Boris Johnson 8pm televised address - official match thread

[Thunder Bolt]

The BBC are starting educational programmes on CBBC, IPlayer & BBC2 from next Monday for children out of school.

https://www.bbc.com/mediacentre/2020/bbc-launches-biggest-education-offer-ever

 

[darkwolf666]

Jim Pickard
@PickardJE
·
29m
in response to [MENTION=612]Sam[/MENTION]CoatesSky
question, Boris Johnson says "things will be very different by the spring" but can't promise with confidence that children will be back in school *before the summer holidays*

I thought that was a cheeky question and was shocked Boris didn't answer in some way!

 

[rogersix]

Sending 3-4 millions kids back to school yesterday only to lockdown a few hours later was beyond negligent.

Yet millions still cheer him, I just don't get it....

it makes me wonder about the organizations/companies people have worked in, if they think boris is a good leader? wtaf!

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

I thought that was a cheeky question and was shocked Boris didn't answer in some way!

He gave the realistic answer people have been demanding. No over promising. Sounds like he can’t win !!

 

[atomised]

He gave the realistic answer people have been demanding. No over promising. Sounds like he can’t win !!

Indeed. I thought we would get bluster and an "every intention to get children back to school as soon as possible" with Whitty and Vallance cringing alongside him. Instead he refused to be pushed on a definitive response

 

[darkwolf666]

He gave the realistic answer people have been demanding. No over promising. Sounds like he can’t win !!

No he can win, he should have dismissed the question for what it was - ridiculous!

Possibly Boris didn’t hear the full content of the question. As surely Coates should have been shot down in flames or Coates knows something that Boris didn’t want to answer.

 

[Neville's Breakfast]

No he can win, he should have dismissed the question for what it was - ridiculous!

Possibly Boris didn’t hear the full content of the question. As surely Coates should have been shot down in flames or Coates knows something that Boris didn’t want to answer.

To be fair it wasn’t a ridiculous question. There is still plenty that can go wrong ie unknown unknowns such as the virus becoming resistant to the vaccine or antibodies proving to disappear sooner than hoped. I’m sure there are others. There is no way Boris should be dismissing that question or making over optimistic promises. He has quite possibly learned something from past mistakes.

 

[CHAPPERS]

Where did you get those figures from out of interest?

Only those in exam years were supposed to go into secondary schools and Primaries were closed throughout the South East, including my daughter's school. Then very many had inset days planned anyway to either create the online learning plan or prepare further for the testing they were being asked to do. I'd suggest a lot of schools were closed. Brighton was shut.

3 million as per a journo in the press conference.

 

[Sussexscots]

Lewis Goodall [MENTION=15917]lewis[/MENTION]_goodall
Important from Whitty. Says that risk isn't going away even with vaccine- merely that risk comes down to a point which society considers acceptable. Raises the prospect of some limited measures being necessary next winter.


What are limited measures?

What indeed.

And is Lockdown the default option whenever the NHS is under pressure? That'll be every Winter then.
Genie is out of the bottle This will never be over.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Lewis Goodall [MENTION=15917]lewis[/MENTION]_goodall
Important from Whitty. Says that risk isn't going away even with vaccine- merely that risk comes down to a point which society considers acceptable. Raises the prospect of some limited measures being necessary next winter.


What are limited measures?

Boris will urge people to wash their hands, and wear a face mask if they want to.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

Lewis Goodall [MENTION=15917]lewis[/MENTION]_goodall
Important from Whitty. Says that risk isn't going away even with vaccine- merely that risk comes down to a point which society considers acceptable. Raises the prospect of some limited measures being necessary next winter.


What are limited measures?

The risk is the same as our attitude to the flu. It’s there, it can kill vulnerable people, but we take a calculated risk with the knowledge there’s a vaccine to stop some getting it and treatments to successfully treat some who catch it. For Covid there might be some of the measures which we currently undertake added for good measure.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

What indeed.

And is Lockdown the default option whenever the NHS is under pressure? That'll be every Winter then.
Genie is out of the bottle This will never be over.

If the vaccines work (they seems to) and uptake is widespread (in the long term, anti vaxers will be more a problem than supply and deployment) we will never be blighted like this again. Also, it is likely the virus will mutate to a less lethal form, as is the usual pattern (an infection is not advantaged if it kills the host; that's like chopping down a vine to harvest the grapes).

 

[portslade seagull]

Boris will urge people to wash their hands, and wear a face mask if they want to.

It's hard enough to get some people to wash their hands after going to the toilet, still happening even now

 

[The Clamp]

https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/poli...he-prick-in-serious-situations-20210105203979

 

[Sussexscots]

If the vaccines work (they seems to) and uptake is widespread (in the long term, anti vaxers will be more a problem than supply and deployment) we will never be blighted like this again. Also, it is likely the virus will mutate to a less lethal form, as is the usual pattern (an infection is not advantaged if it kills the host; that's like chopping down a vine to harvest the grapes).

Clearly, that is what we all hope. And historically, respiratory viruses have tended to peter out.

What is of some concern (to me anyway) is the extent of the 'limited measures' to which Whitty referred being in place next Winter. Are we talking about Mask wearing ad infinitum? Bubbles?
Distancing? Rules of Six? Maybe it won't happen because the vaccines are very effective. But another Winter like this isn't an appealing prospect.

And the next time a virus rises in the East - which it certainly will - what then? We can't lockdown the country every other year. Can we?

 

[Billy in Bristol]

Busy as normal round my parts...what has it been like back in good ol Sussex by the Sea?

 

[The Clamp]

Busy as normal round my parts...what has it been like back in good ol Sussex by the Sea?

Roads a bit clearer but lockdown doesn’t come into effect until midnight tonight

 

[Diallo]

It's hard enough to get some people to wash their hands after going to the toilet, still happening even now

You've been trying to get people to clean their hands?

 

[wellquickwoody]

Sounds like good luck then. The Tories clearly were planning to send kids together to be vectors and then lockdown. If that was not the plan they would have acted earlier. They have been acting "slow" since the start, it is a pattern now and it looks very deliberate.

Guess you are probably an anti vaxxer too?

TBF,with this government, that is not as far fetched as it sounds..

Only if you share a tin hat with Plooks.

 

[jessiejames]

I worked through the first lock-down as I am at a company deemed an essential service. Back in March - April the main coast road between Brighton & Newhaven was completely empty on my commute every day at 7am....but this morning it was still just as busy as usual. There seem to be a lot less people "WFH" now, despite the instructions. Will be interesting to see if it changes over the next few days...

M23 at 6 am was like a normal day from pre Covid. M25/M26 and M20 were a joy, very little traffic going in either direction. Folkstone barely anyone around, Hythe and Dymchurch busy.

Police were stopping cars this morning on Kingsway/Hove lawns, I presume to check if they should be out.