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Coronavirus in the UK - news, lockdown and discussion

Azrael said:
Because if only for reasons of self-interest, not even the most evil elected politician wants hundreds of thousands of their own voters to die needlessly and indiscriminately from disease.
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And if that's a false premise..?
 
Mation said:
I don't think it does. It uses some of the language of hard-hitting piece whilst providing all of the excuses that will be used to let the government and Johnson off.

Unusual for the PM not to chair cobra; unprecedented flooding; work-life balance/pregnant partner; sending ppe aid abroad to a nation in crisis; issue bumped due to Brexit negotiations.

For every failing, an arguable reason given.
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Imagine missing Cobra meetings and then catching Corona
 
Azrael said:
Because if only for reasons of self-interest, not even the most evil elected politician wants hundreds of thousands of their own voters to die needlessly and indiscriminately from disease. As shown from the hostile reporting in their media allies, they can't hide this calamity as they have the horrific human cost of austerity.
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These deaths need to go on the balance sheet of austerity as well.
 
Well. Sunday Telegraph produce some quality journalism.

They've got hold of the pandemic plans from Southeast Asian countries who've successfully contained SARS-CoV-2, and compared them with the British document and its soul-sucking defeatism.

Key quote: "[Beijing] are very conscious that their legitimacy is based on protecting the Chinese People and therefore had to act. In the west, it has never been viewed in those terms. Scientists are fatalistic. They say you just can't do it [contain the virus]."
 
Azrael said:
Well. Sunday Telegraph produce some quality journalism.

They've got hold of the pandemic plans from Southeast Asian countries who've successfully contained SARS-CoV-2, and compared them with the British document and its soul-sucking defeatism.

Key quote: "[Beijing] are very conscious that their legitimacy is based on protecting the Chinese People and therefore had to act. In the west, it has never been viewed in those terms. Scientists are fatalistic. They say you just can't do it [contain the virus]."
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Once every hundred years or so
 
Petcha said:
This is actually real. Good to see No.10 focusing on the important issues facing the country.

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I...I'm just going to float this idea, but like, maybe people have already thought of this? I mean, maybe that's one reason you can't buy flour or yeast in the shops? I dunno. I suppose there might be some people who haven't thought of it before now, in which case this will come as an amazing bright idea. I can tell those people that the best place to get bread yeast at the moment is from China via ebay.

But these people do not exist do they? That's what's so scary. The government have in mind a fantasy public that they learned about in public school.
 
little_legs said:
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tbf, every European country that is currently or will imminently be relaxing lockdown is doing so 'running hot', if this is taken to mean not waiting for daily death figures to drop significantly. Given the time lags from infection to death, the only alternative is to do what China did and seal people in for three months.
 
littlebabyjesus said:
tbf, every European country that is currently or will imminently be relaxing lockdown is doing so 'running hot', if this is taken to mean not waiting for daily death figures to drop significantly. Given the time lags from infection to death, the only alternative is to do what China did and seal people in for three months.
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There's surely other alternatives. I'd support any measures that can mitigate the lockdown -- such as, possibly, allowing a limited number people to sit in the parks or on beaches -- if they can be done safely. Any lifting can't be countenanced until a rigorous virus surveillance system's in place, proved reliable, and has detected all infection clusters, or we'll be right back where we started and enduring another lockdown with equally horrific death toll.
 
Azrael said:
There's surely other alternatives. I'd support any measures that can mitigate the lockdown -- such as, possibly, allowing a limited number people to sit in the parks or on beaches -- if they can be done safely. Any lifting can't be countenanced until a rigorous virus surveillance system's in place, proved reliable, and has detected all infection clusters, or we'll be right back where we started and enduring another lockdown with equally horrific death toll.
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Well yes, they need to have been working on a system for that from day 1 of lockdown. Test, trace, isolate is the long-term way to control this, in whatever form that takes (doesn't necessarily need to involve heavy-handed coercion, if done with sensitivity and sufficient daily support networks in place). That's been obvious from the start.

And that is probably the honest answer to the UK's lack of a lockdown end date. They can't announce one until they've got their act together on a testing regime. But they can't admit that they don't have their act together yet, so they'll keep deflecting and blaming us for not keeping to the rules.

The excuses will wear thin. Germany has all that testing cos they've got 70 years of tradition and infrastructure to draw on, apparently. So what's the excuse for not being able to match Portugal, then?
 
treelover said:
fantastic journalism, and very damning, but soon it won't exist anymore if people don't buy papers, companies block ads on articles on c19, etc,
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Murdoch's papers don't exist to make money, they exist to exert control.

e2a: And it should go without saying but Murdoch can have a penny off of me when hell freezes over and not before.
 
littlebabyjesus said:
Well yes, they need to have been working on a system for that from day 1 of lockdown. Test, trace, isolate is the long-term way to control this, in whatever form that takes (doesn't necessarily need to involve heavy-handed coercion, if done with sensitivity and sufficient daily support networks in place). That's been obvious from the start.

And that is probably the honest answer to the UK's lack of a lockdown end date. They can't announce one until they've got their act together on a testing regime. But they can't admit that they don't have their act together yet, so they'll keep deflecting and blaming us for not keeping to the rules.

The excuses will wear thin. Germany has all that testing cos they've got 70 years of tradition and infrastructure to draw on, apparently. So what's the excuse for not being able to match Portugal, then?
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At least the centralised testing people are, at last, cooperating with smaller labs, although through gritted teeth. Most worried they'll try and wing contact tracing with that app and a central phone bank, instead of getting on with recruiting the small army of contact tracers they're gonna need to make it work.

And yes, undoubtedly, the line about us not being able to keep discipline if we discuss exit strategy (while we seem to be doing nothing but) is paper-thin cover for their woeful lack of prep (which is the other thing we never stop talking about). Some comms gurus they've got.
 
I am so relieved that at long last UK media are beginning to react to this shitshow. I live in Belgium, and have key worker family in London and the Midlands.I spent 5 weeks becoming ever more incredulous and frantic at the dithering, denial, and failure to act by this govt.

I saw no reporting in the UK of what went on the weekend before Johnson finally closed pubs, etc that Monday evening. He had to be dragged kicking and screaming into action. Read this, just one of the reports of those events over here -

""Excerpt from an article by Jean Quatremer in the French daily Libération, last Saturday:
Coronavirus: Behind the scenes of the tussle between Emmanuel Macron and Boris Johnson

Everything was ready to close the border between France and the United Kingdom on Friday evening. That very morning, Emmanuel Macron called the British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, to warn him: if he persisted in taking no measures to stop the progression of the coronavirus pandemic on his territory, France would have no choice but to refuse entry to all travellers coming from the UK, i.e. to consider it as a third country. And all the other European states would have done the same, which would have been very bad news for the British economy and the government's "benign neglect" policy. "We had to clearly threaten him in order for him to finally move," the Elysée Palace admits. With the ultimatum set, "BoJo" had to resign himself to "asking", not without reluctance, pubs, cafés, bars, restaurants and other social gathering places, such as theatres, cinemas and sports halls, to close from Friday evening.

When the 27 decided on March 17 to close their external borders for 30 days, the UK, which left the EU on January 31st, benefited nevertheless from an exception: "Legally, it is part of the single market until December 31st 2020 and we are still very integrated economically," it is explained in Paris. "So London had to close its external borders together with us. In addition, there was the issue of the border between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland which had to be kept open." But faced with BoJo's persistent refusal to budge, even Dublin said it was prepared to close its border with Belfast, regardless of the symbolic significance of the event. [...]

But even if BoJo has moved under threat, it is still a long way from the Italian, Spanish, French or Belgian confinement. [...]"

This govt may like to calculate how many lives have been saved by Macron and Varadkar's intervention that weekend. And how many have died, and will die, in the UK, as a result of the govt's insouciance and failure to act earlier.

I'm also relieved Johnson was discharged. We should be spared the Boris-as-sainted-martyr scenario, and demand and get accountability. In the meantime, the clapping for Boris makes me want to throw up.
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Posted on CIF, How Macron gave Johnson an ultimatum on C19 action
 
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