious end of the opening up process. I have every respect for their views, even though I do not agree with them.

I think they should accord the same respect to those of us who are further down this opening up process, who are not taking risks, who are taking every precaution, but, consider that it is possible to engage with the world more than they do.

Monica I agree with you we are all I hope grown ups and and dealing with this all in the best way possible
I personally do not know anyone who has not tried to carry on with normal life as safely as possible and yes that means eating out going to pubs and meeting friends and family.
If anyone feels they are particularly vulnerable then of course they take actions quite rightly so to protect themselves but the rest of the population is not going to do the same.

I dislike the sanctimonious and judgmental attitudes of all those who are at the more cautious end of the opening up process. I have every respect for their views, even though I do not agree with them.

I think they should accord the same respect to those of us who are further down this opening up process, who are not taking risks, who are taking every precaution, but, consider that it is possible to engage with the world more than they do.

Most folk watch the soaps on TV.
If the TV soaps reinforced mask wearing and spoke of distancing and we saw distancing in practice, then these ill formed individuals may distance and those who can, would wear masks and result in us being safer.

I know how your daughter felt sazz, I could barely stand or walk when I had Covid. When I went to the bathroom in the hospital I had to have a nurse with me as I was so weakened and she/he had to carry a portable oxygen cylinder as I couldn’t go off oxygen at any time. When I came home I was off oxygen but still barely able to walk or go upstairs. Even so, when given the scenario of 6000 deaths in a day as we were last week, and knowing that we never exceeded 2000 during the worst of the pandemic last winter, I’m afraid I do regard it as scaremongering, and if the population don’t believe what they’re told, many will fail to comply.

Is your DD better now,sass? It must have been very frightening for you and her….

Firstly the masks are not effective against viruses.
Secondly if you are as ill as my DD was with Covid you will be lucky to be able to stand without collapsing never mind carrying on with life as usual.
Covid is extremely serious for some, vaccinated or not.

I think the majority of people would not have done as that woman did, there are a lot of people though who are struggling mentally after 20 months, especially those living alone, she sounded very frightened. It’s not your husband at fault or the woman, it’s just the times and stress some people are under.

My goodness so many judgements.

We are experiencing something akin to a type of world war, which is killing millions and injuring tens of millions.

People will obviously react in myriad ways as they try to come to terms with what is happening, by assuming all sorts of misplaced ideas and adopting what appears to be irrational behaviour.

Even the OPs reaction is assuming something that she simply cannot know, by blaming what she describes as “the politics of fear”. The woman in the queue reacted the way she apparently did for a completely unknown reason.

We are constantly being presented with the different models and scenarios from which we use our judgement to adjust our behaviour accordingly. Models are not the “politics of fear” they are best/worse case scenarios, nothing more or less.

It is the same when looking at other models like climate change. We are being constantly presented with such models, it is the way science,economists etc work. But do not look at them as cast in concrete. Models are flexible and change constantly, they are simply a snapshot of the current data which of course changes constantly.

Blaming the messenger is never a good way to react to information.

I'm just so sick of the excuses, with people harping on about 'learning to live with it' or 'protecting mental health' in a weird effort to minimise the fact that we're in a world pandemic.

The logical reaction is to avoid all unnecessary risks, including shopping, travel and socialising, until the case numbers fall dramatically and it becomes endemic. There's plenty of other things to do.

By then, they'll be no shortage of ITU beds, no excess staff shortages due to infection, no possibility of major disruption to society. Routine and emergency care will not be compromised (any more than pre-Covid, anyway).

Then (and only then) it will be appropriate to resume 'normal' activities - without selfishly putting other people's lives at risk.

All the silly excuses just send a message, loud and clear, that you really don't care about anyone else - full stop.

I am not suggesting that anyone does anything that is unsafe or puts others at risk, but I think a lot of people are over reacting, like the lady I mentioned in my OP.

what they (and possibly you) are ignoring is that some vulnerable people will inevitably die or suffer long-term health effects.
That has always happened regardless of whether COVID exists or not. There have always been people whose health is compromised and who must be careful about where they go and what they do and those who know them, do all they can not to compromise them.

I am not suggesting a reckless free for all but each of us taking steps to open up our lives within safe limits. I went up to London last week to see an exhibition. I put my mask on at my home railways station and it stayed on until I got back there. Outside or in, my mask stayed on. There was a tube strike and I did a lot of walking above ground, but my mask stayed on and I was social distancing.

I did a LFT today and it showed I did not have COVID, not that I had any reason to think I might. Come the new year, if there is another eshibition on I want to see, I will repeat the experience.

It is these carefully assessed and protected activities I am thinking of, not rushing around to crowded events without a mask and then visiting my friends and hugging and kissing them. But there is a middle ground between that and locking yourself in your house and throwing away the key, bleaching all your food and leaving the post in the garden for a week before opening it.

aonk I’m so sorry to hear you’re suffering symptoms of acute anxiety. That is horrible for you and I hope you improve soon.

The truth is that whilst some people, large numbers of people in fact, behave as if there is no Covid, and I think in particular of those who refuse to be vaccinated, and those who mix freely without taking any precautions, most of the people on here will act responsibly. To a great extent that will keep people safe, but as this is a highly infectious virus, despite being sensible and responsible, some people will still become infected sadly.

Peasblossom you are not the only poster on here who have medics in their families, and whose families caught Covid because of their work. My family, just like yours, has medics and those medics both caught Covid, in one case through working in the Covid Hub.

We are in the midst of a pandemic with many people being unwell, some seriously and far too many dying.
We are also in the grip of a severe epidemic of anxiety and depression. I thought I was immune to this until recently. When I spoke to my GP about the very bad stomach problems I’d been having for some weeks I was told it was a classic case of anxiety and stress. Of course I was relieved to hear that it wasn’t anything more but I’ve joined the ranks of those whose confidence and mental well-being has been damaged. Please be tolerant when people show signs of mental health problems.

What? Do you mean my family AmberSpyglass?
Or are you answering the OP’s thread title?

growstuff you are a very intelligent person. A teacher. But you always seem so chippy.
With me mostly. I must rile you up out of all proportion.

If I put a smile at the end of a post you deride me and say I’m being smug.

I was replying honestly to PB about how my family feel after a Covid scare last year. Yet you accuse me of being cavalier in my attitude.

Well your attitude hurts me. You are so cutting.

Yes, I’m absolutely sure this happened.

Urmstongran

MOnica ? x 100

Yeah right! Enjoy your time in Unicorn-land!

You're assuming a lot here. Nobody wants to shut down their life. I can guarantee that if I were to do a poll, almost 100% of people would prefer to carry on as if Covid had never happened (apart from the few who have profited).

The majority could indeed carry on at minimal risk to themselves, However, what they (and possibly you) are ignoring is that some vulnerable people will inevitably die or suffer long-term health effects.

At times such as this, the dividing line between those who only care about themselves and those closest to them and those who genuinely care about their society/country becomes obvious.

MOnica ? x 100

Peasblossom

Well, there we are. If you or people you love haven’t suffered (and I do mean suffered) from Covid obviously it was always a load of fuss about nothing and just an unnecessary reaction on the part of Government.

If your family had been badly affected you might think differently. You might wish people had been a bit more afraid and taken more care.

Especially when your family members were so ill because they had to provide the medical care for people who just thought it was fearmongering,

Our family was the same September 2020 our youngest daughter got Covid. “Helping others” teaching full time in a primary school. Then she got long Covid and was really poorly for nine weeks. Breathless, Scared “what’s this doing to my internal organs mum I’m so frightened. Especially at night. I lie there worrying I might die and leave my 2 babies with their daddy and no mummy”.

She had never been so ill. Covid is not just a cold. It’s very real.

However, she got better and returned to full time work 2 weeks before Christmas last year.

Now?
We all get on. With life. What’s the alternative? Hiding away?
We take sensible precautions.
Wear masks when asked (not in the street, none of us!)
We socially distance at all times.
No hugs and kisses with friends.
We ‘flow and go’.

But & here’s the thing. Last September we didn’t have those amazing vaccines. They came on the grid December last year. A 96y old family member was in the first cohort to get one.
Hurrah!

Since then we’ve all been jabbed twice & as of last week, all of us including our daughters and husbands all mid 40’s have been boostered.

We don’t want to shut down our lives more than we have to. It’s not good for mental health sitting in all the time, worrying.

Happy Christmas everyone.
Let’s hope 2022 brings us better times. And hope for our futures.

I think the message from the last few posts is that people should use their brains rather than their emotions. If only!

The diatribe fed to us by the media has made us very sensitive, today nobody indoors was without a mask, a big change from a couple of weeks ago. In practice these blue masks most use are very little protection from virus far too much leaks around the edges, the black fabric masks are no better, it’s mostly psychological.
Some are bound to overreact