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Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

Wilf said:
Leadership is a word I keep coming back to. It's not the way I want to look at the world and I'd love to have seen communities and workers in particular industries getting a grip on the pandemic strategy. However we live in a world where that wasn't going to be likely or easy. But as we live in their world, a world where government's have that responsibility, where government is precisely the organising power, leadership is the thing they are supposed to be doing. It's an obvious point to make, but johnson's gang have failed in just about every aspect of the leadership test. No vision, no effective co-ordination, no wartime style marshalling of national resources. Ideologically unwilling to work with unions, but equally unable to work effectively with the private sector, just a shitty croneyism. And then there's the time lag approach where every decision is made too late, chaotic decision making around schools, failure to test people coming through the airports, appalling messaging, Christmas superspreading, PPE, test and trace, universities giving the virus a helping hand in September, a Tier system that follows the virus rather than getting ahead of it...

EDIT: mercifully short version: they are really shit at doing government.
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It's just a game for pricks like Johnson isn't it. Get to be PM and polish the ego but no need to take it too seriously.
 
Epona said:
The Nightingale hospitals should have been opened a week or two ago using agency staff if need be (not necessarily in high risk areas, but maybe filling in so that better trained staff could be moved into critical areas) because there is already crisis in admissions in a lot of areas.

My OH had a massive asthma attack on Wednesday and I had to call an ambulance (please trust me that I do not call an ambulance on a whim, it was an emergency, his inhaler wasn't giving any relief and he was struggling to breathe) - we were EXTREMELY grateful that an ambulance arrived but it was 40 minutes which is a long time when someone is struggling to breathe - then there was no bed for him so he couldn't be admitted (which would be usual for observation overnight in this circumstance), instead he had a nebuliser on a trolley and was sent home with a prescription for oral prednisone (normally when this happens he is admitted and given IV steroids). Our local hospital was full, they took him to A&E at a different hospital.

There is already massive strain on hospitals, now is the time to open up the Nightingale units and draft in as many people as possible in nursing or auxilliary care roles. They need to stop saying they will do it if it is needed and admit that it is needed.
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There are no nursing agency staff that don't have as much work as they want, whenever and wherever they want and this has been increasingly the case for the last decade......and there is still not enough registered staff. Added that its specifically ICU trained nurses that are needed.

There are not enough trained / registered staff for the hospitals in the UK.

Its a fucking travesty and I completely agree with your sentiments Epona.
 
Going back to the schools are safe thing for a moment or two. [I think I'm repeating myself, so apologies for that]

Schools are a petri dish, a bit like cruise liners, for all manner of infections.
OH is a retired teacher, but when they were still working I dreading the first three weeks or so of every term, especially the January re-start.
Almost without fail, within those first few weeks, various coughs and colds, even 'flu-ish type infections would appear and speed their way through various classes and the especially the staff room. One of them got dubbed "start of term lurgy" - a nasty cough and sore throat were the main symptoms.

If that is the case in a "normal" year - wtf happens with the Covid-19 Pandemic virus ? Then add in this "new variant" ?

So glad OH is now retired and away from that risk ...
 
maomao said:
...he just looks like an idiot after his stuff about 'schools being safe apart from the inevitable household mixing that happens in them' the other day. Doubling down just makes the inevitable u-turn look twice as bad.
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That was really bonkers, I had to check he'd actually just said that when I heard it. It's just weird nonsense, it's like saying playing Russian Roulette is safe, except for that one bullet. (or any similar thing).
 
kalidarkone said:
There are no nursing agency staff that don't have as much work as they want, whenever and wherever they want and this has been increasingly the case for the last decade......and there is still not enough registered staff. Added that its specifically ICU trained nurses that are needed.

There are not enough trained / registered staff for the hospitals in the UK.

Its a fucking travesty and I completely agree with your sentiments Epona.
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OH is still having breathing difficulties - it is fairly low key at the moment, but when he is like this we are constantly just a short trip away from dialling 999. People die from asthma and it is fairly frightening - even at the best of times when someone is struggling with asthma you are thinking how long would an ambulance take to get here - and normally getting an ambulance and being taken to hospital that way results in the best treatment - people do still die of asthma all the time, but you know most of the time all that can be done has been done. If the hospitals are overcrowded though, what happens if an ambulance can't come here because of massive queues, what happens if he makes it to hospital and cannot get a bed and appropriate treatment because the health services are overwhelmed? And this is just the "what if" for one person who doesn't have coronavirus but regularly relies on ambulance and hospital services to save his life?

It's horrific, they should have done more to prevent spread and should be doing all they can now to increase hospital capacity - not just for covid, but for the other "normal" things like severe life-threatening asthma attacks etc.
 
danny la rouge said:
Those wondering what this refers to: No Safety No Work

It's worth remembering that the Labour Party, the unions, the well meaning players of civil society cannot be relied on to do these things for us. That notion that politics is what you wish people in authority would do for us holds us back. Politics is what we do, and only what we do changes anything for the better.

We in the ACG do a lot with the resources we have. But we can neither mobilise the working class nor do we want to. It has to mobilise itself. That’s direct action. We can only agitate, militate, discuss, make ideas and ways of connecting available. And that’s what we do. But if the class isn’t ready to run with it, we can only work to help it gain self confidence.

(*my personal take).
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redsquirrel said:
Basically if a workplace is unsafe then a worker can, legally, refuse to work until it is made safe.

Unions are legally prohibited from organising/promoting S44 as.a strategy to withdraw labour, but they can advise members on what S44 states and how they can use it. As I said on the other thread whatever the faults of the NEU (and there are plenty, danny la rouge is absolutely right that it cannot be left to the unions) it is pushing at the (legal) edge of S44 - and good on them. Hopefully other unions will follow suit.
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Thanks both. My union actually reminded its members about the fact we don't have to do things which are unsafe at the beginning of all of this, but I didn't realise S44 referred to that.

I'm returning to work tomorrow after having the last week before Xmas off, when things got/were getting a lot more serious again. Will be interesting to see whether any changes to work practices have already been made, or whether we still need to push for them.
 
S☼I said:
The
Economy
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beesonthewhatnow said:
Economy before plebs, basically.
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Of course. Well the UK ecomony must be doing well compared to other similar countries this year then.

:hmm:

*I have actually tried to read up on this, but it's a bit of a pain in the arse given the nature of the economic year, and complexities of comparison (e.g it is brexit year). The UK is doing pretty badly by real GDP though... -9.8%. Better than Spain or Italy. Worse than most countries that did well in public health terms with lockdowns. That said the US economy was at -4.3%, which compares favourably with some places that used extensive lockdowns (e.g NZ at -6.2%, Aus about the same at -4.2%). Though US of course is still more complex as you have to think about individual states etc. France is apparently exactly as shit as us economically. Germany not great at -6%. Difficult to say how those are impacted by cost of measures, both have been pretty rocky throughout, despite early promise in Germany. Sweden comparatively ok at -4.7%. Taiwan: no change, Republic of Korea: -1.9%, Japan: -5.3%, China: +1.9%, Vietnam: +1.6%, HK and singapore not great mind: -7.5% and -6% respectively.

You could spin a lot of arguments from those admittedly basic statistics. But I think it's very hard to argue that this particular method of protecting the economy was worth the death, uncertainty and general public health outcomes.

IMF chart - set year to 2020 to view current picture rather than forecasts.
 
Seriously it took 40 minutes to get an ambulance for someone with acute asthma, normally it takes 3 to 10 minutes (sadly I have a lot of experience now when it comes to calling 999)

Our ambulance crews and paramedics are absolutely amazing people, this is not their fault, it is the fault of the government for being too lax and confusing about restrictions and letting coronavirus spread instead of keeping it under control.

Then OH gets to A&E and there is no-one to treat him, this isn't the fault of our wonderful A&E staff, this is the fault of Boris and our government for being completely useless in trying to control this thing - too lax in terms of lockdown and their tier stupidity, too slow in opening the Nightingale units, had all summer to recruit more staff but god knows you can't offer more money to recruit nurses

It is a complete shit show and more people will die than just the folks who get Covid, there is a massive knock-on effect in terms of healthcare provision and frontline A&E services.
 
Epona said:
OH is still having breathing difficulties - it is fairly low key at the moment, but when he is like this we are constantly just a short trip away from dialling 999. People die from asthma and it is fairly frightening - even at the best of times when someone is struggling with asthma you are thinking how long would an ambulance take to get here - and normally getting an ambulance and being taken to hospital that way results in the best treatment - people do still die of asthma all the time, but you know most of the time all that can be done has been done. If the hospitals are overcrowded though, what happens if an ambulance can't come here because of massive queues, what happens if he makes it to hospital and cannot get a bed and appropriate treatment because the health services are overwhelmed? And this is just the "what if" for one person who doesn't have coronavirus but regularly relies on ambulance and hospital services to save his life?

It's horrific, they should have done more to prevent spread and should be doing all they can now to increase hospital capacity - not just for covid, but for the other "normal" things like severe life-threatening asthma attacks etc.
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The closest I have got to the situation you are describing is when mdk1 was little like 2 -3 yrs old and I would hear that distinctive asthma cough in the middle of the night and rush up to the children's, where he would be seen and have a bed straight away. It was terrifying. So I can only imagine what it is like to not be sure or confident that your oh will be treated.
 
kalidarkone said:
The closest I have got to the situation you are describing is when mdk1 was little like 2 -3 yrs old and I would hear that distinctive asthma cough in the middle of the night and rush up to the children's, where he would be seen and have a bed straight away. It was terrifying. So I can only imagine what it is like to not be sure or confident that your oh will be treated.
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It's horrible, I know not everyone knows or has seen first hand what asthma is like and some may think it's not that serious or just do some deep breathing and it will ease up - but it isn't like that at all - it is absolutely horrific (and I can only imagine it is worse and you feel even more helpless if it is a child affected) - but to see someone struggling to breathe and going grey in the face and then starting to tinge to blue because they aren't able to get enough oxygen into their bloodstream - and they feel panic, if feels like slowly suffocating, and you are trying to keep them as calm as possible waiting for an ambulance and just hoping that they are able to stay conscious until the paramedics arrive with nebulisers and oxygen, and then (most of the time) they will be carted off to hospital - used to be I would go with him but that is not allowed now, so I just say "I love you" as he is being taken away to the ambulance and he nods because he doesn't have enough breath to speak.

Covid isn't the only killer, lack of provision and resources for treating Covid patients has a knock on effect on other people getting timely and adequate treatment too. Every death, whether it is directly from Covid, or because treatment could not be given in other situations as a knock on effect, is firmly at the government's door.

We can't always predict nature or disease, but we can come up with a response to it - and the fact that the London Ambulance Service and hospitals (and I suspect others around the country too) are under extreme stress right now is a political issue.
 
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Epona said:
It's horrible, I know not everyone knows or has seen first hand what asthma is like and some may think it's not that serious or just do some deep breathing and it will ease up - but it isn't like that at all - it is absolutely horrific (and I can only imagine it is worse and you feel even more helpless if it is a child affected) - but to see someone struggling to breathe and going grey in the face and then starting to tinge to blue because they aren't able to get enough oxygen into their bloodstream - and they feel panic, if feels like slowly suffocating, and you are trying to keep them as calm as possible waiting for an ambulance and just hoping that they are able to stay conscious until the paramedics arrive with nebulisers and oxygen, and then (most of the time) they will be carted off to hospital - used to be I would go with him but that is not allowed now, so I just say "I love you" as he is being taken away to the ambulance and he nods because he doesn't hae enough breath to speak.

Covid isn't the only killer, lack of provision and resources for treating Covid patients has a knock on effect on other people getting timely and adequate treatment too. Every death, whether it is directly from Covid, or because treatment could not be given in other situations as a knock on effect, is firmly at the government's door.

We can't always predict nature or disease, but we can come up with a response to it - and the fact that the London Ambulance Service and hospitals (and I suspect others around the country too) are under extreme stress right now is a political issue.
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Have noted before but I got asthma really badly when I was 5 or 6. My sis who became a doctor told me last year that she at first never thought asthma was serious unless someone had gone blue :eek:
 
the sending back of some kids tomorrow is a lethal show of hands. where deaths occur in those regions, people will ask "why the fuck are schools open?"

i predict a massive u turn in next 24 hours.

opening schools in low infection areas? it's almsot like they want to get those areas up to the horrendous levels of london! :facepalm:
 
BigMoaner said:
it's almsot like they want to get those areas up to the horrendous levels of london! :facepalm:
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I was going to say in response to something else, earlier, but it feels like a big problem is that thing of people thinking "we only need to take action once there is a problem", and if things seem to be relatively ok then any kind of restrictions seem unnecessary and punitive.

It's like we learned nothing from those Head and Shoulders ads :(
 
"oh, there's not a problem in that area"? Fantastic, we will open the schools and make sure they go into next week with double the numbers!
 
Now is just about the perfect moment for the that old fashioned notion of a 'labour movement' to come together and become active. Well organised workers coming together with the gig economy and with communities who are struggling. Some basic demands around safe workplaces and fully funded isolation, along with an unapologetic reaffirmation of public services. Couldn't be a better moment to point out that spiv-ocracy that passes for our government is killing us.
 
StoneRoad said:
Q - S44 of which act / CoP, please ?
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H and S at Work Regulations Act 1974.

andysays said:
I'm returning to work tomorrow after having the last week before Xmas off, when things got/were getting a lot more serious again. Will be interesting to see whether any changes to work practices have already been made, or whether we still need to push for them.
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You are probably already aware of what I'm about to say andysays but I'll just post it for any lurkers.

While section 44 does allow a worker to withdraw their labour for an unsafe workplace, that does not mean that a worker can simply state that a workplace is unsafe and refuse to work, the employer can challenge the claim that the workplace is unsafe (for example in my workplace the employer specifically stated that post their COVID changes they would fight any worker invoking S44). To get to the level where S44 can be invoke can be quite a high barrier, anyone who is thinking of going down this route should talk to their union and/or colleagues first.

Also, as always, the political situation matters even more than the legal, if everyone in a workplace invokes S44 then you are probably in a better situation than only one worker doing so, even if the legal case is better in the latter.
 
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I hope my own union (UCU) is watching the schools and thinking about using s44. It's hard to think of anything more stupid than moving people round the country as they go back over the next month. Suspect it may not happen anyway in that we'll see another U turn, but it would good to see the union taking charge of the agenda. Would also strengthen university workers for the battles to come.
 
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