[News] Lockdown lifting - when?

[Hugo Rune]

Until there's a vaccine people will continue to catch the virus and our govt have been and continue to be reacting too slowly and too conservatively from the word go. But they are stupid enough and driven by the need to be popular that they are quite capable of relaxing the lockdown far too early too.

We’re heading for the second worse death rate on the planet. Our advantages of being an Island nation and then watching China, Italy then Spain succumb to huge transmissions rates has counted for nothing. If we’d taken the same measure as Ireland, we’d have around 10k dead instead of 26k in my opinion, that blood is solely on Mr Johnson’s hands.

You’re right, with Cummings ’moulding’ the SAGE advice, we’re looking at a populist return from lockdown ASAP. Once the Government are happy that carehomes & the NHS can cope (for 18 months+) it’ll be every man for themselves with a quick return to normality.
Herd immunity will be revisited.

 

[southstandandy]

Errrrm, what did the OP do to deserve that response? Someone obviously shat on your cornflakes this morning.

Sent from my SM-G973F using Tapatalk

Probably just run out of tissues!

 

[Mellotron]

I still think people keep wrongly seeing it as binary, “lockdown” or “no lockdown”.

It’s going to be a very, very gradual lifting over about a year or so. When will the first tiny bit of give be? In the next 2-3 weeks I’d guess.

 

[Stat Brother]

But that could happen with just essential workers. My girlfriend was recalled from furlough to work in a book wholesalers. They aren't essential but aren't banned from operating. This risks undoing me staying home for 6 weeks but what is the alternative? The plan is clearly to get the numbers as low as possible along with getting people to observe a new way of behaving in public when they are slowly allowed back to work. You could be hibernating until next year if you are waiting for a vaccine.

I am curious as to how many on here, as a cross section of southern England, have had WFH either forced upon them, or forced upon their previously reluctant employers are now thinking - 'this is the way forward'.

I wonder if there's been enough time for people to think about the hours away from home sat in traffic jams, on crowded over priced (late) trains etc, wondering if it was worth it.


Naturally my twitter feed is full of government/councils/communities 'reclaiming' roads for all.

If there is even a window to effect change it's going to be a really really small one.

 

[beorhthelm]

lockdown was intended to avoid pressure on NHS. that has been acheived to the point where we are significnatly under utilising NHS for general healthcare. relaxing lockdown is inevitable, it may as well start next week, the question is how much and how to communicate the change.

 

[Blue Valkyrie]

I doubt it will be a sudden lockdown ending as such.

Initially it will just be a few more businesses being able to open.

 

[blockhseagull]

I still think people keep wrongly seeing it as binary, “lockdown” or “no lockdown”.

It’s going to be a very, very gradual lifting over about a year or so. When will the first tiny bit of give be? In the next 2-3 weeks I’d guess.

Exactly this

They will have to monitor every single tiny change for a minimum of 3 weeks before reviewing and then either relaxing or restricting.

I’d expect whatever they announce next week to be nothing more than a holding period where no changes are made to where we are now.... but more a more open discussion about what changes will be made WHEN they see fit.

 

[Frutos]

Oh dear god!

Bozza has lifted the 'Be Kind' reminder sticky from the top of the page, which has been there since Cornavirus got real and the lockdown.

Therefore we no longer have to be kind (despite the fact 99% of the time we all are anyway)
So the JOKE being now we are no longer being told to 'be kind' we can liberally be not kind.






It doesn't seem quite so funny now!

As usual, you are nowhere near as funny as you seem to think you are.

 

[taz]

The number of positive tests is 13.5%for all those tested as of yesterday, and falling daily,, (few days delay in results completion)

 

[darkwolf666]

I think there will be some minor concessions made at the next review, probably in relation to work. I expect the social distance and not travelling unless necessary rules to go on for a lot longer.

 

[A1X]

But they are stupid enough and driven by the need to be popular that they are quite capable of relaxing the lockdown far too early too.

This, and in particular I think our current PM would rather be popular than anything else. He's always been desperate to be "loved", hence some of his ridiculous antics at the Olympics etc.

 

[Yoda]

Now that we are only 1 week from the next review of the country's 'Lockdown' status I was wondering when NSC'ers think that this might be lifted. I know it's a case is how long is a piece of string but I'm cautiously optimistic.

I'm going for just one further period of 3 weeks which would take us to the end of May. Hoping that come early June I'll be able to go and see family and friends not seen in what seems like ages. Fingers crossed.

What's your guess?

I was under the impression for when the initial 3 week period was over that at one of the daily briefings we were at an r. rate of 0.69. This was 3 weeks ago.
(Remember, next week is actually week 7 of lockdown not 6. Dominic Raab et all took a week of bumbling around, deciding what to do about extending it, while Boris was admitted to Hospital)

A rate of 0.7 or below is required for any virus to burn itself out within 30-35 days based on the number of cases at that time.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Bound to be SOME kind of lifting of the lockdown at the end of the current review period, however minor and symbolic

 

[Mo Gosfield]

I doubt it will be a sudden lockdown ending as such.

Initially it will just be a few more businesses being able to open.

Likely to be Garden Centres and Nurseries first. ( May 7th ) No other changes until beginning of June. Forms of lockdown and social distancing with us until at least end of March 21.

 

[Uncle Spielberg]

Never. People need to accept this is the new way of life from now on. There will be partial lifting of some things and then locking down again for years. Even after if or when they find a vaccine for this one the next virus will now be met with a lockdown now a precident has been set. Even with a release this social distancing is so ingrained in people now, interactions will never be the same again and many people will just go out for essentials. I cannot image gatherings of people again, so doubt cinema's pubs concert halls stadium events will ever happen again and as such are now finished

 

[Bry Nylon]

We ***ked up in the beginning by not jumping on it in the way NZ did.

Population of New Zealand 4.8 million

Population of United Kingdom 66.7 million

Probably easier to ‘jump on it’ when your population is less than half that of London

 

[Stat Brother]

Population of New Zealand 4.8 million

Population of United Kingdom 66.7 million

Probably easier to ‘jump on it’ when your population is less than half that of London

And is in the arse-end of nowheresville.

 

[loz]

Never. People need to accept this is the new way of life from now on. There will be partial lifting of some things and then locking down again for years. Even after if or when they find a vaccine for this one the next virus will now be met with a lockdown now a precident has been set. Even with a release this social distancing is so ingrained in people now, interactions will never be the same again and many people will just go out for essentials. I cannot image gatherings of people again, so doubt cinema's pubs concert halls stadium events will ever happen again and as such are now finished

Then whats the point of all this then ? so we can live our lives never seeing are own families never going to meet friends a life scurrying up the shop to buy necessities before locking the front door to live in isolation or with just partners kids...for that is a life not worth living IMHO.

 

[A1X]

Never. People need to accept this is the new way of life from now on. There will be partial lifting of some things and then locking down again for years. Even after if or when they find a vaccine for this one the next virus will now be met with a lockdown now a precident has been set. Even with a release this social distancing is so ingrained in people now, interactions will never be the same again and many people will just go out for essentials. I cannot image gatherings of people again, so doubt cinema's pubs concert halls stadium events will ever happen again and as such are now finished

Given they come along on average once a century I don't think I'll be too concerned about the next one once this one has been put away.

 

[Dick Swiveller]

I am curious as to how many on here, as a cross section of southern England, have had WFH either forced upon them, or forced upon their previously reluctant employers are now thinking - 'this is the way forward'.

I wonder if there's been enough time for people to think about the hours away from home sat in traffic jams, on crowded over priced (late) trains etc, wondering if it was worth it.


Naturally my twitter feed is full of government/councils/communities 'reclaiming' roads for all.

If there is even a window to effect change it's going to be a really really small one.

All depends on the setup of the company, I guess. We had a VPN server setup just for us as an IT department so we could work on call at weekends. It was set to a maximum of 6 people as it is just a Windows setup but word got out. One woman had WFH agreed for her job and that started the ball rolling - all of the great and the good started demanding access. Problem is, it works very rarely with Sky Broadband or Virgin so people started getting annoyed that the thing that wasn't set up for them didn't work.

Then along came these shenanigans and for the first week, we worked as a department from home very successfully. Given that 95% of the computers we support are remote from us anyway, just as easy to WFH as go into the office. But the number of requests we had for access got silly - shed loads of people suddenly wanted laptops.

We did manage to test a system to dial in from a personal PC before we were all "furlonged" (as my gf insists on calling it) but that requires an ongoing cost per person to Microsoft and a big investment in a server if it were to be given to everyone.

Point being that more people can WFH in an emergency that can WFH when things go back to normal. Our payroll staff are WFH at present which is fine when it is just working out furloughed pay or salaried pay but when there are shed loads of timesheets to deal with, not sure it is viable long term. But there will definitely be an increase in the number of people changing there base.

One note of caution that always seems to be forgotten when people want to go down this route, working from home as a base means you need to meet a few criteria - a H&S compliant desk, for example. May also need a change to house insurance. If you require IT support, you need new procedures/policies - especially for lone working females. I would refuse to do a home visit without proper procedures in place.