Covid 19 Part XXXV-956,720 ROI (5,952 deaths) 452,946 NI (3,002 deaths) (08/01) Read OP

I seriously doubt it will come to that. More likely resources just spread thinly resulting in slightly worse care and more knackered staff.

So the hypothetical choice is: would you rather be cared for by slightly fewer COVID free healthcare workers or the normal number of possibly infectious ones?

FWIW in reading on mask standards I can't find much about protecting people other than the wearer. My FFP3 masks have exhalation valves and the FFP2 ones tend to break the seal during exhalation. The only type that are fully symmetrical are the bulky respirators.

Genuine question, would you have seen this as a problem pre-Covid? The standard flu is pretty good at killing the sick and elderly and it’s common for healthy people to have minor symptoms and still go to work, etc.

I completely get where you’re coming from and in a perfect world I’d agree but it’s a trade-off: either we have massive staff shortages to reduce the possibility of spread of an illness almost everyone has been vaccinated for (i.e. it’s not novel anymore, is more minor with this variant, and therefore not as much of a threat as it was two years ago) which will almost certainly result in reduced quality of care and deaths or we allow for a higher level of risk with regard to spread but maintain sufficient levels of staff.

Neither option is without risks but I don’t personally see why one would think that creating the staff shortage would be the better option.

What are ‘minor symptoms’ of ‘flu?

Also, I’ve had ‘flu 3 times in my life. I could hardly make the jacks never mind work.

I don’t think you really addressed my point. The choice we have is sufficient or insufficient staffing levels of nurses and doctors to treat patients. If we take an abundance of caution approach it will result in less spread of the coronavirus but will definitely reduce quality of care and potentially lead to deaths.

In my opinion it’s better to have close-contacts and potentially infectious medical professionals taking care of me than someone who hasn’t slept for 24 hours because they’re working triple shifts to fill in the gap. Plus, everyone is wearing masks in a controlled medical environment. They are likely MUCH more effective there than in our day-to-day experience.

It's possible to have asymptomatic or cold-like symptoms from the flu: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2014/03/17/290878964/even-if-you-dont-have-symptoms-you-may-still-have-the-flu?t=1641203690310

That solves nothing

We don't disagree on the fundamental point! That is definitely the best option. I guess I've just jumped straight to the pragmatic part. Too many people are out as close contacts or are completely asymptomatic and we know it's going to get worse. We have a strain of coronavirus in circulation that no longer has a linear relationship from cases to severe disease which is probably as good as things are going to get. The small tweaks made this week to the isolation rules will not save us from crushing staff shortages. I think a pragmatic approach is warranted and frankly is the one we've been using our whole lives. We were not regularly testing staff for flu pre-covid although it's known to be spreadable while asymptomatic or with minor symptoms (as you can see from the link I posted a couple of posts up). I think we are at risk of making perfect the enemy of good here.

My son (18) double vaxxed tested positive for covid last week on antigen. We are awaiting results of pcr which will probably be positive. The thing is it’s 11 days since his first symptoms but an antigen this morning is still showing positive. He wants to go to the gym but is afraid to as he doesn’t want to infect anyone. Does he have to wait for a negative antigen ? I feel for him because he hasn’t left the house in nearly two weeks.

there was 118 positive tests in hospital yesterday so a proportion of them are surely incidental given the high community spread

Private hospitals may be needed if hospitalisations keep rising.

It appears now that the notion of closing anything is off the agenda. The public doesn't want that.

Delta spreads 50% faster than Alpha, which was 50% more contagious than the original strain. Omicron, according to some studies, spreads up to 70 times faster so it means it can get to more people more quickly and viruses tend not to survive all that well outside a host body.

Here's a Twitter thread with some thoughts on Omicron