Johnson to make a statement at 8pm

I never thought I would say this but watching Johnson's, "Address to the Nation", I felt almost sorry for him.

No sniggers, no classical allusions delivered with an airy wave of the hand and no attempts at making what he regards as jokes.

He looked awful; like someone who the party Mafia had told to, "Get it right this time Matey or it's curtains", (with appropriate hand gestures).

And still he couldn't deliver. He seemed to think that the people giving vaccinations are volunteers. (Some of them may be).

My Daughter-in-Law who had been in a profession that involved injecting patients for over 30 years had to give up because of the danger of cross infection.

It took her weeks to qualify to do 11 hour shifts giving Covid vaccines. She had to do 15 mini courses including one on Safeguarding.

Does he really think that people are going to turn up, say they'd like to volunteer, be given a quick lesson involving a syringe full of water and a tomato and be let loose?

Actually. Writing this I've stopped being sorry for him. He can't help being an idiot but an idiot he is and it affects us all.

Oh and no mention of ventilation in schools.

If the population of this country had taken heed of the advise given ie sanitized ,worn masks and socially distanced then taken up the vaccine when asked instead of the antivaxers conspiracy theorists and in general people who think they know better than the scientists perhaps we would not be in this position now.

Iam64

Whitewavemark2

No health authorities were warned. I suspect the only one knowing of the vaccine push until 8pm was Johnson.

What a way to run a country.

The NHS is on its knees. The most obvious indicator most of us see is the difficulty in communicating with your GP. As for actually seeing your GP - 3-6 week waits seem to be the new normal.

Where is this army of health professionals to administer the roll out of jabs to come from? Even the army of volunteers is feeling the strain.

Iam64
I had my booster at the weekend and it was like trying to get to the January sales - it was extremely well-organised when in there (they weren't responsible for the traffic jams outside, obviously!). I've never seen so many staff, possibly some were volunteers, so I hope everywhere will be as well-organised as it is here.

However, they are going to be exhausted by the end of this.

Cant help but wonder if the broadcast was anything to do with the bye-election or the vote tomorrow on the theme of " Boris saves the day".
They have gone very quiet about the supply of the promised ventilation improvements in schools .

Casdon
Well I would say that the governments have done better so far in both Scotland and Wales Pudding123.

I should have added that I'm in Wales. However, I was invited to two different locations and had great difficulty trying to cancel one so I will be down as a no-show.

My booster was at a large, well ventilated walk in centre and was very well organised. But people that took up the offer of having their booster at our GP’s found themselves crowded into a small, badly ventilated surgery. Given the transmissibility of Omicron I really wouldn’t want to be vaccinated there. My neighbour said there were lots of people and he had to queue for ages. Another surgery that I know of refused to do vaccinations because they said they didn’t have the facilities. Johnson has already been in trouble with the speaker for making announcements without consulting parliament and yet he continues to do so.

As most of you will know I'm no fan of either Johnson or this government. But I am fed up to the back teeth of people saying how scruffy he was, how he probably didn't tell anybody what he was going to say, how we're going to miss the target. And especially fed up with people saying its a dead cat.

It wasn't a one-off turn up and say what he thinks on the day type presentation; as someone said above it was probably recorded. They had had a Cabinet (?) meeting earlier in the day, I expect Javid was there. Did they not tell every NHS employee in advance? Well excuse me for not being sympathetic.

Will they meet the target? Probably not. Should we try? Definitely. What would you have preferred? Him to turn up on the TV and tell us he was going to Parliament later this week to ask them if they agree with what he's doing? Some things just need doing.

But he’s not doing it for the sake of the country, He’s doing it to appease his back benchers who don’t want restrictions. It’s still all about remaining in power, not doing what’s best for the country. If it is what’s best for the country that just happens to be a happy accident.

I don't care why he's doing it, it needs doing. He's doing something and more will probably follow.

If he'd come on TV and said they were imposing restrictions this thread would have been full of people complaining that he didn't go to Parliament first.

Johnson effort is simply not good enough. Yes, it is a difficult time, yes it is a crises of epic proportions.

He is the leader of the country for heavens sake. I do not and will never excuse incompetence in my country’s leader.

The protocols have not been issued, LFTs are running short. No other mitigation introduced. Another pigs ear in the making.

alegrias how is your nations leader doing?

Sorry, but did you expect Boris to issue the protocols? Personally place the orders for LFTs?

Never thought I'd say this but I'm willing to get on with it. This is what we've got. Or, we can all sit on the sidelines saying how we'd have done better.

Whitewavemark2

alegrias how is your nations leader doing?

Not much better, to be honest.

More restrictions tomorrow I expect.

I am still raging about the use of the word tsunami and the fact that they pretended there were >5,000 cases one day last week when that was as a result of a backlog.

Its all about stoking fear and I'm fed up of that too.

I don’t agree with you about not informing the NHS before the rest of the nation Alegrias1, a day has already been wasted that could have been spent reorganising what will be a massive raft of other priorities if the service had been pre-warned. Hence for example the online booking system not having appointments that are bookable until January. He presumably didn’t even bother to tell the leaders of the other countries either, and what would that have taken in terms of effort? It was a pre-recorded message, so there’s no excuse.

As an aside. I do think that omicron is shaping up to be much milder than the previous strains, which when you think about it is the biggest stroke of luck in the world, as it could have been much more lethal than we have yet seen.

This imo should be a lesson learned by the entire world as until we vaccinate the world, the next strain could be both extremely catching and lethal.

Alegrias1

Sorry, but did you expect Boris to issue the protocols? Personally place the orders for LFTs?

Never thought I'd say this but I'm willing to get on with it. This is what we've got. Or, we can all sit on the sidelines saying how we'd have done better.

Yes I do. Or at least get the ducks in line. That is his job.

I would expect nothing less.

Alegrias1

Whitewavemark2

alegrias how is your nations leader doing?

Not much better, to be honest.

More restrictions tomorrow I expect.

I am still raging about the use of the word tsunami and the fact that they pretended there were >5,000 cases one day last week when that was as a result of a backlog.

Its all about stoking fear and I'm fed up of that too.

But isn’t Johnson using fear as a means of getting people vaccinated? Fear of a largely unknown variant ( that does, hopefully, appear to be quite mild)?

Of course we are all getting in with it, that is what the entire country has been doing since this debacle started, but there are some things that we can’t control.

Like LFT shortage , inability to book appointment.

Casdon

I don’t agree with you about not informing the NHS before the rest of the nation Alegrias1, a day has already been wasted that could have been spent reorganising what will be a massive raft of other priorities if the service had been pre-warned. Hence for example the online booking system not having appointments that are bookable until January. He presumably didn’t even bother to tell the leaders of the other countries either, and what would that have taken in terms of effort? It was a pre-recorded message, so there’s no excuse.

Once again, I don't care if he told the leaders of the other nations or not, as they make their own decisions. And I don't know if he didn't tell them.

What would I have preferred; getting all the systems in placed them telling us that they had a new target, or just getting on with it. Answer; just getting on with it.

But isn’t Johnson using fear as a means of getting people vaccinated? Fear of a largely unknown variant ( that does, hopefully, appear to be quite mild)?

Yes. They're all doing it.

Its all about stoking fear and I’m fed up of that too.

I agree about the fear factor. It’s a well known technique when trying to get the public to comply with the wishes of government, and it worked too. I’m also fed up of the whole situation as we seem to lurch from one wave to another, and I wonder when it will end. Speaking to my daughter last night (she’s a doctor) she told me yet again that pandemics are expected to last between three and ten years! Oh dear, we’re only two years in. She’s living in New Zealand at the moment, and of course even New Zealand, although lauded early in the pandemic, has now got more cases again. And since our daughter arrived in New Zealand, they’ve had two more lockdowns. So it seems to show that that whether you are Boris Johnson or Jacinda Ardern, you cannot control a virus, and whatever methods you employ, a virus will follow its course. We all have to do the best we can for ourselves, and the government does what it considers best for it’s citizens.

Whitewavemark2

Alegrias1

Sorry, but did you expect Boris to issue the protocols? Personally place the orders for LFTs?

Never thought I'd say this but I'm willing to get on with it. This is what we've got. Or, we can all sit on the sidelines saying how we'd have done better.

Yes I do. Or at least get the ducks in line. That is his job.

I would expect nothing less.

So its the Health Minister's job to speak to the nation but the PM's job to order LFT's. ?

MayBee70

But he’s not doing it for the sake of the country, He’s doing it to appease his back benchers who don’t want restrictions. It’s still all about remaining in power, not doing what’s best for the country. If it is what’s best for the country that just happens to be a happy accident.

... call me cynical, but I agree.

So its the Health Minister's job to speak to the nation but the PM's job to order LFT's. ?

If you're going to change the 'rule' on self isolation, if a family member has covid, from 10 days isolation to 'if you're fully vaccinated you can 'do an LFT every day for a week' it might be a good idea to check that there are enough LFTs available to accommodate it...