When will it all end?

patnor1011 wrote: »

They already do. My old neighbors visit each other regularly. If the weather is nice you do have 5-10 of them happily chatting together. None of them bothers with any distancing or masks.
Lol I do have neighbors both of them working for HSE as nurses and they have friends and family at their house every day. They used to have family barbecue during the first lockdown. And ever since...
Guards at a checkpoint waving you with a smile and have a nice day. If it rains they just sit in a car. Only people deep in covid end of the world religion think that people follow restrictions. Vast majority stopped long time ago and quite rightly so. We need social contact and interaction with others.
You must be not quite right in the head if you really followed all of it to the letter.

Even NPHET have accepted people wont adhere to the restrictions with Glynn asking people who intend meeting to do so outdoors.


Even Glynn has accepted hes losing the battle.

Doctor Jimbob wrote: »

Media and social media are pointing the finger at people for breaking the restrictions instead of at government for imposing restrictions for too long. It was acknowledged last March/April that harsh restrictions should be temporary (no more than a few weeks). That seems to have been forgotten this year. Do people not remember how long a year felt when they were in their late teens/early 20s? Is it any wonder a lot of people in that age group have had enough?

Of course some people will break restrictions. That’s a given. We ban theft but that doesn’t mean nobody will ever steal. It just gives a mechanism to deal with breaches of the rule.

If not through restrictions, how would you suggest the government gets the numbers down over the last year? Take the post Christmas period as an example. How should they have dealt with it?

Deleted User wrote: »

Can you show the evidence you have that they would have being lost?

Good to see you care about those low value people.

It's basically what the CB have stated.

These job losses are not a result of the lockdowns, but more the result of the pandemic itself.
People have dramatically changed how they work and how they shop. This is going to have consequences for footfall in traditional customer facing businesses in cities and towns.

It was all happening prior to the pandemic, but covid accelerated it to a huge extent.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Of course some people will break restrictions. That’s a given. We ban theft but that doesn’t mean nobody will ever steal. It just gives a mechanism to deal with breaches of the rule.

If not through restrictions, how would you suggest the government gets the numbers down over the last year? Take the post Christmas period as an example. How should they have dealt with it?

It's also a given that the longer restrictions last, the more people will break them. At what point does it become a failure of policy rather than a failure of the people?

Post Christmas, I think harsh restrictions were the correct choice. If anything, I think they should have been even harsher, with more strict enforcement but, and this is the key part, for a shorter period of time. Short, harsh, proper lockdowns with periods of relative relaxation in between would be preferable to the not really lockdown but it might as well be for the majority of people we've been in for the majority of the last 6 months.

Doctor Jimbob wrote: »

It's also a given that the longer restrictions last, the more people will break them. At what point does it become a failure of policy rather than a failure of the people?

Post Christmas, I think harsh restrictions were the correct choice. If anything, I think they should have been even harsher, with more strict enforcement but, and this is the key part, for a shorter period of time. Short, harsh, proper lockdowns with periods of relative relaxation in between would be preferable to the not really lockdown but it might as well be for the majority of people we've been in for the majority of the last 6 months.

Harsh lockdown was not the plan. Proactive suppression was the methodology in play, but the government made a balls of it over Christmas leaving us in this predicament.

There are no good options available to us at the moment. I think what we're currently doing is close enough to the least worst option.

TonyMaloney wrote: »

Harsh lockdown was not the plan. Proactive suppression was the methodology in play, but the government made a balls of it over Christmas leaving us in this predicament.

There are no good options available to us at the moment. I think what we're currently doing is close enough to the least worst option.

I agree they made a balls of things over Christmas to be fair. For all I want to see a faster opening now, I also think the speed and extent of our opening at Christmas was a mistake.

Doctor Jimbob wrote: »

It's also a given that the longer restrictions last, the more people will break them. At what point does it become a failure of policy rather than a failure of the people?

Post Christmas, I think harsh restrictions were the correct choice. If anything, I think they should have been even harsher, with more strict enforcement but, and this is the key part, for a shorter period of time. Short, harsh, proper lockdowns with periods of relative relaxation in between would be preferable to the not really lockdown but it might as well be for the majority of people we've been in for the majority of the last 6 months.

Given that the post Christmas lockdown was necessary from just a few weeks of relaxed restrictions, you’re talking about a few weeks off from restrictions which creates the conditions for necessary lockdown (harsh lockdown for a month or whatever you’d suggest is reasonable) then lift lots of restrictions for a few weeks and back to necessary harsh lockdown. And that’s assuming that very harsh lockdown can get the numbers down in that short time.

You might think that’s a better system, but it’s not a whole lot better than the system we have. Businesses wouldn’t be happy with unpredictable opening and closing. It’s probably a case of far away hills are greener. We even had loads of posters claiming they’d prefer the curfew system in France. I can absolutely bet my life that those people would not be happy with a 6pm curfew system. They might be slightly more or less happy, but not very different. But, far away hills...

The fact that the weather is warming means that we can afford to have more people flout the rules on occasion and still keep transmissions relatively stable and hopefully drop ICU numbers and hopefully have as many adults as possible vaccinated by winter. Then hope for the best next winter.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Given that the post Christmas lockdown was necessary from just a few weeks of relaxed restrictions, you’re talking about a few weeks off from restrictions which creates the conditions for necessary lockdown (harsh lockdown for a month or whatever you’d suggest is reasonable) then lift lots of restrictions for a few weeks and back to necessary harsh lockdown. And that’s assuming that very harsh lockdown can get the numbers down in that short time.

Those few weeks involved a wildly irresponsible relaxation of restrictions. It should be no surprise that they resulted in a huge spike in cases. When I'm talking about a relaxation I'm not talking about anything approaching what we had at Christmas.

You might think that’s a better system, but it’s not a whole lot better than the system we have. Businesses wouldn’t be happy with unpredictable opening and closing. It’s probably a case of far away hills are greener. We even had loads of posters claiming they’d prefer the curfew system in France. I can absolutely bet my life that those people would not be happy with a 6pm curfew system. They might be slightly more or less happy, but not very different. But, far away hills...

Maybe not for you. For someone in a new job in a county 5 hours from my family and friends with only my partner for company, our current system is becoming unbearable. I can't imagine what it's like for those living alone. Businesses mightn't be happy, but some of them would certainly be happier with opening and closing rather than our current stay closed for an undefined period of time model.

The fact that the weather is warming means that we can afford to have more people flout the rules on occasion and still keep transmissions relatively stable and hopefully drop ICU numbers and hopefully have as many adults as possible vaccinated by winter. Then hope for the best next winter.

I agree with that for the most part, but I'd go further and say as the weather gets better, why does outdoor hospitality not seem to be under consideration? There's little evidence that significant spread occurs outdoors.

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Do what kind of restrictions should they have imposed during the relaxed periods between harsher lockdowns?

Is there any chance of you imposing this level of scrutiny on the decisions government make?

Parachutes wrote: »

It ends when we don’t comply anymore. Scores of people have been partying in parks around England over the week but there was simply too many people for the police to do anything but point the finger and give a half shrug.

Things are moving in the right direction. I’ve been back and forth between Ireland and the UK since the start of this and people who were very afraid and followed restrictions to a tee during the first lockdown couldn’t give a fiddlers anymore. Apart from mandatory mask wearing in shops, very few are going along hook, line and sinker anymore. Especially with the good weather. Guards can’t be arsed enforcing it either.

All pubs and business could open tomorrow and that would be it. This farce of a media scare would be over.

Things are going in the right direction in people’s minds. They are starting to become wise to it.

Yep, all just open with no public liability insurance, what could go wrong......

Parachutes wrote: »

It would be reinstated fairly quick I can tell you......

Yeah, cause insurance companies are notorious for paying out when they don't have to.

sabat wrote: »

Yet another poster who joined in 2020, has no other interests than covid19, and writes in a style reminiscent of a government wonk. I can actually visualise someone in a conference room pointing at a slideshow saying this sentence.

Yeah, I'm a covid nerd. So what?
I know the data and I know what I'm talking about.

If you've like to have a conversation with someone that's misinformed, be my guest. There's plenty around.

Lundstram wrote: »

"Mobility data"

Another buzz word made up by people who like to fingerwag at the so called selfish pricks having the cheek to leave their homes.

It's two words, and it's used to describe data derived from the location of people's phones.

I'm not using it to "fingerwag". The opposite in fact. I'm saying that compliance is still pretty good.

Once again, Ireland's vaccine supply has been revised downwards, Minister Donnolly told the Dail that supply for April would be slightly under a million doses, when questioned further the figure became 860,000. Thats including the j+j supply, at this rate we will be going back to give the very elderly a booster shot before we are fully vaccinated.