Relaxation of Restrictions, Part XII *Read OP For Mod Warnings*

CruelSummer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118308228#Comment_118308228

How many will be killed off when excess deaths due to Government policy’s re Covid are also included? Ireland’s excess deaths for 2021 for non-Covid is increased.

is_that_so

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118308235#Comment_118308235

Poster seems to be praising Florida for an extremely shambolic response to COVID, we went a different route and no amount of your very irate whataboutery will change that. The US response is not one for any other country to aspire to, anymore than the UK's or Brazil's was.

Don't Chute!

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118307992#Comment_118307992

Is this post a joke? The HSE are being scapegoated?! They are about the ONLY people that that have NOT been blamed for this ****. It’s this attitude that has us where we are. “Oh we can’t do anything about that so why bother even trying”. Absolute nonsense.

_Kaiser_

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118307992#Comment_118307992

I'd echo Don't Chute's comments but I'd add that we shouldn't forget that this isn't a new situation - we have poured 20 BILLION euros annually (plus top-ups) into the HSE for decades at this point and yet every year we have the same reports of the service being on the brink of collapse in winter, patients on trolleys, ridiculously long waiting lists (with people dying or suffering in pain if they can't afford private insurance or going abroad), and staffing not where it needs to be in the areas that need it.

All Covid has done is provide a convenient excuse/get out over the last 18 months for these long standing problems but the fault and responsibility for this lies entirely with HSE management and the Department/successive ministers for Health, although the latter are - to be fair - working with one hand tied behind their backs because of union resistance and overly generous contracts written in/based on a different era.

As I have said many times before, post July 2020 (and certainly post July 2021 when the vaccination programme really took hold) all we have really been protecting is this ongoing waste, incompetence and inertia in what we laughably call a health "service" (but I suppose "employment scheme" wouldn't look good from a PR perspective). THIS is why we still have restrictions, blame-shifting among the population and scaremongering - as usual it's the Irish tactic of pitting one group against another to distract from the real issue!

JRant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118308228#Comment_118308228

I think "killed off" is slightly over the top being honest. No country or place has done everything correctly because nobody really knows what the right thing to do is. It's only in the fullness of time when we can look back at all the areas affected by both the virus and restrictions that we'll have a clearer picture.

is_that_so

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118308706#Comment_118308706

I can't see the US approach ever figuring anywhere on lists of what's good to do. Their own list of failures is extremely long.

Richard Hillman

If Covid 19 is going to knock around in variant form for years and years, maybe even decades, will they still rollover "emergency" restrictions?

The science/technology wasn't there for Spanish Flu. Variants or relatives of Spanish Flu were probably knocking around for decades. You could even have distant relatives of the Spanish Flu floating around now that are no more than a sniffle.

So when the variants of Covid 19 evolve and evolve and evolve, you have run out of the Greek Alphabet but under testing they are still related to Covid 19, will we still have restrictions? vaccine passports? Mandatory boosters? Mask mandates?

If governments can get away with what they are doing now. What will stop them rolling it on for 10 years loose variants of Covid 19?

It's a hell of a lot of long term trust being handed over to politicians.

What do people see as the true Freedom Day? Zero restrictions. No "emergency legislation" being left in the attic but always there to be whipped out in a days notice?

Importantly, where do people see themselves this time next year? The HSE shouting from the roof tops like Scotty in Star Trek saying "she won't hold". Booster 3 being rolled. Do you truly believe Vaccines passports will be done away with by then? That your boosters are not going to be linked, like they are saying all around Europe.

Hego Damask

^^ They are already flying the flag of "even if omicron is harmlessly mild it will still flood hospitals due to pure numbers" ...

So no, this will never end, at least every winter will be like this, at best I think we can hope for relatively normal summers...

JRant

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118308721#Comment_118308721

Operation warp speed was a huge success. How many lives have been saved by that program alone?

astrofool

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118309005#Comment_118309005

It was pretty much copied in Europe (BioNtech/Pfizer was first out of the gates), the UK (Oxford), Russia (Sputnik) and China (Sinovac/Pharm), so it did very well but not really any better than the rest of the superpowers.

MilkyToast

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118307927#Comment_118307927

The far-right are well known for... uh... their opposition to compulsory medical procedures and the discrimination of mostly minority groups. 👀

completedit

If the Swine Flu had emerged in 2020 and not 2009, would we have had these lockdown measures? I firmly believe that lockdowns are the byproduct of the overabundance of information we have at our disposal.

Chris_5339762

I don't think so - swine flu would have killed people but the problem with COVID is not that it kills so many, its that so many require ICU specifically.

Even high hospital numbers wouldn't cause lockdowns to the same extent, and can be mitigated with COVID field hospitals if necessary, but the ICU numbers is the big problem.

High deaths really would happen one way or the other - lockdowns cause them to just happen over a longer period, but that means the ICU cases come over a longer period and you can cope.

completedit

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9781137530332_6

If only there was some sort of external event that would allow him to achieve his long-held objective to alter Irish drinking culture.

It's funny that the sectors that have been hit the most by restrictions have been cultural events which are just viewed as collateral damage, the one part of the economy that is intrinsically human. The other parts of the economy that just serve to exist for their own ends have flourished.

bokale

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118310584#Comment_118310584

Think our cultural events rely too much on alcohol to be viable anyway. Think a change there would be good.

ceadaoin.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118308228#Comment_118308228

And California "killed off" 75k, despite restrictions for the best part of 2 years, vaccine mandates and passports etc. It's almost like there's no controlling an airborne virus and the cases and deaths rate will be similar everywhere eventually 🤔

Marty Bird

I’m just back from another brilliant weekend on plaque island, no virtue signalling masks in hospitality, pubs and clubs out the door. I was doing the Omicron on the dance floor Fri/Sat, nobody mention the Rona and my team won.

Stay safe, brighter days ahead, are we fcuk in this together, wake the fcuk up people….

Richard Hillman

https://twitter.com/Lukewearechange/status/1470089268454477834?t=9Nn4EIgL4cEWYInMBLTa5A&s=19

Allegedly out of France over the weekend. There were videos last week of a police force throwing down their handcuffs.

You would wonder how long they can continue with restrictions/passports, if the police are turning up to work and are getting battered every weekend. Will they bother even turning up for work? The French armed forces most definitely won't be getting onto the streets. I think they take their vow to protect the nation as opposed to a government very seriously.

It's going to get even more violent when booster mandates come it.

Boris Johnson is in trouble within his own party for the vaccine passport. The British don't seem to be standing for it.

Major unrest to happen around Europe over the next 2 months. Rising fuel prices. Inflation. Potential Ukrainian refugee crisis.

The next 6 months are going to be wild.

PTH2009

Will we see new 'rules come it's for specific days/nights in the hospitality industry

7pm close for all establishments on Xmas eve/Stephens Day/NYE and NYD

NPHET can think up of an excuse for it. 'Blah blah variant emerges blah blah'

SusieBlue

According to a report shared by TD Michael McNamara, suicide figures for the second quarter of 2021 are up 192% on the same time period in 2020. 78% of these deaths were males.

192%. Those figures are absolutely frightening. Why is no one else talking about this, why am I only hearing about this on Twitter?

And the worst part is, this is probably only the start of it. The secondary deaths from these lockdowns and restrictions are going to far surpass the deaths with covid. And you can be damn sure that the majority of those deaths won’t be people above the average life expectancy either.

When the inevitable tribunals and investigations conclude on the management of the pandemic in the future, I will sleep well knowing I called this BS out for what it was from the beginning.

Meanwhile we will have to continue to suffer through this nightmare until Leo rides in on his white horse next year to save the day. I don’t even like him or FG but I recognise now that they are our only hope of getting out of this mess.

MM is the worst leader in the history of our country, and nothing will change about our approach of extreme caution until someone with the balls to stand up to NPHET takes charge.

Penfailed

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118311974#Comment_118311974

I really can't see the need for you to make up random scenarios in your head and then share them with the rest of us. It's getting weird at this stage.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118312024#Comment_118312024

Except it was misrepresentation, or lies in other words. 2020 was a low year in lockdown. 2021 was back where it was in the preceding years

Hellrazer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118312208#Comment_118312208

More lies from useless Ministers - Same quarter in 2018 was 63. In 2019 it was 104.

In 2020 there were 25 deaths and this year its 73.

These ministers will do anything to get publicity.

2020 was a blip in the figures and cant really be compared to 2021 - they should be comparing it with 2019 where the headline would read "Suicide rate keeps falling with suicides down 70% but thats not dramatic enough for him.

Real Donald Trump

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118311500#Comment_118311500

Indeed, the covid faithful go all silent when you present them with facts, they don't seem to like it very much.

Wolf359f

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118312932#Comment_118312932

Guess you can always look at excess mortality to stop under/over reporting of covid deaths.

M_Murphy57

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118312024#Comment_118312024

Agree word for word.

SusieBlue

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118312208#Comment_118312208

The only articles I can find say suicides were down 20% over all last year. I actually distinctly remember certain posters on this thread triumphantly using it as proof there was nothing to see here regarding mental health issues caused by lockdowns and that it was much ado about nothing.

So if suicides were down 20% over all in 2020 and we’ve had a 192% increase since then, that’s still quite alarming.

And it’s still quite a bit higher than the 2019 figures and the years before that.

Surely if we’re interested in saving lives here, even a small increase on figures is worrying, and urgent action should be taken? Where is the abundance of caution for this issue?

astrofool

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118314297#Comment_118314297

Was it not a 30% drop in 2021 based on 2019 figures, 2020 will always be taken out of any statistical data in the future (even Ireland death rates were down as the deaths from the Christmas wave occurred in January/February.

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118311974#Comment_118311974

If they were smart they'd be trying to convince people to go to the pub instead of attending house parties... They ain't smart though are they?

Red Silurian

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118312024#Comment_118312024

I'm not a Micheal Martin fan by any stretch of the imagination but would you really consider him worse than Brian Cowen?