A few dozen cases of Covid and no deaths as of yet is apparently now enough to put restrictions on quarter of a million people...... https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-53666665 I feel sorry for the locals there, especially the business owners who are having to shut by 5 pm today. I wonder how many will be thinking about never opening again? All the stock they have now that could be out of date by the time they can open, all the stock they would need to order to replace it when they don't know when they can open and all the other pains to deal with. If they are going to be shut down so easily then nobody could blame the business owners if they think what's the point. Especially as it could happen again in the future once they open back up a second time. If the UK has gone back on the flatten the curve line back in March that we understood lockdown was for, then this overeaction is going to be what the new normal is known for. Leaders like Sturgeon and Johnson should just be honest and let it be out in the open that the only way pre March 23rd life will return will be with a vaccine and not before.
Overreaction? I don’t think so. What do you propose? No reaction to an epidemic. Nicola has swiftly done the right thing. A local lock down for around 10 days and hoping that will be sufficient to halt the spread. The alternative would be a total lock down.
Life is never going to return to as it was pre-March 23rd. It has gone in the same way that life never returned to pre-September 1939 or pre-1914. Too many government lies (#3.5%) and corruption, too many dead, too many mourning families and friends. Potentially many more to come Aberdeen has locked down precisely because a bunch of drunks decided to go on a bender just like they did before. You can't do that anymore. Its gone. Hope you enjoyed it while it lasted. Life has changed. We can now make it better than it was. We can work from home more - which will reduce overcrowding, pollution and housing costs in the cities but probably increase demand and cost in rural areas. We will lose some (many?) jobs and industries but we will find new jobs and industries. It has accelerated the next 20 years of change into 6 months, but sometimes events do that. Welcome to the century of the digital nomad. Life has changed. Adapt to the new "normal" and make the best of it. Life will change again in the future and those alive then will have to adapt to it.
Prediction. Every time there's a local lockdown anywhere, the same argument is recycled on here like that Nadal/Federer match that went 7 hours the other year.
don't let the tories fool you. a properly funded and properly resilient NHS would have coped with treating other ailments as well as Covid.
What an incredibly depressing post. Are we not allowed to go to the pub or enjoy ourselves ever again?
Great post. By pre March 23rd I just mean no more social distancing or masks. The points you make I agree with such as less pollution.
I would keep an eye on deaths and hospital admissions and should they rise then look to lockdown with restrictions. I wouldn't be locking down because of 50 odd infections in a population of over quarter of a million people and zero deaths. Infections are going to continue to happen all the time but as long as deaths don't rise and hospitals don't start seeing an influx of new cases then we should be OK. When Aberdeen gets to open again, what if a month later they have another 50 odd infections? It wouldn't be right to shut the businesses all back down again. Test and trace should find those infected and all those they have been in contact with. More testing will result in more cases, but we shouldn't panic....
English people are in no position to lecture the Scottish in handling CV19 given that their response has been infinitely better than ours. Sturgeon comes across as thoughtful and caring Johnson less so
Rubbish. I’m sure many of us will still enjoy scrabble evenings with friends all enjoying a half pint and sucking on our Worthers Originals
surely they are tightening up so that the hospitals don’t get so overwhelmed that they can’t deal with stuff like that!