Will there be another lockdown?

Wear a gas mask?

Leo's thoughts on a potential lockdown: can't be ruled out but doesn't think we'll need one.

Looks like Leo is rolling out the script from October 2020. 😀

A lockdown would be a disaster on many fronts but mentally and emotionally it would be a huge blow to the country. We've all by and large put in a massive effort, there's been enormous vaccine take up and a massive effort put in overall. A lockdown would signal that it was all a waste of time, that we can't get out of this and you could see large parts of the populace just giving up.

You won't get anywhere near 93% of adults to queue up for another vaccine anyway and especially if we have another lockdown. Belief in the vaccines as a way out of this would be shot to pieces.

Stephen Donnelly: there will not be another lockdown for Christmas

Loads of Irish: ah fcuk, probably going to be a lockdown for Christmas

It's a stupid question anyway. Why on earth would and decent policy maker rule out an option that could be needed.

There will be a lockdown of some sort. Just take a look at what happened in Wales today.

More open than us?

Personally I can't see another Lockdown but can sense either a roll back or perhaps re introduction of some restrictions. I'm not advocating anything just expressing an opinion based on what I'm observing.

The Narrative from NPHET, MM,Leo and Donnelly, whilst perplexing seems to have moved on to a "nothing to see here approach " with only one primary concern, how the HSE will cope, seems to me the question has been asked and answered on numerous occasions. ( I apportion no blame to front line staff)

There's been some quite extraordinary deflection attempts lately, it's the unvaccinated, it's Eastern Europeans etc, it would be amusing if not so utterly offensive and absurd. My own humble opinion is its waning of vacinnes protection that is at play here and Gov had only one weapon in its armoury, the Vacinnes with absolutely no Plan B , for the record I'm absolutely pro Vacinne but respect personal choice.

I'm sensing ground hog day approaching, a sense we've been here before. I will admit to being surprised at the reopening of night clubs and more alarmed at the approach or lack of it prior to reopening. Some of the back and forth, utterly absurd rules, even the creation of a new concept "Social Distance Queuing " just completely ridiculous, indeed I'd ask, why if little concern, all these unworkable notions.

Reopening, Particularly with cases so high seems extraordinary. The oddest thing being, we've been hovering around 1000 new cases daily for weeks before night life re opened, would another month or two not have been a reasonable sacrifice with appropriate supports continuing for those in this sector.

This mornings examiners headline is a little worrying, Waterford with the highest percentage of vacinated, Shockingly high numbers, Kerry, particularly Dingle went for months with practically no new cases.

Not at all sure were this is going but I'm not entirely confident we won't see a roll back .

If Dingle was somehow separated from the rest of the country you might have a point but it's not and by all accounts had a roaring summer with staycationers and this despite Fungi's departure. Dingle, like the rest of the country has been out of lockdown for months.

I lived and work there for 7 years , it's not somehow separated from the rest of the world.

Good.

Only way out of this is to let it go through the population while most are vaccinated.

Well said, I genuinely don't believe there'll be a return to were schools were and closures , there seems a momentum to have contract tracing return and antigen testing to start albeit a little vague in terms of how. I can't comment on the ins and outs of both measures as I'm not a parent but know many and I know full well what parents and indeed children went through, there's a determined effort to keep schools open and that's positive.

I think a somewhat overlooked aspect here is how another lockdown in Ireland would be viewed abroad.

Firstly, it would reflect extremely badly on Ireland, assuming we were the only European country with a high vaccination rate to return to lockdown. It would look truly awful to an outsider that a country with 92% of adults vaccinated cannot cope to the extent that it has to return to lockdown.

And what kind of a message would it send to people in countries with low vaccination rates (and worse healthcare systems)? The vaccine hesitant in these countries are being encouraged to get vaccinated to go back to normal. However if they see Ireland, not only one of the most vaccinated countries in the world but also one of the richest returning to lockdown, what kind of message would that send? I think a lot of people wouldn't bother getting vaccinated and would you blame them?