Unless you’re geriatric

Some of us on here are, and all of us on here have close family and friends who are, so yes, we are worried about the virus.

Even by recent efforts at trolling bellendery, this is right up there

Unless you’re geriatric or a fat smoker it’s not a major concern

Sorry I can confirm that’s rubbish. I know of at least one fit and healthy 30yr old with no existing health conditions who is currently being ventilated, fighting for their lives

+ what an incredibly selfish attitude to take, if you injur yourself and require hospital treatment you will be taking up vital resources, possibly causing a death.

+ you could currently be infected and as you move around you are exposing more people to the virus

I’m surprised how worried many of you seem to be about the virus. Unless you’re geriatric or a fat smoker it’s not a major concern

Or diabetic, or have any chronic illness, or have any respiratory issues or are in any way immunocompromised, had cancer or heart issues, or pregnant/due shortly. Or just unlucky.

Or care for the well being of anyone that has any of those things. I find it difficult to believe that anyone doesn’t have, within their circle of friends or relatives, know anyone in that situation.

Yeah. **** them because you want to ride your bike in the sun.

Yes. The vulnerable should’ve been compelled to self isolate, and systems put in place to help them do that – keep them supplied and supported while the virus went through the rest of us with minimal effect, building up herd immunity and denying it a reservoir to hide in further down the road. Develop vaccines, treatments, then ease restrictions on vulnerable groups.

We haven’t done that, we’ve adopted the worst of all compromises – left the vulnerable to swing in the breeze, killed the economy and still not prevented the spread of the disease. It’s taken hold the way it has precisely because so many people suffer no or trivial symptoms. The death rate (nowhere near 5%) is massively skewed towards that small high risk group.

There’s a lot of talk about going on a war footing. OK, in wars, tough decisions have to be made about who lives and dues. In the past, young men were sent off to certain death as part of a greater strategy. Maybe this time it’s the old and those with often self inflicted health conditions who might have to take the bullet for the greater collective good.

Oh, and I’m not riding my bike at all. I spent today digging up my lawn, ready for a couple of tons of topsoil next week and seed potatoes. No panic buying for me because I keep a constant month’s worth of food in the cellar. And, as someone deemed an essential worker, I did 20 hours overtime last week covering for sick colleagues and those having to look after kids. No problem, we have a moral obligation to step up at times like this.

montgomery
Member
I’m surprised how worried many of you seem to be about the virus. Unless you’re geriatric or a fat smoker it’s not a major concern – you should be much more worried about disruption of trade, countries shutting their borders and the coming Depression. How/when/if you ride your bike has no bearing on what’s steam-rollering towards us.

On this point, I have to agree…..

– with Withnail.

Maybe this time it’s the old and those with often self inflicted health conditions who might have to take the bullet for the greater collective good.

Anyone in particular you had in mind, ****?

Anyone in particular you had in mind, ****?

Nope, it’s a lottery. Could be my 77 year old dad. That’d be a personal tragedy, but old and sick people do die all the time.

**** you

Not quite the same but related. Saw a lot of people out for a Sunday ride on motorbikes today. They didn’t seem to be taking it easy either. We were doing the limit (60) and many of them shot past, at least 80, maybe 90 mph. Knee down, wrong side of the road, etc. A bit further up the road the police were directing traffic and there was a bike in the hedge, not one that came past us as it was obviously a little bit earlier. Three police cars on the scene. I guess an ambulance was there earlier and a trip to A&E for the rider. I shall be taking it extra careful when if I venture on the (mountain) bike.

montgomery
Member

… The death rate (nowhere near 5%) is massively skewed towards that small high risk group.

China – 4.5% with another 2% still critical.
Italy – 9,5% with another 5% still critical.

Of those that are critical, none are getting better, they’re CTD with medical staff doing everything possible to keep them alive. Of those critical cases so far, 1/5th have been under 50 with no underlying health conditions known to them. That’s not to say that some didn’t have them, but still. 1/5th.

So let’s do the numbers. 66mm people in the UK. 5% mortality (optimistic) = 3.3m people who die. Of those, almost 700k are not high risk demographics. That means everyone in the low risk categories has a 1% chance of dying from it. In my tiny village that means that at least 3 people will die.

Or you can take precautions and dramatically reduce that risk to a tiny fraction of 1%. THAT’S what the Imperial Modelling showed. That’s why we, all of us, need to do it.

I see Montgomery is getting flamed and yes maybe he could have phrased it better…
However backing up a sec, can those who are attacking, please reflect on the longer term issues to the economy? Are you more worried about the short(er) term deaths and crippling of NHS, or the longer term economic consequences? (including knock-on consequences – that which we can’t foresee?)
Can you see the link/compromise between these or not?

Personally I am worried about both, but probably more the latter than the former.

PS I’ll be riding (slowly) until told not allowed.

China – deaths heavily skewed towards men – 70% of whom smoke (I lived there for many years).

Italy – they haven’t even got close to comprehensive testing, so the death rate is meaningless.

South Korea is the only country to get close to comprehensive testing – 104 deaths for 8897 cases, about 1% mortality rate despite a heavily aged population. They shut it down in time. We in the West haven’t, it’s too late. That’s why we needed to isolate the vulnerable for their own safety, rather than unleashing an economic apocalypse, with all the suffering and loss that will go with it. If I was young I’d be very angry – **** over by the gerontocracy again, a wasted generation.

If you really thought it worthwile to sacrifice your picked statistic of the population for some economic greater good, then consider the following.

Ill people are expensive, 2+ weeks of ICU treatment is probably more expensive than most peoples annual wage!

Dead people are expensive. A lifetimes lost earnings and taxes.

Are you completely simple or are you just trying to be? In the same sentence you state that Korea got a handle on it which skewed their statistics and on the other that we’re nothing like Korea as the Genie is out of the bottle.

We’re now on the path toward Italy where the mortality rate isn’t defined by the just the virus itself, but in our limited ability to treat a large number of cases. If Chris Witty is to be belived, we’re already at 1% mortality and the ICU beds aren’t yet full. What happens when they are? What happens when there are no beds and no doctors to treat new cases? That’s when the mortality rate spirals and that’s when the young start dying at that 20% rate. Sure a fit and healthy young person will recover WITH TREATMENT, where an older person might not, but what if they can’t get treatment?

Agree Montgomery. listened to govt. Science advisers press conference posted on the other thread. Repeatedly stated growing confidence death rate is no more than 1%. Main area of uncertainty is how many cases are truly asymptomatic. Antibody test coming out should give some insight. I’m rooting for high numbers of asymptomatic transmission- If so, COULD give some hope that death rate is even lower.

True about effect of running out of ICU beds tho – I concede that.

In the same sentence you state that Korea got a handle on it which skewed their statistics and on the other that we’re nothing like Korea as the Genie is out of the bottle.

No, I said Korea had the most accurate statistics AND they got a handle on it. Our statistics in the West are neaningless due to a lack of good testing. We have failed to get a handle on it. Increasingly, the evidence suggests there are many, many more asymptomatic people out there, which render your numbers irrelevant. The Italian health service is being overwhelmed by elderly and chronically sick people who should’ve been isolated for their own safety while the rest of us carried on.

Dead people are expensive. A lifetimes lost earnings and taxes.

Not the people who are dying – the economically inactive elderly and chronically ill.

You might want to move over to the main CV thread with the other argue-y ****.

Probably last time I’ll see my other half for months. We don’t live together.

We met via separate cars on the North Downs and went to walk a part that is usually very, very quite. There were LOADS of people there so we walked right away from them to some quite paths well off the beaten track.

Saw a few people, we kept well away from. Quite a few mtbs about mostly in groups of 2 or 3. I’m not commenting.

Was astounded by the amount of “couldn’t give a fig” about social distancing” types we could see from afar. People getting out of separate cars and hugging etc. What the f***!

Partner and I walked on opposite sides of roads from each other and crossed over the roads/paths to keep away from anyone. We never came closer than about 4 metres. Upsetting in a way but it’s got to be done so you bloody do it!

I despair. There are a lot of people out there that are as thick as s***!

We are Italy about to happen.

Most concerned about my daughter growing up without a mother. She may be my ex wife but she’s still a good friend, is pregnant and has underlying health issues. Unfortunately she’s pretty **** stubborn and reckless. So despite not being geriatric or a fat smoker, I am very worried.

So this is a classic

….against my better judgement but bowing to the wishes of my family we go out for a walk today. 2 families of 4 both of whom have been living in each others pockets for the last month, children at school with each other till Friday.

We pick a patch of forest that we know is sparsely used, unlike the rest of Ashdown Forest and we agree to make a small picniq and not share anything, walk apart but basically hope we don’t meet anyone. To be honest if either family has it, one more walk in the country won’t make a difference but we obviously need to be careful with others.

Success -nobody in the tiny carpark and we boot up, put the dog on a lead (never do normally but…) and start walking. Don’t see a soul till we get to a section of the footpath that goes down a private drive for 100m or so. Just getting to the end where the footpath turns off into the woods again and a bloke runs out shouting blue murder about how we should be at home isolating, He is very rude and tries to block our path with a horsey type woman who is shouting about how we are idiots and he really knows his stuff. To be fair, though its a footpath it is his drive and so I try to diffuse the situation and say that if he moves we will be on our way superfast and we don’t want to be any nearer than 2m to anyone. He just goes ballistic so we ignore him and keep walking. We had a lovely walk and didn’t see another soul but he bugged me and he was very very upset. I thought we were being fairly responsible.

Turns out he did know his shit – who knew and really, what are the odds of literally the only person we saw today being:

https://appg-longevity.org/wayne-m-channon

Subscriber
Probably last time I’ll see my other half for months….
We met via separate cars on the North Downs and went to walk a part that is usually very, very quite

So, you met up in a car park and wanted to find somewhere secluded……??
Sorry couldn’t resist 😉

We are about to lose the right to ride outside (cos many people can’t work out that going outside and playing on bikes is daft at the moment using their own brains), so drag out the winter trainer and get used to it!
No sneaky, trying to beat the system, riding in the dark or going out when its quiet – we only have a few days to develop new habits that will save the country.

Did you not play the video right above your post? I’m going with the chief medical officer’s advice…

montgomery – some of us are worried because we suffer from anxiety, depression or low immune systems, which are all kept at bay with exercise.
As we are all cyclists and cycling gets us out into the now much fresher air, then out into greenery/counryside, then yes it is very important.
Many of us are self employed, going from earning to nothing, not a bean coming in.
So getting out on our bikes will help to clear the head and giving us time to re-evaluate our lives and take the next steps.
If I wasn’t cycling atm with the worries of elderley parents (who are not in any way shape or form understanding self isolation, or staying away from others), no work and my best friend who is a health worker, I would be in a bad place.

Yes the future holds many problems, but we need to take each step at a time.

The article linked below from the New York Times on 20 Mar is worth a read. The author argues that isolating and supporting essentially only the vulnerable would limit the death rate, build immunity in the long run and limit economic impact. Similar to some of the points that Montgomery makes but without sounding like we are sacrificing the vulnerable to save the rest!

It does however say there is a narrow window of opportunity to go down this route. Maybe that has passed. Not sure if I agree with the article but a good discussion piece.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/opinion/coronavirus-pandemic-social-distancing.html

On a bicycle it’s easy to maintain more than the required separation distance, so I’m still not seeing why it’s bad.

However dim-bulbs will be dim-bulbs, but that’s a different problem and nothing to do with cycling.

It all comes down to the age old thing of “don’t be idiots”.

Out on your bike, somewhere quiet, alone and not pushing yourself so you end up in A&E? At the moment , fine.
In a group, going fast, where there are lots of people. Not fine at all.

I went for a run last night, I took a route that I knew would be quiet. I went at a time that most people would be at home and not outside, I went alone and crossed the road when a saw anyone. I am confident that is OK.

Up with the sunrise this AM, working from home so no commute, just did a local coastal loop, felt great, barely another soul out and made exaggerated motions to maintain distance when I passed anyone (with a sort of ‘raised eyebrows’ type smile to make a joke out of it). Will keep doing this until we get told otherwise.

The only ‘training’ I’m doing right now is trying to build up time in the saddle again, I’ve barely done more than two hours in the last 9 months. I think a lockdown could make this difficult, there is only so long I can spend on the trainer although I could try and alternate 1hr rollers, 1hr turbo, 1hr rollers…

Not quite the same but related. Saw a lot of people out for a Sunday ride on motorbikes today. They didn’t seem to be taking it easy either.

Yep, for pretty much the first time ever I had someone pull a ridiculous over take on the inside of a blind bend, he immediately had to slam himself into the gap between me and the car in front. I guess maybe he knew what he was doing but just seemed so un-necessary.

I’m debating a local XC loop from my door this afternoon/evening. It’ll be like the 90s again. Haven’t ridden a bridleway for about 2 years since I succumbed to the lure of berms, tabletops etc. Time to reconnect.

It’s still a debate for me – yesterday I was going to head out but thought I’m bound to have to pass someone on a bit of narrow trail (as presumably many MTBers will switch to solo XC type rides) so my heart ended up not being in it. Hopefully quieter today.

If we go to full lockdown I’m lucky in that I have a concept 2 rower at home which is the perfect virus-apocolypse exercise.

Maybe now’s the time to practice wheelies & manuals if we can’t go for big rides?

So this is a classic

….against my better judgement but bowing to the wishes of my family we go out for a walk today. 2 families of 4 both of whom have been living in each others pockets for the last month, children at school with each other till Friday.

Essentially you went against all of the guidance on social distancing and did what thousands of others have been doing all weekend, because,well, it doesn’t apply to you because you have exceptional circumstances.

The countryside was littered with big groups, imagine the 8 of you multiplied many thousands of times over.

Could you not bear just going for a walk with the 4 of you? to anyone else trying to get out in isolation you would look like the rest of the selfish British public this weekend.

I came across 2 groups of 10 standing either side of a bridleway having a good chat, I had to ride through the middle of the arseholes, told them Glasto had been cancelled.

Not quite the same but related. Saw a lot of people out for a Sunday ride on motorbikes today. They didn’t seem to be taking it easy either.

Motorcyclists and boy racers have been taking advantage of the quieter roads to rag it round.

On my lone road ride yesterday, I was passed by a group of half a dozen Subaru’s (one with a bloody great airplane wing of a spoiler on the back of it), loads of motorcyclists and some sort of BMW convention – lots of 03 and 04 reg modified BMWs.

At least all the pubs and cafes had closed by then so there weren’t really any worthwhile congregation spots for them.

@scandal42 I partly agree with you and whilst we have been working together over the last week it was our last contact. However as I clearly said, we did not go nearer than 2m to anyone. We did not see anyone apart from the CEO of the firm at the forefront of COVID 19 vaccine development…which was surreal.

First dog has it summed up first dog

On a bicycle it’s easy to maintain more than the required separation distance, so I’m still not seeing why it’s bad.

So the arguments against:

1. Small risk of infection – particularly if you keep the two metre boundary and plan on quiet routes / times, but…

2. A risk of crashing and in the process taking up scarce NHS resources.

3. Some people seem incapable of riding alone and social distancing on wheels seems problematic based on observation (I mostly ride alone)

4. If you absolutely battered yourself, you could, temporarily suppress your immune system – easy answer, stay steady. Not an issue for most of us.

5. As per above, but the personal risk of finding yourself in a hospital, which is the last place you want to be when it comes to avoiding infection.

6. I guess there is also a broader compliance issue in the sense that people are more likely to understand simple instructions – stay home unless you are buying food / going to and from work / buying medicine. By doing something ‘normal’ you’d arguably be detracting from the feeling that this is not normal and people need to understand that and knuckle down.

If you buy into the last of these, in a sense it trumps the other considerations. But right now there is no lockdown, just various recommendations which people are often ignoring.

I’m not saying any of the above should stop you riding per se, but those are some of the arguments you could make against riding at the moment.

On the plus side: it benefits your physical and mental health, by wearing out bits of bike and replacing them, you support the bike industry / businesses and you avoid the mind-numbing horror of Zwift or whatever other indoor torture you want to substitute for riding a bike.

Who knows. I fear that we’re heading for a lockdown which will end up including cycling and running mostly because people seem incapable of understand more nuanced messages and our government seems incapable of communicating anything clearly.

In answer to the OP, the weather was unseasonably warm here (Toronto) on Friday (15C) so got out for a road ride. Roads are quiet, towns are totally deserted round here, and I saw 2 other cyclists the whole time, and very few pedestrians. 2 hours, felt much better for it; and Saturday it was -7, and snow today, so glad I got out.

But the public response here has been very different – people have been staying inside, keeping their distance when out walking, and very civilised in supermarkets. The UK response is worrying…

One BIG nitpick here – please think about this when quoting death rates.

Repeatedly stated growing confidence death rate is no more than 1%.

The death rate is 1% of ALL CASES. Given the scarcity of testing, the number of CONFIRMED cases is much much lower than the total number of cases.

Therefore, the death rate of CONFIRMED cases is much higher than 1%, and could edge to 5% or more.

Did a little xc loop with my boy yesterday. He’s nine and even he worked out that a) theres more people out walking than usual and b) it’s probably because all the pubs, restaurants and shops are shut. Shame Boris didnt think about this!!

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