This is not a covid thread!

[fisicx]

There are lots of concerns of the new covid variant and how immunisation may be compromised. This thread isn’t about that.

It’s about how any government reacts to any changing situation.

They could do nothing. That’s always an option.

They could put the country in a state of emergency.

They can take a light touch and hope people are sensible and consider each other not just themselves.

Whatever any government does at any time will generate argument and pointing fingers. They may get it right, they may get it wrong. Not just here but around the world. But it’s selfishness from individuals that often exacerbate. Those who topped up their tanks during the recent fuel crisis being a good example.

 

[japancool]

They can take a light touch and hope people are sensible and consider each other not just themselves.

Genetic engineering is good, but it has not yet extended to airborne swine.

 

[simon field]

I don’t know a single person who trusts this government, or believes that they have the best interests of the people at heart. They don’t seem to know what to do next.

Along with the sensible, balanced, non-sensationalist coverage in the MSM (not), their message is confused at best.

It’s no wonder people do their own thing!

 

[fisicx]

It’s not about trust. No matter what any government around the world does in any situation there is a high probability they will get it wholly or partly wrong.

 

[simon field]

Selfishness from individuals you say?

Who decides what’s selfish and who decides what’s sensible though?

My point is - why would any reasonable, free thinking person do what the government says, when it is rotten to the core with incompetence?

 

[Mark T Jones]

You've hit the nail on the head - there is no right answer.

Fir the most part we judge actions on the outcome to ourselves and those immediately around us. Of all the people who preach their version of a better way, have ever you heard a single one of them going on to balance social, economic, personal and political outcomes?

In my view, Boris's single redeeming feature is that he is standing up and doing it while everyone else is moaning

 

[fisicx]

My point is - why would any reasonable, free thinking person do what the government says, when it is rotten to the core with incompetence?

In your opinion.

If a mask helps prevent the spread of covid then the selfless thing to do is wear one. That has nothing to do with government.

If some petrol stations may run out of fuel for one or two days the selfish thing to do is rush to top up your car. That has nothing to do with government.

If you truly believe the whole of government is incompetent what are you doing about it?

 

[simon field]

Trouble is, we know this virus isn’t going away - so what are you gonna do? Keep wearing masks on & off forever?

 

[Bob Morgan]

Trouble is, we know this virus isn’t going away - so what are you gonna do? Keep wearing masks on & off forever?

Rather like the cardboard Gas Mask boxes everyone carried around during WW2!

 

[japancool]

I know I bang on about it all the time, but I just look at East Asia.

Japan has gone from one of the lowest levels of vaccination amongst the G20 to one of the highest (75% of the whole population has been double-vaccinated, compared to 67% for us). That is despite much higher levels of general vaccine hesitancy than in the west. Almost everyone wears a mask, despite masks never having been legally, because people put others before themselves - and because vaccines and masks have never been politicised.

Result? The country is largely open (although foreign travellers are mostly not allowed in), and despite having a much higher percentage of elderly people than we do and denser urban environments, have had 1.73 million cases and 18,354 deaths, compared to 10.1 million cases and 145,000 deaths in the UK. That is almost ENTIRELY down to personal behaviour.

 

[japancool]

Trouble is, we know this virus isn’t going away - so what are you gonna do? Keep wearing masks on & off forever?

If you have to, so what? How much inconvenience is it putting you to? It's less onerous than putting on underwear, and I assume you do that most days (don't answer that, I don't want to know).

 

[fisicx]

Trouble is, we know this virus isn’t going away - so what are you gonna do? Keep wearing masks on & off forever?

Yes

 

[simon field]

But, we’ve done all this previously and look where we ended up - a tiny island, 4th worst in the world!

What makes you think that the government’s advice is sound this time around? (They’ve already been told by WHO to avoid travel restrictions but have ignored that)

 

[japancool]

(They’ve already been told by WHO to avoid travel restrictions but have ignored that)

WHO told everyone to avoid travel restrictions when the pandemic first started. Yep, THAT went well.

61 people tested positive on just 2 KLM flights from South Africa. I'd say that makes a pretty good case for travel restrictions.

 

[simon field]

WHO told everyone to avoid travel restrictions when the pandemic first started. Yep, THAT went well.


61 people tested positive on just 2 KLM flights from South Africa.

Exactly my point! Everyone has a different opinion on the best way forward.
What works in the Far East doesn’t necessarily work here, and so on.

 

[japancool]

Exactly my point! Everyone has a different opinion on the best way forward.
What works in the Far East doesn’t necessarily work here, and so on.

Because of people.

It's not rocket science. Look at what works, and do it. Get vaccinated, wear a mask, wash and sanitise your hands. Then we can all get on with our lives with some semblance of normality, instead of wasting time arguing about it.

 

[japancool]

Or - look after your immune system

Not everyone has that option.

cough in your Nan’s face

And how do you avoid doing that on a crowded Tube train, for example? You wear a mask. Simples. Even for a moron in a hurry, that should be doable.

Holiday in the campsite up the road.

If that's your idea of a holiday, go for it. You could also drive nails through your feet.

 

[simon field]

I’m guessing you’re in favour of restrictions. That’s completely up to you of course, but it does look rather futile to say the least.

 

[japancool]

I’m guessing you’re in favour of restrictions. That’s completely up to you of course, but it does look rather futile to say the least.

No, I'm in favour of people doing all the sensible shit they should be doing so we don't have to have restrictions. But I doubt they will.

 

[Deleted member 59730]

I feel sorry for the SEO people trying to get their client Omicron Lightbulbs noticed.

Apparently my local NHS Trust is planning on the pandemic lasting 9 years.

 

[simon field]

If you truly believe the whole of government is incompetent what are you doing about it?

Ignoring them. They have double standards in any case.

 

[simon field]

@simon field I do not see how you can comment on the government response without considering the possiblities.

The two possiblities I have given are the two possible outcomes. Unless covid acts unlike any other infectionsrespiratory disease ever known, and the scientific understanding of how these eveolve is entirely wrong, then if the first possiblity does not happen, the second will. Thre only question is how long it will take.

Oh I agree totally with you. If one thing doesn’t happen, then another thing will. That’s applicable to many things in life.

But the thread is about governments handling of ever changing situations. Doesn’t it seem pretty clear to you - given the track record - ‘three weeks to flatten the curve’ ‘eat out to help out’ ‘don’t kill granny’ ‘do as I say, not as I do’ ‘don’t wear masks, do wear masks, don’t wear masks’, that the government would be best to stay out of it, and leave the expertise to the experts?

 

[gpietersz]

But the thread is about governments handling of ever changing situations. Doesn’t it seem pretty clear to you - given the track record - ‘three weeks to flatten the curve’ ‘eat out to help out’ ‘don’t kill granny’ ‘do as I say, not as I do’ ‘don’t wear masks, do wear masks, don’t wear masks’, that the government would be best to stay out of it, and leave the expertise to the experts?

No, because expert advice does not lead directly to policy.

1. The role of the government in this is to balance different things: balancing health benefits against economic damage, the the restriction of freedoms etc. Some of that will involve balancing advice from experts in one field against advice from experts in another.
   
2. Experts even within a field will differ. There were multiple different models of the likely consequences of covid ranging from the far too pessimistic (many millions will die) to the far too optimistic (its not going to be much worse than a bad 'flu season. Even now there are unknowns (e.g. what to expect from the omicron variant).
3. Experts are subject to personal bias - its striking that the two experts in this country that made the most optimistic and pessimistic predictions in this country that I know of have a history of such predictions and have a personal enmity.
4. Even where experts reach a consensus, things that have been an expert consesus have repeatedly been wrong. Dietary advice has frequently been reverse (because of the practical and ethical difficulties with doing proper controlled experiments on human beings means it not well proven). There are cultural biases in research: 60 years ago the experts would have told you homosexuality was a curable disease, a few decades further back and they would have told you that, not only were black people intrinsically inferior to white people, but nordics were intrinscially superior to mediteraneans, and high caste Indians were intrinsically superior to low caste Indians.
5. Experts may be wrong because they are proved wrong when new evidence emerges: e.g. ether theory or phogliston.

Because of points 3 to 6 you cannot take expert advice without evaluating how well proven their basis for it is. One of the problems is that few politicians know enough to even ask them the right questions.

 

[Bob Morgan]

It is worthwhile researching 'The Great Barrington Declaration,' and its advocacy of 'Focussed Protection.' However, GOVERNMENTS appear to have been dismissive of it, often acting in concert. Instead they have erred towards Indiscriminate Lock-Downs, and Covid QE.

 

[WaveJumper]

Perhaps the government are like magicians, look whats happening in this hand whilst the masses concentrate on that and they forget for a while all the other crap going on double inflation, coming interest rate rise etc etc .......... just a thought

 

[fisicx]

If you want to discuss covid or omicron this ain't the thread to do it in. This thread is about governments wordlwide being between a rock and a hard place whatever the crisis.

 

[japancool]

If you want to discuss covid or omicron this ain't the thread to do it in. This thread is about governments wordlwide being between a rock and a hard place whatever the crisis.

The ONLY reason governments in the West appear to be caught between a rock and a hard place is because one moron decided to politicise the vaccine, and the mindless lemmings who followed him and his related ideology bought into his narrative.

Where the vaccine has not been politicised, populations have generally been supportive of whatever policies their governments have taken.

 

[fisicx]

Not just the vaccine. It happened during the recent 'fuel crisis' when it was nothing of the sort. Same happened when fracking was suggested, HS2, energy supply and so on.

 

[simon field]

Not just the vaccine. It happened during the recent 'fuel crisis' when it was nothing of the sort. Same happened when fracking was suggested, HS2, energy supply and so on.

It’s a shame that we have absolutely no effective opposition in this country, so that people get taken in by whatever the media decides is the next trendy agenda.

 

[fisicx]

It’s a shame that we have absolutely no effective opposition in this country, so that people get taken in by whatever the media decides is the next trendy agenda.

And that's the problem. When BP said a few petrol stations might run out of fuel the media seized on this and made it into a crises. Which it wasn't.

Social Media makes things even worse - because Karen now has a platform to spread misinformation. The Government may refute this but it's too late. If they did nothing Karen would be allowed to continue. If the Government explain why Karen is wrong they are accused of cover ups and lies. They can't win.

This doesn't mean we should believe everything that comes out of Westminster. It's just that whatever the Government does usually polarizes the population. Nobody wins.

 

[NickGrogan]

So banning Twitter would make the country a better place.

Can we add Facebook too?

 

[NickGrogan]

It’s a shame that we have absolutely no effective opposition in this country, so that people get taken in by whatever the media decides is the next trendy agenda.

If the next trendy agenda is the idea that "people get taken in by whatever the media decides", how would you know?

 

[japancool]

And there was me thinking the media was dead.

 

[simon field]

So banning Twitter would make the country a better place.

Can we add Facebook too?

Was the country a worse place before the bile taps were turned on and Karen got her megaphone out? I didn’t notice.

 

[NickGrogan]

Was the country a worse place before the bile taps were turned on and Karen got her megaphone out? I didn’t notice.

No idea, but I don't feel that about the country now. Maybe the issue is more localised?

 

[simon field]

No idea, but I don't feel that about the country now. Maybe the issue is more localised?

No, it’s global. Maybe it doesn’t happen in some areas.

There’s this kind of deep division thing going on, turning human on human, with some countries even going so far as to allow people to drown whilst travelling there and pretending that there’s no money to stop it!

 

[Clodbuster]

One reason for the huge variation in reaction is the range of "advice" around by specialists. I'm pretty sure they cannot agree. Firstly you get Dr Angelique Coetzee (the South African who discovered and announced this new variant) says the reaction is unreasonable and nothing to worry about, yet the Gauteng province (Johannesburg) where it was first sequenced has shown a 330% increase in hospitalisations in the last 14 days.
Which way to go?

 

[MOIC]

What advice are the WHO suggesting to governments worldwide on how to manage the current status, albeit not from an economical point of view?

Do they have any teeth left, similar to the UN not really doing anything that falls within their remit?

FWIW I believe that the WHO were complicit in allowing the virus to get out of control and did nothing to stand up to the 'culprits' to hide what was occurring at an alarming rate. A 'heads up' on what was really happening and advice on containing the virus could probably have meant that governments worldwide would not be in their current dire predicament.

 

[NickGrogan]

No, it’s global. Maybe it doesn’t happen in some areas.

There’s this kind of deep division thing going on, turning human on human, with some countries even going so far as to allow people to drown whilst travelling there and pretending that there’s no money to stop it!

Have you been watching the MSM again?

What is the safest part of the journey for migrants coming to the UK? Which is the most dangerous part?

There are plenty of ways to stop it from happening, there is no desire to stop it from happening. It's not a money issue.

 

[Newchodge]

If a mask helps prevent the spread of covid then the selfless thing to do is wear one. That has nothing to do with government.

Absolutely right. But you started the sentence with IF. There are conflicting views on whether a mask does help prevent the spread. The government says that it does. If you don't trust the government you may doubt their view. So trust in the government matters.