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When will it all end?

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Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,168 ✭✭✭ypres5


    Nightclubs opening would depend on whether we still need social distancing or not. Nightclub are one of the places where people go to act foolish and shake off a lot of the normal rules of the rest of normal life. I wouldn't expect anyone to adhere to distancing rules in a nightclub. So I'd say it will come down to whether we still need distancing or not.

    imagine that people enjoying themselves in a nightclub it's a disgrace joe


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 220 ✭✭Responder XY


    I'd imagine that nightclubs will be last to open on an unwind of restrictions. I can't think of a place that would be more suited to spreading the virus.

    That said, they do need to re-open too, so as the population gets vaccinated restrictions should be unwound and as the vaccination coverage gets high nightclubs should get there too.  


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 222 ✭✭Batattackrat


    Are people actually fretting about under 18's been vaccinated. Most of them don't even know they have Covid or might have a slight cough or slight fatigue and that's it.

    Once the over 70's are all vacinated it's time to go to Level 2 and no reason why the country shouldn't be fully open when everyone over 55 has go the vacinne.


  • Posts: 2,129 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    ypres5 wrote: »
    imagine that people enjoying themselves in a nightclub it's a disgrace joe

    On Liveline a couple of months ago, several people were overcome with emotion and one lady was reduced to tears because two people went on holidays to Spain.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,152 ✭✭✭✭El_Duderino 09


    ypres5 wrote: »
    imagine that people enjoying themselves in a nightclub it's a disgrace joe

    Did someone say anything bad about people enjoying themselves in nightclubs?


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,798 ✭✭✭✭hatrickpatrick


    Did someone say anything bad about people enjoying themselves in nightclubs?

    Ok, one yes or no question and I'll go from there:

    Are you personally willing to countenance the possibility that crowded scenarios such as nightclubs, concerts, festivals etc may be permanently banned because of COVID and potential variants etc?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 220 ✭✭Responder XY


    Are people actually fretting about under 18's been vaccinated. Most of them don't even know they have Covid or might have a slight cough or slight fatigue and that's it.

    Once the over 70's are all vacinated it's time to go to Level 2 and no reason why the country shouldn't be fully open when everyone over 55 has go the vacinne.

    I'd agree with the sentiment (although I might be a little more cautious - lv. 2 after over 55s and the high risk population are done sounds better to me - that's not going to be too far off!)

    But the risk related to U-18s isn't that the U18s get sick themselves, it's that they will spread the virus amongst the vulnerable population (the vaccine isn't 100% effective) and that it might drive mutations/variants.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,152 ✭✭✭✭El_Duderino 09


    Ok, one yes or no question and I'll go from there:

    Are you personally willing to countenance the possibility that crowded scenarios such as nightclubs, concerts, festivals etc may be permanently banned because of COVID and potential variants etc?

    Permanently? No. (I hope you appreciate how easy it was to get me to answer a straight question first time. I certainly wish it was that easy to get you to answer the questions I have asked you)

    Why do you ask?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 718 ✭✭✭Kunta Kinte


    Are people actually fretting about under 18's been vaccinated. Most of them don't even know they have Covid or might have a slight cough or slight fatigue and that's it.

    Once the over 70's are all vacinated it's time to go to Level 2 and no reason why the country shouldn't be fully open when everyone over 55 has got the vaccine.

    Are you trolling? No way will this happen nor should it.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 220 ✭✭Responder XY


    Ok, one yes or no question and I'll go from there:

    Are you personally willing to countenance the possibility that crowded scenarios such as nightclubs, concerts, festivals etc may be permanently banned because of COVID and potential variants etc?

    Why should they be permanently banned? of course not. Either we suppress the virus through vaccines or we go back to normal accepting that our ability to treat sickness has regressed slightly and people might die. We need to give the vaccines a chance to work, but once we have we need to go back to normal and open these types of events again.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,798 ✭✭✭✭hatrickpatrick


    Permanently? No. (I hope you appreciate how easy it was to get me to answer a straight question first time. I certainly wish it was that easy to get you to answer the questions I have asked you)

    Why do you ask?

    Firstly, I have repeatedly answered straight questions from you, it's just that you choose to ignore my answers :D

    Secondly: Permanently, no. Fair enough. In that case, at what point in terms of mass vaccination do you personally believe it would be appropriate to allow such mass gatherings again?

    Again, this is about what you personally believe. Forget about NPHET, Leo or anyone else. Out of curiosity.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,152 ✭✭✭✭El_Duderino 09


    Firstly, I have repeatedly answered straight questions from you, it's just that you choose to ignore my answers :D

    Secondly: Permanently, no. Fair enough. In that case, at what point in terms of mass vaccination do you personally believe it would be appropriate to allow such mass gatherings again?

    Again, this is about what you personally believe. Forget about NPHET, Leo or anyone else. Out of curiosity.

    I don't know what point of vaccination would be appropriate to allow such mass gatherings again. I don't have the data to have an informed opinion. Time will tell, particularly how things go the winter after when most people are vaccinated and most restrictions have been dropped. That will be a good test (hopefully that's this winter)

    Do you have the data to make an informed opinion on that question?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,168 ✭✭✭ypres5


    Are you trolling? No way will this happen nor should it.

    how is it trolling and why shouldn't it happen?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 222 ✭✭Batattackrat


    Are you trolling? No way will this happen nor should it.

    How am I trolling? Once hospital numbers are low and the most vunerable vacinated which is the over 70's there is no reason not to move to Level 2.

    In 2017/2018 there were 4000 people in hospital over the year with flu but didn't shut down the country. 191 admitted to ICU over the same year due to flu.

    Once the hospitals are stable and the most vunerable protected it's time to open up.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 350 ✭✭SheepsClothing


    It comes back to something that has been ignored for nearly a year now.

    Adult conversations about death.

    People get sick and die all the time, it happens, a friend of mine died at the weekend, cancer, mid 40's, very sad but it happened and thats life.

    Too many people have blinded themselves to that fact, now they are scared to pass people on the street in case they catch a bug and die. Such mindsets are not compatible with living, they are childish and narrow minded.

    It was a relief to hear that UK minister acknowledging that people would die from covid but that society needed to open up anyway, hopefully now that will seep into the mindset elsewhere and we finally start taking a rational approach to all things covid.

    Categorising the reaction to covid as people afraid to have adult conversations about death is a fairly significant misunderstanding of the problem.

    The reason we've been social distancing for the last year, is to prevent the unnecessary death that would come from hospitals and ICU's being packed out whilst medical staff are forced to take sick absence.

    It's a big problem when a cancer patient can't get treated or a person involved in a motorcycle accident can't get a place in ICU. You can throw out platitudes like "that's life", but in 1st world democracies, that's not life. If you are in a car accident, you should be able to get treatment and if you are denied that essential life saving help, societal trust degrades.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 190 ✭✭Quantum Baloney


    have to agree with the last statement, if they refuse it so **** them, if they get sick and even if they die they had a chance at some protection and declined.
    The rest of us, take the vaccine and get back to normal lives.. which I for one simply can't wait for and will not accept restrictions because some prick thinks the vaccine is a conspiracy or some other ****e

    You might spare a thought for those of us who are not intending to have the vaccine but who have anyway had to live through a year of restrictions and lockdowns because of gullible individuals like yourself who go along with everything they're told.

    Don't worry, you'll be patted on the head like a good dog when you get your vaccine (and annual boosters) and be allowed to travel. Now can you finally leave the rest of us alone.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 550 ✭✭✭Sobit1964


    Categorising the reaction to covid as people afraid to have adult conversations about death is a fairly significant misunderstanding of the problem.

    The reason we've been social distancing for the last year, is to prevent the unnecessary death that would come from hospitals and ICU's being packed out whilst medical staff are forced to take sick absence.

    It's a big problem when a cancer patient can't get treated or a person involved in a motorcycle accident can't get a place in ICU. You can throw out platitudes like "that's life", but in 1st world democracies, that's not life. If you are in a car accident, you should be able to get treatment and if you are denied that essential life saving help, societal trust degrades.

    Now that all 'frontline' medical staff in Ireland have had their first dose, and massive evidence suggests that they are no longer at risk, do you agree that it's time to speed up the pace of reopening the country?

    If not what are your reasons for continuing to remain under current regulations?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 718 ✭✭✭Kunta Kinte


    You might spare a thought for those of us who are not intending to have the vaccine but who have anyway had to live through a year of restrictions and lockdowns because of gullible individuals like yourself who go along with everything they're told.

    Don't worry, you'll be patted on the head like a good dog when you get your vaccine (and annual boosters) and be allowed to travel. Now can you finally leave the rest of us alone.

    Take your conspiracy theory bull****e to the proper forum. This is not the place for it.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,798 ✭✭✭✭hatrickpatrick


    I don't know what point of vaccination would be appropriate to allow such mass gatherings again. I don't have the data to have an informed opinion. Time will tell, particularly how things go the winter after when most people are vaccinated (hopefully that's this winter)

    Do you have the data to make an informed opinion on that question?

    Fair answers, and no I do not.

    I do, however, believe that a point will come at which for the sake of not just the economy but the nation's mental health, we will have to make a judgment call on this - and I personally believe that that point is going to arrive before the end of this year. I certainly don't believe that two full years of that kind of lockdown, as has been recently raised as a possibility by Leo and others, should be countenanced at all. I think that's fundamentally where we differ.

    I'm saying all of this as somebody who has close family and friends who are severely immunocompromised, by the way. Anyone suggesting that I'm taking this lightly couldn't be more wrong, myself and my family have been overly cautious about COVID since literally the first case was reported in Ireland (close family member's doctor told him that he'd be advised to get out ahead of this before things got bad) so I very much take it seriously and understand the risks.

    However, I also understand the serious risks to mental health which come from having the only sources of happiness taken away from people, and for many, many people, being surrounded by people is that source. Therefore I believe in balance on this, and I don't believe "however long it takes" is an acceptable answer. At some point, we have to talk about balancing the risk of COVID outbreaks leading to death by COVID, and existential misery leading to death by suicide. That's all I've been saying pretty much all along.

    I think what many here don't understand (and I get this, having been a full-on internet nerd for my entire life I totally get that many of us are far more introverted than others and thus find this situation easier to cope with) is that for a huge proportion of people, life without mass gatherings is genuinely a life not worth living. Maybe it's because some people need a lot of background noise to drown out their inner demons. Maybe it's because some people don't have as many close friends as others and need the experience of a crowd in order to compensate. Maybe it's because some people have never known any other way of socialising since they were young.

    Whatever the reason, the bottom line is that there are people - and I know some of them, so I can say this with 100% certainty - for whom an indefinite ban on mass gatherings, as has been either deliberately or inadvertently raised as a genuine possibility by the media over the last month or so, will fundamentally result in a "f*ck this, life is going to be sh!t from here on out and I'm not bothered sticking with it" mentality.

    That isn't hyperbole - I've caught myself feeling like this several times since the idea of quasi-permanent social distancing started being raised and I've had to seriously catch myself. I'm lucky though in that I survived a brush with suicidal ideation in my early 20s (when I say ideation I don't mean the vague ruminating kind, I mean coming within a hair's breadth of actually going through with it and surviving honestly by the grace of God, happening to get a random phone call which interrupted me in what I was about to do) and as such, I have a very specific set of coping mechanisms and internal dialogue with myself which I use to talk myself down from such thoughts. What's alarming is that I haven't had to call these into action since that horrible night in 2011. They've been deeply buried inside my psyche for almost ten years. But the suggestion of social distancing being a permanent reality (and thus, by extension, the thought of never getting to sing my heart out in a gigantic crowd of similarly singing people) was more than enough to dig that sh!t up from where I'd buried it.

    I have those coping mechanisms from when I felt like this before, so I know I'll survive the current lockdown. I know of many people who never faced this in their lives and are genuinely scared at where their thoughts have been leading them over the last month. I know this because I've been relatively open about my prior experience over the last year and thus people are comfortable texting or calling me to talk about this where they might otherwise hesitate. And I can tell you for a fact that it's been the idea of "mass vaccination by Autumn, yet we still need a lockdown in Winter and "well into next year" -> mass vaccination doesn't solve this -> we might never get to dance again until we're f*cking middle aged" which has directly precipitated that sentiment.

    I'm a musician and I grew up surrounded by musicians, so naturally my friend group skews overwhelmingly extroverted - the kind of people I mentioned above who need crowded dancefloors and mosh pits in order to feel alive. And all of us were more than capable of tolerating this quarantine situation for as long as it took to achieve mass vaccination. What isn't ok is the idea that even after mass vaccination, this "new normal" won't go away, and the one thing which makes life worth living for us will never return.

    Whether intentionally or inadvertently, that's the conclusion many are drawing from the government and the media's messaging over the last several weeks. And you can tell us we're misinterpreting things or misremembering things, but I think the bottom line is that once such "misinterpretation" is applying to dozens upon dozens of people, not just a few outliers, it's an indication that either the messaging from those in charge has been sh!te, or that they've left so many gaps and vacuums in their discourse that peoples' minds are having to fill in the blanks on their own. And just like watching a horror film, when one is already in a heightened state of anxiety, one's mind will tend to fill those vacuums with worst case scenarios - indeed, this psychological device has been employed by writers in the horror genre since time immemorial, and is one of the reasons many horror movies and stories which never directly show you the monster tend to scare people a lot more effectively than those which eventually have a big reveal.

    What I'm basically saying is that we eventually need to have a conversation about balancing the risk of death by COVID outbreak and balancing the risk of death by loneliness-induced suicide. We cannot countenance this "only if this or that" conversation - we need to publicly acknowledge that eventually, mass gatherings must return, COVID risk or not, ineffective vaccines or not, etc, because without them, people will die from another equally potent epidemic.

    Right now, the national discourse is skewed far too much in the direction of "as long as COVID remains a threat, we can't gather - and that has no end date whatsoever". We need to have a conversation with the balance of "Eventually, we cannot countenance banning people from gathering anymore, even if we've thrown everything including the kitchen sink at suppressing the pandemic and it hasn't worked". That needs to be acknowledged in the public discourse. Right now, it isn't being, and the fact that it isn't being is causing an unimaginable wave of existential dread among those many, many young people I've alluded to, for whom a life without crowded spaces is a living death.

    Eventually, we have to be able to have a conversation around "even if the vaccines don't work and covid is still with us, there's some kind of cut-off point at which we have to allow people to socialise again". That's all I've been saying. The current discourse of "some undefined and vaguely explained date months or years after mass vaccination" is unpalatable to many people and is running the serious risk of causing a cascading series of mental health breakdowns. And folks here can accuse me of being hyperbolic in saying this, all I can say in response is that I know my sh!t for the reasons I've outlined in this post. It's not a theory, it's a fact.

    The current discourse is already causing a slide into extreme depression and hopelessness among many young people in that extroverted bracket, and something needs to change fairly rapidly about how those in charge are talking about the future, or they are going to end up killing people. It's as simple as that.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 18,992 ✭✭✭✭gozunda


    Fair answers, and no I do not.

    I do, however, believe that a point will come at which for the sake of not just the economy but the nation's mental health, we will have to make a judgment call on this - and I personally believe that that point is going to arrive before the end of this year. I certainly don't believe that two full years of that kind of lockdown, as has been recently raised as a possibility by Leo and others, should be countenanced at all. I think that's fundamentally where we differ.

    I'm saying all of this as somebody who has close family and friends who are severely immunocompromised, by the way. Anyone suggesting that I'm taking this lightly couldn't be more wrong, myself and my family have been overly cautious about COVID since literally the first case was reported in Ireland (close family member's doctor told him that he'd be advised to get out ahead of this before things got bad) so I very much take it seriously and understand the risks.

    However, I also understand the serious risks to mental health which come from having the only sources of happiness taken away from people, and for many, many people, being surrounded by people is that source. Therefore I believe in balance on this, and I don't believe "however long it takes" is an acceptable answer. At some point, we have to talk about balancing the risk of COVID outbreaks leading to death by COVID, and existential misery leading to death by suicide. That's all I've been saying pretty much all along.

    I think what many here don't understand (and I get this, having been a full-on internet nerd for my entire life I totally get that many of us are far more introverted than others and thus find this situation easier to cope with) is that for a huge proportion of people, life without mass gatherings is genuinely a life not worth living. Maybe it's because some people need a lot of background noise to drown out their inner demons. Maybe it's because some people don't have as many close friends as others and need the experience of a crowd in order to compensate. Maybe it's because some people have never known any other way of socialising since they were young.

    Whatever the reason, the bottom line is that there are people - and I know some of them, so I can say this with 100% certainty - for whom an indefinite ban on mass gatherings, as has been either deliberately or inadvertently raised as a genuine possibility by the media over the last month or so, will fundamentally result in a "f*ck this, life is going to be sh!t from here on out and I'm not bothered sticking with it" mentality.

    That isn't hyperbole - I've caught myself feeling like this several times since the idea of quasi-permanent social distancing started being raised and I've had to seriously catch myself. I'm lucky though in that I survived a brush with suicidal ideation in my early 20s (when I say ideation I don't mean the vague ruminating kind, I mean coming within a hair's breadth of actually going through with it and surviving honestly by the grace of God, happening to get a random phone call which interrupted me in what I was about to do) and as such, I have a very specific set of coping mechanisms and internal dialogue with myself which I use to talk myself down from such thoughts. What's alarming is that I haven't had to call these into action since that horrible night in 2011. They've been deeply buried inside my psyche for almost ten years. But the suggestion of social distancing being a permanent reality (and thus, by extension, the thought of never getting to sing my heart out in a gigantic crowd of similarly singing people) was more than enough to dig that sh!t up from where I'd buried it.

    I have those coping mechanisms from when I felt like this before, so I know I'll survive the current lockdown. I know of many people who never faced this in their lives and are genuinely scared at where their thoughts have been leading them over the last month. I know this because I've been relatively open about my prior experience over the last year and thus people are comfortable texting or calling me to talk about this where they might otherwise hesitate. And I can tell you for a fact that it's been the idea of "mass vaccination by Autumn, yet we still need a lockdown in Winter and "well into next year" -> mass vaccination doesn't solve this -> we might never get to dance again until we're f*cking middle aged" which has directly precipitated that sentiment.

    I'm a musician and I grew up surrounded by musicians, so naturally my friend group skews overwhelmingly extroverted - the kind of people I mentioned above who need crowded dancefloors and mosh pits in order to feel alive. And all of us were more than capable of tolerating this quarantine situation for as long as it took to achieve mass vaccination. What isn't ok is the idea that even after mass vaccination, this "new normal" won't go away, and the one thing which makes life worth living for us will never return.

    Whether intentionally or inadvertently, that's the conclusion many are drawing from the government and the media's messaging over the last several weeks. And you can tell us we're misinterpreting things or misremembering things, but I think the bottom line is that once such "misinterpretation" is applying to dozens upon dozens of people, not just a few outliers, it's an indication that either the messaging from those in charge has been sh!te, or that they've left so many gaps and vacuums in their discourse that peoples' minds are having to fill in the blanks on their own. And just like watching a horror film, when one is already in a heightened state of anxiety, one's mind will tend to fill those vacuums with worst case scenarios - indeed, this psychological device has been employed by writers in the horror genre since time immemorial, and is one of the reasons many horror movies and stories which never directly show you the monster tend to scare people a lot more effectively than those which eventually have a big reveal.

    What I'm basically saying is that we eventually need to have a conversation about balancing the risk of death by COVID outbreak and balancing the risk of death by loneliness-induced suicide. We cannot countenance this "only if this or that" conversation - we need to publicly acknowledge that eventually, mass gatherings must return, COVID risk or not, ineffective vaccines or not, etc, because without them, people will die from another equally potent epidemic.

    Right now, the national discourse is skewed far too much in the direction of "as long as COVID remains a threat, we can't gather - and that has no end date whatsoever". We need to have a conversation with the balance of "Eventually, we cannot countenance banning people from gathering anymore, even if we've thrown everything including the kitchen sink at suppressing the pandemic and it hasn't worked". That needs to be acknowledged in the public discourse. Right now, it isn't being, and the fact that it isn't being is causing an unimaginable wave of existential dread among those many, many young people I've alluded to, for whom a life without crowded spaces is a living death.

    Eventually, we have to be able to have a conversation around "even if the vaccines don't work and covid is still with us, there's some kind of cut-off point at which we have to allow people to socialise again". That's all I've been saying. The current discourse of "some undefined and vaguely explained date months or years after mass vaccination" is unpalatable to many people and is running the serious risk of causing a cascading series of mental health breakdowns. And folks here can accuse me of being hyperbolic in saying this, all I can say in response is that I know my sh!t for the reasons I've outlined in this post. It's not a theory, it's a fact.

    The current discourse is already causing a slide into extreme depression and hopelessness among many young people in that extroverted bracket, and something needs to change fairly rapidly about how those in charge are talking about the future, or they are going to end up killing people. It's as simple as that.

    Not to pick any issue with your own personal experience of the Pandemic to date. They are yours and completely valid. If its any consolation - I don't know anyone who has found the last year easy or on whom it hasn't taken its toll.

    For myself - those who are in the main making claims 'we will be in lockdown forever' or wtte are those who are using that idea to demand we "open up now".

    As to the the media, I've found a lot of the headlines are easily dismissed as hyperbole and much is mainly conjecture especially considering we are only at the beginning of our vaccination programme.

    It remains most other countries with some exceptions are at more of less the same point in this journey. And not that we should look to them to do what and when - rather we can view them as fellow travellers at this point in time. Young people are not stupid - they know what the likley consequences if not for themselves then for others.

    It may be somewhat trite but the saying about the darkest hour is before the dawn is more than apt at this time imo.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 220 ✭✭Responder XY


    Categorising the reaction to covid as people afraid to have adult conversations about death is a fairly significant misunderstanding of the problem.

    The reason we've been social distancing for the last year, is to prevent the unnecessary death that would come from hospitals and ICU's being packed out whilst medical staff are forced to take sick absence.

    It's a big problem when a cancer patient can't get treated or a person involved in a motorcycle accident can't get a place in ICU. You can throw out platitudes like "that's life", but in 1st world democracies, that's not life. If you are in a car accident, you should be able to get treatment and if you are denied that essential life saving help, societal trust degrades.

    There has most certainly a massive amount of immaturity to the general reaction when it comes to having conversations about death and sickness. Most people are interested in the daily death and case numbers. 

    Hospitalisation numbers are never the main headline or focus (they should be though.)

    You are completely right to say it's not OK that the cancer patient or Road Traffic accident victim may have to do without care if their bed is taken up by a Covid case. But as an argument for lockdowns and restrictions, this made sense 12 months ago. Now we are a year in. I know health care capacity can't be magiced up, but our new normal calls for significantly more capacity and we've done very little to prepare for that.

    We've put all our eggs in the vaccine basket. I hope it pays off, and we should give it a chance to work by not coming out of restrictions too fast. But if it doesn't work, the general population should not be made to suffer for any longer due to failure of leadership in this country to put in place the capacity required. 


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,032 ✭✭✭✭bucketybuck


    gozunda wrote: »
    For myself - those who are in the main making claims 'we will be in lockdown forever' or wtte are those who are using that idea to demand we "open up now".

    I believe that what they actually want is the government to recognise and properly discuss the concept of "living with covid", instead of basically avoiding the question like they have done to date.

    This government has done nothing except hide its head in the sand hoping that covid would go away, it has improved nothing, answered nothing, implemented nothing, a year later and still we have no response to covid other than lock our doors and hide.

    People would not be discussing "lockdown forever" if our leaders had shown any inclination to an alternative.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,798 ✭✭✭✭hatrickpatrick


    I believe that what they actually want is the government to recognise and properly discuss the concept of "living with covid", instead of basically avoiding the question like they have done to date.

    This government has done nothing except hide its head in the sand hoping that covid would go away, it has improved nothing, answered nothing, implemented nothing, a year later and still we have no response to covid other than lock our doors and hide.

    People would not be discussing "lockdown forever" if our leaders had shown any inclination to an alternative.

    This, exactly. The suggestion of social distancing even after mass vaccination and "well into next year" implies that "living with covid" is somehow synonymous with "never having a proper party or night out again". It implies a willingness on the part of government to take the view that if we can't eradicate the threat from COVID through vaccination or other measures, we can eradicate social outlets, and that this is an acceptable paradigm for those in power. That's what's caused so much fear among young people over the last month - the idea that we have to wait and see if we can reopen social outlets after vaccination implies the possibility that we can't. And for most people, the possibility that we can never socialise without keeping 2m from other people again is something which should not be discussed as a theoretical reality which we might actually implement.


  • Posts: 745 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    "Society and conversation, therefore, are the most powerful remedies for restoring the mind to its tranquillity, if, at any time, it has unfortunately lost it ; as well as the best preservatives of that equal and happy temper, which is so necessary to self-satisfaction and enjoyment. Men of retirement and speculation, who are apt to sit brooding at home over either grief or resentment, though they may often have more humanity, more generosity, and a nicer sense of honour, yet seldom possess that equality of temper which is so common among men of the world. "
    Adam Smith, 1759

    Man is a social creature. Isolation drives him nuts. The sooner we can get back to socialising the better.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,798 ✭✭✭✭hatrickpatrick


    gozunda wrote: »
    It may be somewhat trite but the saying about the darkest hour is before the dawn is more than apt at this time imo.

    I fully agree with this. My issue is that the messaging from government and from the kind of extremists RTE tends to entertain has been the opposite of this lately - more along the lines of "dawn is only a possibility, we're willing to accept remaining in darkness indefinitely as an acceptable policy decision if the vaccine doesn't bring the dawn". That's something the vast majority of people simply won't accept. That's what is implied by the idea of maintaining restrictions well into next year even if we have mass vaccination by Autumn - because it implies that if mass vaccination doesn't result in a retreat of the virus, the government is willing to condemn us to this living death in perpetuity, without any other options being put on the table.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 14,353 ✭✭✭✭jimmycrackcorm


    Are people actually fretting about under 18's been vaccinated. Most of them don't even know they have Covid or might have a slight cough or slight fatigue and that's it.

    Once the over 70's are all vacinated it's time to go to Level 2 and no reason why the country shouldn't be fully open when everyone over 55 has go the vacinne.

    The actual KPI will be around hospital admissions. It's not just over 70's that are affected, they're just the group that is the most susceptible to death as an outcome. But there will need to be a reduction of serious admissions to hospitals, otherwise, that will overwhelm our health system also.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 940 ✭✭✭ujjjjjjjjj


    The British government has made it clear that British society will have to learn to live with Covid once the lockdown ends and will have to tolerate a level of hospitalisations and deaths.

    The Irish government hasn't made that jump yet and that is what the problem is.

    This virus once it became clear it was endemic was never going to go away and herd immunity (be that natural or vaccine or both) was always what was going to happen.

    If the Chinese borders had been closed last Jan it might have not gone globally endemic but we are so far past that point now it is irrelevant.

    The national discourse has to move to a line in the sand policy which clearly tells people that once we reach a certain point in the vaccination program we will fully and entirely open up. There comes a point where you have to say we have done all we can (and this will be that line in the sand vaccine point).

    Without this there is no end in sight but one thing everyone has to wake up to is that we simply have to accept that this virus will continue to make some people sick for the foreseeable future but we must get on with life. Failure to accept this is child like fantasy stuff and so incredibly naive.

    Time for our health advisors and politicians to grow up and act like adults.

    This is an endemic virus just like the flu and common colds are endemic.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 18,992 ✭✭✭✭gozunda


    I believe that what they actually want is the government to recognise and properly discuss the concept of "living with covid", instead of basically avoiding the question like they have done to date.

    This government has done nothing except hide its head in the sand hoping that covid would go away, it has improved nothing, answered nothing, implemented nothing, a year later and still we have no response to covid other than lock our doors and hide.

    People would not be discussing "lockdown forever" if our leaders had shown any inclination to an alternative.

    I'd disagree. Most of those demanding 'open up now' seem to want just that and damn the consequences.

    I'm no fan of politicians in general but they present lot are damned if they do and damned if they don't. That said I don't envy them the job of trying to deal with a highly dynamic infection. Currently the priority is getting numbers down (which that seems to be going the right way atm) and getting vaccination numbers up - ditto with known issues of promised supplies not being delivered. So we are where we're at.

    Its evident that once the full vaccination schedule is met or as is close to as possible - then we will be much better able to understand what "living with covid" will be like. Until that point we are all obliged to do what we can to cover our arsess to keep infection rates down. I don't envy their job at all trying to keep everyone happy.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 727 ✭✭✭C.O.Y.B.I.B


    The actual KPI will be around hospital admissions. It's not just over 70's that are affected, they're just the group that is the most susceptible to death as an outcome. But there will need to be a reduction of serious admissions to hospitals, otherwise, that will overwhelm our health system also.

    Surely Level2 by mid June brings us back to where we were that time last year , but with the added bonus of a lot people vaccinated , particularly the "vulnerable". I'd be hopeful that we would have staycations , pubs and restaurants with table service , kids sports activities etc... All operating by mid June as the were last year. However I would expect masks to still be in play , sanitising equipment for sports , no spectators , people spread out in pubs , no large groups etc....


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,308 ✭✭✭Irish Stones


    This, exactly. The suggestion of social distancing even after mass vaccination and "well into next year" implies that "living with covid" is somehow synonymous with "never having a proper party or night out again". It implies a willingness on the part of government to take the view that if we can't eradicate the threat from COVID through vaccination or other measures, we can eradicate social outlets, and that this is an acceptable paradigm for those in power. That's what's caused so much fear among young people over the last month - the idea that we have to wait and see if we can reopen social outlets after vaccination implies the possibility that we can't. And for most people, the possibility that we can never socialise without keeping 2m from other people again is something which should not be discussed as a theoretical reality which we might actually implement.


    I'm one of those who believe the bold part will be the new life we'll live.
    I might sound excessive or pessimistic, but it is what I believe, and nothing can make me think differently, no matter how hard they try.
    I hope I'm very wrong.


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