Social Distancing ...

[daktulos]

You can fight the virus by isolating everyone until it goes away, and try to stop it at the borders until a vaccine is available, if it ever is. You take a big hit to the economy, it may be over quickly, but there may also be a second wave. (e.g. China, South Korea)

You can let it run through the population in the hope that it won't mutate and so will be spared a second wave. You take a big political hit for letting people die. (e.g. Belarus)

I think the UK actually has a fairly reasonable balanced approach - protect the most vulnerable while reducing transmission to a manageable level, but not zero. They won't say it for political reasons, but the more people who catch and get over the virus, the better.

Once there's an antibody test, things may start to go back to normal for people who have had it. Let's hope!

[Chris_SVS]

Was there not a previous interest in herd immunity? Until the numbers were crunched and it wasn't going to be in any way feasible

[Craig380]

Originally Posted by Chris_SVS

Was there not a previous interest in herd immunity? Until the numbers were crunched and it wasn't going to be in any way feasible

There was, but taking that approach demands blanket testing of the population so that hotspots can be quickly identified, and measures taken to protect the most vulnerable people.

The Government overlooked the whole 'testing' bit because they're a bunch of incompetents, who have either ignored the advice of their senior health & scientific advisors, or bullied the advisors into agreement.

This article from The Lancet is especially damning on the Government's and national NHS management bungling and failures: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/l...727-3/fulltext

[yokohama]

Originally Posted by Craig380

There was, but taking that approach demands blanket testing of the population so that hotspots can be quickly identified, and measures taken to protect the most vulnerable people.

The Government overlooked the whole 'testing' bit because they're a bunch of incompetents, who have either ignored the advice of their senior health & scientific advisors, or bullied the advisors into agreement.

This article from The Lancet is especially damning on the Government's and national NHS management bungling and failures: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/l...727-3/fulltext

I think there's a lot of truth in that. Test, test, test. People with the virus can be isolated and contacts traced. Instead of a common sense approach based on past epidemics, the Government decided to rely on an untested computer model created by mathematicians and academics.
Becoming subservient to technology seems to be the way these days, sadly.

[daktulos]

Originally Posted by yokohama

I think there's a lot of truth in that. Test, test, test. People with the virus can be isolated and contacts traced. Instead of a common sense approach based on past epidemics, the Government decided to rely on an untested computer model created by mathematicians and academics.
Becoming subservient to technology seems to be the way these days, sadly.

I'm not convinced. Contact tracing was used initially, but there are likely hundreds of thousands of people who currently have the virus, so it's impractical, if not impossible.

The tests take 24 hours to come back, and they are in short supply. Given that you're not able to do contact tracing, there's little benefit to knowing that someone showing symptoms has the virus rather than something else a day ago.

The WHO want testing because it gives them numbers to put into their models, but really, how does it actually help? Once there's an antibody test, that's a different matter.

I'm no fan of the government, but they do appear to be following advice from the scientists.

[Red Herring]

It's interesting reading the various views around the real threat of this virus and steps being made to contain it. We would be fools to ignore the statistics coming from other countries further down the road than us but we also need to keep what they have done, and they did it, in perspective. South Korea has had one of the best successes in containing the virus, and they achieved this through contact tracing. They basically used their mobile phone network to trace anyone who had been near a confirmed case and immediately forcibly isolated them. I wonder how the population of the UK would react if they even thought the government had the ability to do that, let alone actually tried doing it...... Our freedom has a price, and we're going to pay it.

[daktulos]

Originally Posted by Red Herring

South Korea has had one of the best successes in containing the virus, and they achieved this through contact tracing. They basically used their mobile phone network to trace anyone who had been near a confirmed case and immediately forcibly isolated them. I wonder how the population of the UK would react if they even thought the government had the ability to do that, let alone actually tried doing it...... Our freedom has a price, and we're going to pay it.

As you say, it's a different culture there - we'd react differently.

One thing to note is that it's not a success yet. Look again in 5 years' time to judge that. Their only option now is to stay in a permanent state of semi-lockdown until a vaccine is available.

[Red Herring]

This virus won't be beaten until it's been eradicated worldwide so until that happens you can expect some serious restrictions on travel and social movement. This is why it's important to tackle it on a global basis, there really isn't much point in us sorting the UK out and then opening our borders......

[Chris_SVS]

If we could open them for a couple days in the middle of July that would be fantastic, I can't help but think I'll not be making BPW2020 with the lads

[yokohama]

Originally Posted by Red Herring

there really isn't much point in us sorting the UK out and then opening our borders......

Ours aren't closed yet as far as I'm aware, which maybe doesn't help.
My wife came home from last week after 2 weeks in Japan, self-scanned her Japanese passport through the machine at Heathrow and walked right in. She went back and asked the immigration guy if she needed a stamp but he just said they weren't bothering and waved her in. No checks, no monitoring of people coming in, no advice on self isolation.