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Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

I expressed my concerns a while back that the relaxing of restrictions would lead to my council workplace being expected to go back to normal pre-Covid working, but a week ago we all had an email from our Acting Chief Executive saying the following

You will hopefully have seen the Prime Minister’s broadcast earlier this week confirming the Government’s plans to remove lockdown restrictions from 19 July. In his update the Prime Minister explained that further details will be shared by Ministers in the coming days and the Government plans to formally confirm their decision on Monday 12 July.

As we expected, it is clear that careful planning will be needed to review the guidance that the Government will be issuing and decide how we should apply this in our workplaces, customer service spaces and our venues. While the legal restrictions are due to be removed, the Prime Minister warned us that 'It's not time to get demob happy' and he made it clear that we will all be expected to continue to act with caution. We must also make sure that we carry out our health and safety duties responsibly and consider our public health leadership role in <name of council removed>.

We are currently finalising updates to our guidance on the precautions you should take when carrying out work that involves visiting people’s homes. This will help colleagues and services as they make their plans to step up services in line with lockdown easing.

As I have explained in my previous updates to you, our office arrangements will remain as they currently are until at least the start of September. It is important that for those staff who can, you should continue to work from home where possible and only use our ‘Covid secure’ office spaces when necessary for work purposes or personal health and wellbeing reasons. We have and will continue to provide ‘Covid secure’ office space where needed for service or individual needs - this can be organised through your service’s Office Champions.

Thank you again for your continued hard work making sure that we continue to deliver the vital services that our community and local economy rely on.

So I thought everything was OK for now. But today our immediate
service manager has sent this out, to supervisors only, expecting them to explain it to the rest of the workforce

As I am sure you are all aware the government is lifting covid restrictions in a bid to return to normal. As such the measures that we had put in place , although gradually decreasing in line with our covid risk assessments will now stop.

Thank you all for your commitment to these temporary rules during a difficult period and lets hope we can remain in our "back to normal" position.

Still awaiting the official response from the unions (I think it may have taken them by surprise, TBH), but the mood among the workforce is not good...
 
I'm very pleased to have been getting emails from various train companies, tour organisations, food banks, etc, all saying they are sticking to masks. Interesting email about trains that go between Scotland and England and vice versa.

Whilst social distancing guidance remains in place in Scotland, we have reached an agreement with Transport Scotland that LNER will operate under English guidance. This will ensure a consistent experience for customers on our cross-border services. However, face coverings remain mandatory in Scotland for the time being.
 
This is the context of the Whitty comment about scary numbers. Mostly the usual attempts to explain exponential growth.

 
In other news, I spent most of this afternoon arranging a second vaccination for one of my team members.

He's 63 years old, and has learning difficulties, and no family or support worker to help him.

I've been trying to help him get it sorted for a while, but with no success, so this afternoon we finally had to go together to his GP surgery and arrange things with the receptionist (who was really helpful). He now has an appointment for his second jab next Thursday afternoon.

I'm sure part of the reason vaccination rates are low in some areas isn't because people are choosing not to get vaccinated but because many simply aren't able to access the system themselves and don't have the support to help them do so.
 
cupid_stunt said:
Now he speaks out, somewhat bloody late.





www.mirror.co.uk

Chris Whitty warns UK could be plunged back into restrictions in just 5 weeks

Speaking ahead of "Freedom Day", the Chief Medical Officer said a spike in hospitalisations could leave the NHS in "trouble again, surprisingly fast"
www.mirror.co.uk
Click to expand...

Wtf? There were over 2000 people in hospital on July 3rd! :confused:

Anyway - glad he's been shamed into saying something now - that clip from The Lancet editor (posted here recently) was very scathing of his comments on 'agreement' from scientists.
 
SpookyFrank said:
Less a deliberate policy than a general strategy of using every disaster or upheaval that comes along to push their agenda in ways that might not work in peacetime.
Click to expand...
"That’s the standard technique of privatization: defund, make sure things don’t work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital."
Noam Chomsky,
 
sheothebudworths said:
Wtf? There were over 2000 people in hospital on July 3rd! :confused:

Anyway - glad he's been shamed into saying something now - that clip from The Lancet editor (posted here recently) was very scathing of his comments on 'agreement' from scientists.
Click to expand...
Stuff he is saying now is being said for the same reasons he said certain things in the press conference on Monday, the 'trying to get people to cahnge their behaviours slowly' thing.

And that was the same press conference where he characterised broader scientific opinion in ways that I knew would wind people up.

His performances are no surprise to me because this is after all one of the people that stood behind the podiums in the first half of March 2020 and tried to sell us on the original government 'herd immunity' plan. And then had to stand there and look consistent whilst they u-turned on that plan.
 
andysays said:
In other news, I spent most of this afternoon arranging a second vaccination for one of my team members.

He's 63 years old, and has learning difficulties, and no family or support worker to help him.

I've been trying to help him get it sorted for a while, but with no success, so this afternoon we finally had to go together to his GP surgery and arrange things with the receptionist (who was really helpful). He now has an appointment for his second jab next Thursday afternoon.

I'm sure part of the reason vaccination rates are low in some areas isn't because people are choosing not to get vaccinated but because many simply aren't able to access the system themselves and don't have the support to help them do so.
Click to expand...
You're a good man, andysays
 
elbows said:
Stuff he is saying now is being said for the same reasons he said certain things in the press conference on Monday, the 'trying to get people to cahnge their behaviours slowly' thing.

And that was the same press conference where he characterised broader scientific opinion in ways that I knew would wind people up.

His performances are no surprise to me because this is after all one of the people that stood behind the podiums in the first half of March 2020 and tried to sell us on the original government 'herd immunity' plan. And then had to stand there and look consistent whilst they u-turned on that plan.
Click to expand...

But he's used a hospitalisation figure that is half of the actual total?!
I mean I'm not the fucking CMO but even I can work that much out. :confused:
Have I misunderstood? It doesn't relate to admissions or patients in ICU... but I've also watched the clip and the reporting of it is exactly what was said.
Just seems a bit bizarre for the chief CMO to have forgotten (?) the figures, even if it doesn't minimize the point he's apparently (finally :rolleyes: ) trying to make.
 
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sheothebudworths said:
But he's used a hospitalisation figure that is half of the actual total?!
I mean I'm not the fucking CMO but even I can work that much out. :confused:
Have I misunderstood? It doesn't relate to admissions or patients in ICU... but I've also watched the clip and the reporting of it is exactly what was said.
Just seems a bit bizarre for the chief CMO to have forgotten (?) the figures, even if it doesn't minimize the point he's apparently (finally :rolleyes: ) trying to make.
Click to expand...
I cant tell you why he made that mistake.

If forced to guess then the best I'd probably come up with is that 'a little over 2000' was a good fit for the number for Covid-19 patients in hospitals in England on July 7th when SAGE had a meeting to look at the unlocking step, a moment which then probably involved him having to brief people like Johnson, who probably needed a similar lesson about epidemic exponential growth. Maybe numbers from that period are burned into his brain.
 
Supine said:
Glad to hear more talk about N95/FFP2 masks on urban recently.

It’s going to be really important that we protect ourselves for the next few months. None of this relying on others is going to cut it.
Click to expand...

Those masks are beyond my budget. And will be for many. I'm just not going to use public transport or go inside anywhere that isn't my flat, for a while. I'm lucky, I can do that. I'm not employed, nor am I a carer for anybody, and I am well enough to cycle.
 
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Plagueisland is trending on the twitters.
Even though I've been double jabbed,
I'm getting very nervous about about going out at all.

Perhaps policy will change when every other country puts the UK in their Red Lists.
 
elbows said:
I cant tell you why he made that mistake.

If forced to guess then the best I'd probably come up with is that 'a little over 2000' was a good fit for the number for Covid-19 patients in hospitals in England on July 7th when SAGE had a meeting to look at the unlocking step, a moment which then probably involved him having to brief people like Johnson, who probably needed a similar lesson about epidemic exponential growth. Maybe numbers from that period are burned into his brain.
Click to expand...

That makes sense, and the numbers for England on that day would match up with a doubling over three weeks, albeit that that has already reduced to two weeks now (which he vaguely suggested might be happening).
Just seems important to know the correct current numbers if/when they're actually being used to illustrate such massive points (or just anyway, tbh), even when there is already some other dishonesty involved, iyswim!
 
Storm Fox said:
Plagueisland is trending on the twitters.
Even though I've been double jabbed,
I'm getting very nervous about about going out at all.

Perhaps policy will change when every other country puts the UK in their Red Lists.
Click to expand...
I'm kind of glad I've got the inevitable out of the way now - and that it's been so mild (thus far).
 
BillRiver said:
Those masks are beyond my budget. And will be for many. I'm just not going to use public transport or go inside anywhere that isn't my flat, for a while. I'm lucky, I can do that. I'm not employed, nor am I a carer for anybody.
Click to expand...

by reusing it’s costing me 90p per week. Not free but not hugely expensive.
 
What are the other countries doing differently? My understanding is we had much higher vaccination uptake than on the continent, so what restrictions do they still have that we don’t? I can’t believe you still can’t go to the pub or get your hair cut, so what are they doing right that we aren’t? Restrictions on numbers? Better track and trace?
 
Supine said:
by reusing it’s costing me 90p per week. Not free but not hugely expensive.
Click to expand...

The only ones I've seen for sale are single use.

I'd rather not risk re-using them.

Also as I understand it, to really protect you they'd need to be specifically fitted to your face, not just generic ones.

But I appreciate there are degrees of protection, and we all do what we can in our various circumstances.
 
purenarcotic said:
What are the other countries doing differently? My understanding is we had much higher vaccination uptake than on the continent, so what restrictions do they still have that we don’t? I can’t believe you still can’t go to the pub or get your hair cut, so what are they doing right that we aren’t? Restrictions on numbers? Better track and trace?
Click to expand...

We imported the Delta variant & let it rip, which is why we are in the shit, it's only just starting to take off in the rest of Europe, no doubt partly because Brits have seeded it in holiday hotspots.
 
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