When will it all end?

GT89 wrote: »

This is exactly what I think should happen
https://twitter.com/ZubyMusic/status/1362508121361567754?s=19

Is he a professor of molecular immunology?

GT89 wrote: »

And neither are politicans

They take advice from people who are experts in the area of disease control, immunology, microbiology etc.

You on the other hand watch YouTube videos that align with your narrative, believe everything on conspiracy theory websites and get your information from Twitter.

I prefer the politicians' approach.

bubblypop wrote: »

Except for Finland and Norway, not much sunshine and low cases.

Both nations are experts at social distancing. They do it when there's no pandemic.

bucketybuck wrote: »

And yet a year later still the only thing they can come up with is "lockdown".

They should save themselves the consultancy fees.

What's the alternative?

It's been the response that most countries have taken when there's a rise in cases.

NeuralNetwork wrote: »

Throwing everything at the kitchen sink into getting the vaccines rolled out rapidly seem like the only solution I can see.

My view of it is that it the EU programme continues to deliver too slowly by say the end of March, it should be bypassed. I’m hopeful it will deliver, but we need contingencies. We just can’t go on like this indefinitely.

We should be aiming to get the vaccination programme complete as soon as humanly possible, even if it costs a lot to do so. The longer this drags the more damage is done to the economy and society.

I agree but can we bypass the EU programme?

I hope there are some bods in government departments working on the various scenarios.

Scenario 1: At least one of the vaccines will work each and all of the known new strains. By summer enough people will be immunised, on a worldwide basis, so that new strains are unlikely to occur. By winter enough people will immunised, on a worldwide basis, to ensure that day to day life can resume.

In the above scenario, how do we come out lockdown without having a fourth wave and while minimising further economic failure and damaging people's mental health further?

Scenario 2: One new strain emerges that is resistant to all current vaccines. There is a scramble from the various pharma companies to amend present vaccines or to test new ones against this new strain. Pharma companies state that it will take at least a year before we will know if a modified/new vaccine will work.

In the above scenario, what steps do we take? Further lockdowns for another year? Will people accept this? Will we look to close the border with the North and go for a zero covid strategy? Will we get agreement with the North to go for an all-Ireland strategy (least likely option in my opinion). Will we get agreement to do a zero covid UK and Ireland strategy?

Scenario 3: A number of new vaccine resistant strains make an appearance over the next six months. It becomes clear that we cannot make enough tailored vaccinations to keep up with the variety of new strains.

What then? Do we build temporary hospitals and import as many doctors and nurses from abroad that we can find? Do we lower the points for medicine and nursing and have hundreds more homegrown hospital staff in four years time to staff these new hospitals? Do we then try to go back to normal? Because we can't do this for another ten years, or twenty or whatever.

bucketybuck wrote: »

Do you not think that a year later there should be even a little bit of nuance in our response? Have they even tried to implement layered responses?

They have industries shut down when there is no evidence whatsoever that they are anything but negligible in terms of covid spread, but god forbid we try to contact trace and carry out risk assessments. They have entire counties closed when their level of cases were acceptably low, but god forbid we even try to have regional restrictions.

All of that would be hard, so instead we just use the same old sledgehammer every time. No alternatives, no ideas, simpler just to tell the phlebbs that they have to stay at home. Who cares that this is peoples' lives being destroyed day by day and week by week.

There has been different levels of reopening and closing throughout this whole thing. It hasn't been level 5 lockdown or a sledgehammer as you call it.
Layered responses would the correct approach but only when cases are low enough. They need to open up one step at a time. First open the schools..wait a few weeks and see what effect that has on case numbers. If that doesn't have too much effect on case numbers then open construction...wait a few weeks and see what effect that has. Then open retail if it's safe to do so and so on.
These things need to be done one step at a time so causes of outbreaks can be identified.
People calling for everything to open obviously don't care about anyone but themselves. There's far less chance of the country being put into another lockdown if the biggests factors of outbreaks can be identified and these area can be shutdown if cases rise rather than going for level 5 everytime.

aido79 wrote: »

Believe me I want nothing more for life to go back to normal and am at the end of my tether with all this lockdown stuff. However it's fairly obvious from what happened over Xmas that opening everything up would just be a recipe for disaster and will prolong the situation.
What do you think would happen if the government just opened everything up tomorrow and everyone went back to normal with no restrictions?

Why did I bother talking about nuanced responses if you just want to label it as "open everything up".

Richard Hillman wrote: »

It's a different scenario to Christmas. There won't be the emphasis of visiting people and family gatherings.

Retail and pubs opening had very little impact on the increase in numbers, as Dublin during the early parts of January had numbers either in line with the population percentage or lower. And to be honest, it was mostly lower. If things like Retail, Restaurants etc were a factor, the numbers in Dublin would have been through the roof.

All we need is a Level 3ish Lockdown and the over 70s have to isolate until vaccinated.

I'd agree with most of that but wouldn't be in favour of the pubs reopening initially just to err on the side of caution.