Forum menu
At the risk of repeating myself, you can’t catch suicide.
What's the relevance of that?
There are things you can do to mitigate the risks of suicide and depression, just as there are with an infectious disease.
And if the two are linked, it seems reasonable to take them both into account, rather than dismissively joke about one and fixate on the other.
But mental health is being taken into account. It's been talked about at loads of the press conferences and highlighted as related to a lot of decision making on the level of restrictions.
All this moaning about the hardships of covid life……I do wonder how we would manage if something properly horrible happened like a world war scenario with conscription and bombing of civilian areas. I’m not sure we have the minerals for it in 2020. Maybe we are all too attuned to our mental welfare to manage a bit of short/medium term knuckling down.
They're completely different things. During the war (which both my parents were in) there were significant opportunities for social interaction. This now means no contact at all with other people.
An invisible killer of generations.
I haven't seen my elderly parents since February, I may never see my mother alive again. My aunt died with C-19 just after Easter, my partner's aunt died of it in May, a good friend's father died of it in June.
If we've learnt nothing over the last 9 months it's that social contract is paramount, as humans we can learn to suffer, we can put up with physical hardship, but being cut off from physical interaction is hugely destructive.
It's not that simple as what you've said, and unless you're over 85 you didn't experience the war, so, TBH what you wrote is trite and meaningless.
Wrong thread
It’s not that simple as what you’ve said, and unless you’re over 85 you didn’t experience the war, so, TBH what you wrote is trite and meaningless.
And of course neither did you 🙂 I have however served in a war zone. You? I don't remember the social interaction being too amazeballs in that one.
Given the choice between being stuck in my own home with nothing but Zoom to video call friends and family; literally more on demand TV that any human could consume; plentiful food (though not toilet roll at times granted!) and the opportunity to get out and exercise daily or being conscripted and fighting for months on end in a foreign country not knowing if your family were safe at home I think I know which I would go for.
Not saying this situation has not got it's hardships but when we get to the point that we are fretting about not having running races to be entered it's time to have a word with ourselves.
Yeah..... I'm going to post this again:
bigrich
I live in Victoria.
in july we had 700 cases a day, which was the same as the UK at the time.
We went full lockdown for months. Strong leadership, Everyone followed the rules, which were clear. Everyone knew what to do. a few idiots tried it on, got fined.
now it’s day 16 with no new cases, everything is opening back up.
what’s happening in the UK is baffling.
Victoria (Melbourne) had the same case numbers as the UK back in July, but took EFFECTIVE steps to stop the spread of the virus. So effective, that they have now had 16 days with no locally acquired cases, and no deaths. If you want to see what an effective lockdown is.... the Victorians have literally written the book on it.
It amazes me how little people in the UK are paying attention to what's going on elsewhere - I guess demonstrated by the lack of response to the above post.
What’s the relevance of that?
Exactly my point.
And if the two are linked, it seems reasonable to take them both into account, rather than dismissively joke about one and fixate on the other.
I never meant to be dismissive.
I'm struggling mentally, this whole situation has robbed me of the one tangible thing that salvaged me from, well, let's say 'unpleasantness' a couple of years back. And apologies if that attitude spills into the forum occasionally, I do try so very hard not to let that happen. But I have to swallow it all down for the greater good, there's plenty worse off in the world than me.
For all that I may come across as a grumpy argumentative prick, please believe that I'm trying. I'm holding on by my fingernails, I'm arrogantly perhaps trying to make the world a better place, and I'm trying to make this little corner of the Internet a better place also.
Eh.
I should probably delete all that because I don't do Personal but bugger it. I'm a zombie and I'm going to bed.
Thanks Cougar.
It amazes me how little people in the UK are paying attention to what’s going on elsewhere – I guess demonstrated by the lack of response to the above post.
We’re “World Beating” in all regards… so why look to what works in other countries?
My sister lives in Victoria, it's pretty awesome what they've achieved. I don't know that it's directly comparable to the UK, but definitely frustrating that it's ignored. Or worse, dismissed out of hand as impossible.
All this moaning about the hardships of covid life……I do wonder how we would manage if something properly horrible happened like a world war scenario with conscription and bombing of civilian areas. I’m not sure we have the minerals for it in 2020. Maybe we are all too attuned to our mental welfare to manage a bit of short/medium term knuckling down.
100% this I'm afraid. 'I can't go to the pub, I can't enter running races, I can't go on a foreign holiday'...boo xxxing hoo... these are miniscule problems compared to what many people face every single day.
I have mental health issues, I have anxiety issues, and I live on my own and haven't seen most of my mates in months. I'm not going to bleat about it however as I'm aware many many people are in far worse positions than me... and whilst in 6 months time my life will hopefully be back to normal, the 50000 folks that have died, plus many more whom have lost loved ones, won't have that luxury.
My sister lives in Victoria, it’s pretty awesome what they’ve achieved.
Babies dieing because they can't be taken across state borders for heart surgery. Awesome!
https://twitter.com/9newsaus/status/1318632532716457986
We’re “World Beating” in all regards… so why look to what works in other countries?
I'm afraid, it does rather look like "exceptionalism" from where I am sitting.
The Victorian lockdown was very severe, and their Premier took a huge amount of stick for it at the time - but it has worked spectacularly well.
Unfortunately, the window of opportunity for that action (with such success) has long since passed...... it was July BTW, but that was when the UK was being told to go on holiday, visit their local pub/restaurant etc. Bigrich (I'm sure) and I were looking at what was happening in the UK in absolute horror.
In all honesty - this is the first time I've looked at my local politician (state governor in this case) and thought: "fair play, you're doing a great job".
Babies dieing because they can’t be taken across state borders for heart surgery. Awesome!
Granted, that's shit, but obviously not as shit as the 51000 extra deaths we've had in the UK.
Is going on a foreign holiday to somewhere with a lower case rate than ours (which is most of the world at the moment) actually a bad thing to do from a transmission in the UK perspective? You're less likely to catch it than whilst here, and there is zero chance of spreading it to other people in the UK for two weeks if you're not in the country..
Babies dieing because they can’t be taken across state borders for heart surgery. Awesome!
Absolutely tragic for sure, and hugely preventable/unnecessary.
600 COVID deaths in the UK on Wednesday last week alone
I should probably delete all that because I don’t do Personal but bugger it.
Nah, I think it's healthy to talk about this stuff.
Wasn't having a go, just challenging some of the 'man up' style responses to somebody who expressed something similar.
and they couldn't be transferred interstate because of travel restrictions
< narrator > “There were no interstate travel restrictions applying to these patients.”
It’s a tragic story, but the headlines don’t match the tragedy. Both States said that there were no restrictions on moving them from SA to Victoria… the investigation is for a reason… it’s not clear what went wrong, and warnings about this happening go back to before the pandemic.
Is going on a foreign holiday to somewhere with a lower case rate than ours (which is most of the world at the moment) actually a bad thing to do from a transmission in the UK perspective?
Will you fly your private helicopter back? Or do you have some other cunning way of maintaining social distancing on your journey?
You’re less likely to catch it than whilst here, and there is zero chance of spreading it to other people in the UK for two weeks if you’re not in the country..
But will you quarantine - and I mean REALLY quarantine - for two weeks on your return to the UK, just in case. That was when cases began to rise in the summer, people going on holiday and people thinking "eat out to help out" meant relaxation of social distancing rules. And I suspect there was a big overlap between those two groups.
Then the schools and unis went back.
What Victoria did was fantastic, as was New Zealand. It's what we should have done in March. Sadly, the opportunity, and 50,000+ people, were missed.
I’m hearing talk of rising hostility towards the large numbers of mtbers heading into Peebles, am I am genuinely worried that some form of direct action is in the offing..
I turned down the chance to go with a group of friends last week, It started out as 3 friends going in two cars - just about acceptable but ended up as 7 people from 6 households. I said no. this is people who generally have been following the rules. I am not impressed
So we've established blatant lockdown cheats are unfeeling monsters. What about discreet lockdown cheats?
At the risk of repeating myself, you can’t catch suicide.
No, but you can drink the Kool-Aid.... 🤪
What's that even supposed to mean?
Is going on a foreign holiday to somewhere with a lower case rate than ours (which is most of the world at the moment) actually a bad thing to do from a transmission in the UK perspective?
It's not great from a 'transmission in where you're going to' perspective.
But no, it's all about us. Again. Start thinking past the end of your nose.
What’s that even supposed to mean?
I think it's a ref to the Jonestown Massacre, where almost a thousand cult members were convinced (ish) by Jim Jones to drink poisoned Cool-aid.
I watched the documentary a while ago - it was truely shocking, widely used as an example of mass suicide
Is going on a foreign holiday to somewhere with a lower case rate than ours
It's not just the destination, it's getting there. Airports contain people from many destinations, planes are ideal places to catch it.
Anyway it's rule number one. I do wonder what would happen if we a had a really serious national crisis that meant a lot more than people's 2nd holiday was banned. How would people cope?
I think it’s a ref to the Jonestown Massacre, where almost a thousand cult members were convinced (ish) by Jim Jones to drink poisoned Cool-aidI think it’s a ref to the Jonestown Massacre, where almost a thousand cult members were convinced (ish) by Jim Jones to drink poisoned Cool-aid
Well, it's a bit more than that. It's become a cultural metaphor, a way of saying a large group of people are blindly obeying a suggested course of action that might not be in their best long-term interests.
. I do wonder what would happen if we a had a really serious national crisis that meant a lot more than people’s 2nd holiday was banned.
We'd be stuffed if we had an Ebola outbreak.....
Nah, wouldn't be much blatant lockdown cheating going on if people were keeling over in the street with blood squirting out of their eyeballs.
Well, yeah, I understand "drunk the Kool-Aid" to mean that you've perhaps blindly or unwisely bought into something. I don't understand the relevance here unless the poster was suggesting that the whole pandemic thing is a hoax. And I rather hoped that no-one could be quite that stupid so figured I'd probably misunderstood.
Cool aid surely refers to the yippies and the electric cool aid laced with lsd
I don’t understand the relevance here unless the poster was suggesting that the whole pandemic thing is a hoax.
I think it might have been just about your suicide comment… nothing to do with this medical emergency. On a more serious note, there is a lot of work being done at the moment as regards people persuading others to take their own lives… it is one thing that the social media companies are taking very seriously.
Too subtle, metalheart. Lay it on thicker next time.
planes are ideal places to catch it.
No they're not. Actual real research and science that has been conducted over recent months it has been proven that planes are amongst the safest places you can be regarding transmittal of Covid. Counter intuitive I know, but our intuitions all told us masks would make a difference and they had zero impact on the occurrence or severity of a second wave, so our 'common sense' intuitions don't necessarily apply in the real world. Covid also spread just as quickly in China and SE Asia early on where mask wearing was common even before COVID so they did little to subdue the spread in those countries.
One of the most important factors that prevents the spread is having clean fresh air that minimises the chances and exposure to infected saliva droplets. In an environment where air is exchanged frequently the chances of transmittal is very low. On aircraft the cabin air is exchanged every 10 - 15 minutes or so and filtered through HEPA filters. Also the way air flows within an aircraft cabin where it goes from the top to the bottom means any airborne droplets of infected saliva are sucked down to the floor and extracted away via the floor vents, so very little chance of being consumed by passengers as it can only spread through consumption of anothers infected saliva...so long as you don't lick the tray tables where droplets could have settled you're relatively safe.
It spread around the world by infections in-country not on aircraft. Airports are now covid secure. You're still subject to quarantine rules either end, but if you're happy to comply with that then there is no reason not to fly and go visit other countries if you're not prohibited to do so and happy to do the quarantine time at either end. I know several people who have travelled to see family over recent months and sucked up the quarantine at both ends. One of the beauties of working from home for many is that you can be anywhere. You can work from quarantine anywhere in the world, spend some time with family then fly back and work while quarantining back at home. It's hard time I realise but depends how much you want to see your family.
Thanks Wobbliscott
I have it on reasonably good authority that none of the crew have contracted the virus whilst at work for the airline I work for.
but our intuitions all told us masks would make a difference and they had zero impact on the occurrence or severity of a second wave
How do you come to that conclusion?
but our intuitions all told us masks would make a difference and they had zero impact on the occurrence or severity of a second wave,
based on what?
Actual real research and science that has been conducted over recent months it has been proven that planes are amongst the safest places you can be regarding transmittal of Covid.
Please reference the peer reviewed research....
Counter intuitive I know, but our intuitions all told us masks would make a difference and they had zero impact on the occurrence or severity of a second wave, so our ‘common sense’ intuitions don’t necessarily apply in the real world. Covid also spread just as quickly in China and SE Asia early on where mask wearing was common even before COVID so they did little to subdue the spread in those countries.
Why would you undermine what seems a perfectly reasonable argument about plane safety with this horseshit? I am now wondering whether all that stuff about filtration is bollocks, too.
There is plenty of evidence which suggests masks work as part of a package of measures to prevent spread, or at least reduce it.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/more/masking-science-sars-cov2.html
https://www.aseanbriefing.com/news/coronavirus-asia-asean-live-updates-by-country/
Have a scan down that list of Asian countries and tell me how badly they are doing in controlling the spread and associated mortality.
Why would you undermine what seems a perfectly reasonable argument about plane safety with this horseshit?
I suspect he's been listening to an expert called 'Janice' on FB who heard it from a friend.
How do you come to that conclusion?
Because masks were introduced in-between lockdowns and 2nd lockdown happened despite us all wearing masks. So they don't appear to have been much of an effective mechanism against the spread. The science is what the science is so don't listen to me...listen to the science.
Why would you undermine what seems a perfectly reasonable argument about plane safety with this horseshit?
What the bit about plane safety or impact of masks? Planes are safe. that is a point of scientific fact.
There is plenty of evidence which suggests masks work as part of a package of measures to prevent spread, or at least reduce it.
Agree with that...part of a package but hard to disseminate the actual contribution that masks have made. The way the second wave took off suggests they had a minimal contribution to the prevention of the second wave occurring. And the fact the spread in China and SE Asia where mask wearing is common. No measure on their own is 100% effective so of course it's a case of a package of measures.
Anyway, my point is planes are safe. And in congestion with quarantine measures at either end there is no reason to dob your neighbour in for taking a flight.
Because masks were introduced in-between lockdowns and 2nd lockdown happened despite us all wearing masks. So they don’t appear to have been much of an effective mechanism against the spread. The science is what the science is so don’t listen to me…listen to the science.
OK, this seems pointless, but just look at the shape of the curve for the present wave vs wave 1, and tell me that the mitigation we put in place has had no impact (masks being one of the primary measures). Of course there are other factors yet to be determined, both physical and behavioural.
Masks were never going to prevent wave 2, whatever hopeful noises were being made by politicians. But they, and other distancing measures, look likely to have mitigated its impact so far.
The impact of foreign/domestic travel on the timing and extent of the second wave, like the impact on travel to Italian ski resorts on the first, has yet to be fully understood. But it's OK to say we don't know.
I never trust anyone who speaks in absolutes - x is safe, y is unsafe. So your proclamation about air travel is immediately undermined. Plenty of the points you have made are reasonable, and I would agree that the quality of filtration and airflow in the aircraft cabin, in conjunction with mask usage to reduce droplet spread to adjacent rows, quite possibly makes it relatively safe compared with other forms of public transport. But one thing we are learning is that the absolutes spouted at various points of this pandemic - schoolkids can't transmit it, there is no evidence of spread in pubs and restaurants etc etc generally turn out to be more about a desperation to project confidence than actual science. And no form of public transport where you confine infected individuals in close proximity to uninfected for a prolonged period should be assumed to be entirely risk-free.
PS. Literally two seconds on Google
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4969063/
https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/11/20-3254_article
Even ****ing IATA describe it as a low risk, not zero risk.
So they don’t appear to have been much of an effective mechanism against the spread.
Are you saying that the timing and scale of the "second wave" have not been effected by mask wearing? Remember, you claimed "zero impact".
don’t listen to me
Probably wise.
What the bit about plane safety or impact of masks? Planes are safe. that is a point of scientific fact.
In order for it to be a real fact, rather than an 'internet fact' there would be a number of peer reviewed studies which analysed the data etc and came to that conclusion, care to reference any?
Airports are now covid secure.
What does that mean exactly? How is it measured?
They are probably quite low risk now mainly as no one is using them, but then so is any empty space...
Weighing in with my perspective - I'm currently abroad and travelled out here last week. I live in England. My dad lives out here and since March there have been virtually no direct flights. Direct flights resumed on about 1 November and I was booked for the 7th. That got cancelled due to lockdown, but I managed to find an alternative route out here. Some may query the legality of it, but my dad lives alone and hasn't seen any of his family since February so I was willing to give it a go on the basis that it was actually possible for the first time in months. We didn't leave the house for anything other than solo exercise in the week or so before we came out here, and we will do the same on our return (although there's no formal quarantine requirement at the moment as case levels out here are much lower than at home). I'm actually working from "home" today (although I am taking some time as holiday while I'm out here). I did worry about the flight, but I'm doing everything I can to manage the risk.
Too subtle, metalheart. Lay it on thicker next time.
Yeah, sorry about that. I’ll wear my hobnail boots next time.
Drinking the kool-aid does emanate from the Jonestown Massacre (the Rev Jim Jones ‘mass-suicide’)... which was the point. (And the reason for the emoji)
Cougar
The origin of both "drink the kool aid" and" acid test"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Electric_Kool-Aid_Acid_Test