Anteater, you seem to have forgotten the purpose of mask wearing.
This is a very nasty disease. I listened to the science programme on Radio 5 live this morning (well worth a listen on catch up).
A lot of people are getting the disease, not hospitalised and not overly severe symptoms. They are mainly in their 30s and 40s. Then they are getting an awful post viral syndrome which affects everyone differently but brings severe fatigue and inflammation of the lungs, heart and (sometimes) brain. It lasts for months. They are calling themselves the ‘long haulers’ and life is very hard for them.
Those people you cite who *should* be allowed to go about with no masks would suffer terribly from months of such symptoms - compare that to learning to wear a mask.
Anteater, you seem to have forgotten the purpose of mask wearing.
This is a very nasty disease. I listened to the science programme on Radio 5 live this morning (well worth a listen on catch up).
A lot of people are getting the disease, not hospitalised and not overly severe symptoms. They are mainly in their 30s and 40s. Then they are getting an awful post viral syndrome which affects everyone differently but brings severe fatigue and inflammation of the lungs, heart and (sometimes) brain. It lasts for months. They are calling themselves the ‘long haulers’ and life is very hard for them.
Those people you cite who *should* be allowed to go about with no masks would suffer terribly from months of such symptoms - compare that to learning to wear a mask.
I’ve had a fairly mild version of the post viral syndrome (postural tachycardia with resultant fatigue and shortness of breath, but normal heart and lungs - almost certainly an autonomic nervous system issue) and it’s taken me over 4 months to return to fairly ‘normal’ and I don’t know whether the symptoms will return. I was 50 when I got covid in March, fit and healthy with no prior medical issues, and I was not hospitalised with covid.
In a restaurant??? Where is that a law? We are trying to support local restaurants and in the probably 10 or so visits since mask-day, I've never seen a mask. How are you supposed to eat?
In the state of Baden-Württemberg in Germany and in most other states too. Where my son lives their current virus rate is zero for the whole area.
Obviously, you may remove your face covering while eating and drinking. You put it back on as soon as you are done with your meal and when entering and moving about the restaurant/cafe/anywhere indoors.
Why are their coronavirus numbers so low? Because they have strict laws on what people can and can’t do. Collective responsibility is strong and makes everyone safer.
Why are the UKs numbers so terrible? Because of fudge and more fudge. Our govt has knee jerk reactions which are both sudden and far too late. Wishy washy laws where no-one is sure what we can and can’t do.
It’s madness. I dread the winter when the virus will thrive here. (It likes the cold and it spreads well indoors).
Why are the UKs numbers so terrible? Because of fudge and more fudge. Our govt has knee jerk reactions which are both sudden and far too late. Wishy washy laws where no-one is sure what we can and can’t do.
The litany of errors by the UK government is very long: too late to introduce lockdown, too quick to relax the restrictions; abandoning tracing programme early on and then making a pigs ear of building a new system (in England, at least, in Scotland the government simply provided more support for the existing system); a complete disaster over providing health and care workers PPE. A lack of enforcement of measures put in place to control the virus, and very public examples of government officials not following the rules, largely destroyed public trust in the government acting in our best interests (many didn't believe that anyway, but though it was late the lockdown restrictions were at least sensible).
If the levels of incidence are low, and there's no particular reason for the unmasked person to be more likely to be infected (probably the case if they are asthmatic or psychologically unable, probably not if they are an intentional troublemaker) then you do get some benefit.
You only need to mask the carrier's, if we knew in advance we could mask (or better isolate) them. Or to quote Jesus "if we knew when the burgler was coming..."
So you do get all the benefit in 99% of cases. And even when the maskless is patient zero, at least the masked part of the herd won't pass it on, even if the immediate herd is are unprotected. So if trauma is involved, there probably is something.
I did see two people with visor and one unmasked today (I don't know why).
Why are the UKs numbers so terrible? Because of fudge and more fudge. Our govt has knee jerk reactions which are both sudden and far too late. Wishy washy laws where no-one is sure what we can and can’t do.
The litany of errors by the UK government is very long: too late to introduce lockdown, too quick to relax the restrictions; abandoning tracing programme early on and then making a pigs ear of building a new system (in England, at least, in Scotland the government simply provided more support for the existing system); a complete disaster over providing health and care workers PPE. A lack of enforcement of measures put in place to control the virus, and very public examples of government officials not following the rules, largely destroyed public trust in the government acting in our best interests (many didn't believe that anyway, but though it was late the lockdown restrictions were at least sensible).
I'm pretty new on here and I've been reading some threads on Purgatory wondering whether I should jump in to one of the 'big' discussions, and feeling a tad nervous about doing so! But I thought I would go for it anyway because I wasn't sure I agreed with this summary of the situation so far. Here goes (yikes!) ...
I am not sure how you conclude that the government was 'too late to introduce lockdown'? For example, Northern Ireland at the moment is experiencing a resurgence in Covid infections. When lockdown was introduced - the full lockdown on 23 March rather than the invitational version a week earlier (which lots of people, including myself, responded to) - Northern Ireland had confirmed it's first case just the day before. So lockdown was introduced extremely early for them. Yet I think at present their rate of increase is higher than in England. But in England alone, by the time lockdown was introduced (on 23 March), London had already past its peak in infections (not known at the time, but can now be seen in retrospect) while here in the north west of England we were still some time away from that, and so it could be said that in England the government was too late in locking down for London but just in time for the north west of England. According to (I think it was) Cambridge University genome project, the UK was hit by 1,300 patient zeros within a month from February to March, mostly British citizens returning from holidays in Spain, France and Italy. Therefore, unlike other European countries, the virus in the UK was seeded fairly evenly throughout the country but it was seeded over a period of one month, making it harder to time the lockdown to maximum effect for the whole country.
On the original track and trace ... we didn't have the numbers of staff to track and trace once the virus had taken hold here. Whereas the NHS didn't become overwhelmed our track and trace system did. It was good that we built it up to the extent that we did, albeit late in the day, and it is good now that local authorities are being given dedicated teams of extra contact tracers. That is appropriate for this stage of the pandemic when we are trying to get on top of local outbreaks. If we can keep that up, assuming local authorities get to grips with local outbreaks in their areas, then we should be able to live a half decent life in the hope of finding a vaccine.
Based on what I've read regarding PPE: first of all we had plenty of PPE in the pandemic stock. However, it was stock for a flu pandemic which meant we did not have enough of the right face masks or gowns. Unfortunately for us, we reached peak pandemic when China was still in lockdown and China is where we (and the rest of Europe, if not the world) had been getting most of our PPE from. I hope we have learned from this that we need a robust home based PPE supply chain. I'm sure this is a lesson for every country given that most if not all countries have had a PPE crisis at some point in their pandemic experience so far.
I am not entirely sure that public trust in the government's message has been destroyed as you suggest. If that had been the case then people would not have responded in Leicester, for example (and they have a mayor, still in position, who did not follow the Covid rules), and subsequently brought down the rate of infection; most people would not be wearing masks now, etc. While the government's Covid policies could be clearer in some respects - for example I think mask wearing should be backed up by doctor's letters for those exempt and should apply to staff as well as customers - releasing lockdown was always going to be a more difficult enterprise because to just release everything all at once in the manner we had closed everything all at once really would have been disastrous for the infection rate. Thus far I can see the point of the choices made given that it is all a balancing act between health and the economy even though sometimes (as with the point above) I don't think the government has been forceful or distinct enough.
Shops don't need any powers beyond their normal, legal right to refuse service.
There isn't an unconditional right to refuse service, and you can be prosecuted under Discrimination Legislation (I can't give chapter and verse) for refusing service to a minority group, such as those exempt from the need to wear masks.
They are not a protected minority group. Even those few with a legitimate reason do not have the right to infect others.
Shops don't need any powers beyond their normal, legal right to refuse service.
There isn't an unconditional right to refuse service, and you can be prosecuted under Discrimination Legislation (I can't give chapter and verse) for refusing service to a minority group, such as those exempt from the need to wear masks.
They are not a protected minority group. Even those few with a legitimate reason do not have the right to infect others.
If (in the UK) you want to discriminate against disabled people (and most of those unable to wear a mask would qualify, so barring the unmasked would count as indirect discrimination) you have to show that what you're doing is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. The aim here would be the safety of your staff and other customers, and I think (probably barring shops selling essential goods) you could make a good case for it being proportionate.
I am not sure how you conclude that the government was 'too late to introduce lockdown'?
A full lockdown was not placed on the UK until March 23, lagging behind other European nations. I was in Germany at the end of February and they were already shielding bus drivers with tape, not allowing passengers near them. Many bus drivers lives would have been saved if we’d done the same. They were already limiting the number of people in shops and enforcing distancing.
Two weeks before lockdown here I could see how things were going. I started hand sanitising and distancing (elbow bumps instead of handshakes etc). People - two or three at Church - poo pood my attitude.
In those two weeks there was Cheltenham races, a Liverpool football match and other events which, if they hadn’t happened, would have prevented 1000s of people from becoming infected and infectious.
Professor Ferguson said “The epidemic was doubling every three to four days before lockdown interventions were introduced. Had we introduced lockdown measures a week earlier, we would have then reduced the final death toll by at least a half."
(Epidemiologist Neil Ferguson is a professor at Imperial College in London.)
At the same time, people anticipated the lockdown in England. I was in Oxford St the week before, and it was empty. School attendance was shrinking and so on.
A brand new business just opened in our small town. It is a coffee shop and the weekly town newspaper printed a nice article about the shop and it's owner on the front page. They also printed a picture of the owner masked serving coffee to an unmasked customer. Now sadly people around town who believe in masks are saying they will not support the store.
Despite being anti-mask, I would have no criticism at all for people boycotting a shop if they genuinely believe that not wearing a mask is a health hazard, and a business make it fairly clear that they intend not to prevent, or even to encourage, people not to wear masks as they queue for their coffee. If he is not making a pitch to non maskers to support his shop, he should have been more careful.
LambChopped:
telling everybody that they had to wear masks inside because it was the LAW
In a restaurant??? Where is that a law? We are trying to support local restaurants and in the probably 10 or so visits since mask-day, I've never seen a mask. How are you supposed to eat?
But in the UK, as I have already said, the LAW does not mandate masks for everyone anywhere. It's interesting that at the Snooker world championship, the (now re-admitted) spectators are not wearing masks except for a few. SFAIK the Crucible is an enclosed space, and one of the smaller venues, so many churches would be as large.
As to the issue of whether it is unreasonable to claim "extreme distress" at wearing a mask, we must be wary of thinking we understand what this could mean to a person with any degree of mental illness, we may co-exist with breathing difficulties.
In the U.S., specifically St. Louis County. And duh, they let you take it off when actually eating, but the sign was ON THE DOOR directed at people waiting to be seated, picking up deliveries, paying, and the like. Why should the staff have to put up with unmasked people who are not actually eating or drinking?
My point (which seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle) is that it is safer and easier for a shop or restaurant attendant to deflect customer anger over masks by redirecting it to the legal powers-that-be. If you simply say to them, "No masks, no service," you risk a punch in the mouth or worse from various covidiots. So it's a safety issue.
It's not so difficult to grasp, esp. if you have been a parent. Surely every parent has given their child permission to "blame me" when their friends want to do something dangerous and the kid doesn't feel up to simply refusing on his own personal authority?
Shops don't need any powers beyond their normal, legal right to refuse service.
There isn't an unconditional right to refuse service, and you can be prosecuted under Discrimination Legislation (I can't give chapter and verse) for refusing service to a minority group, such as those exempt from the need to wear masks.
They are not a protected minority group. Even those few with a legitimate reason do not have the right to infect others.
If (in the UK) you want to discriminate against disabled people (and most of those unable to wear a mask would qualify, so barring the unmasked would count as indirect discrimination) you have to show that what you're doing is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. The aim here would be the safety of your staff and other customers, and I think (probably barring shops selling essential goods) you could make a good case for it being proportionate.
In addition, if you limit people not wearing masks to people who actually cannot wear them and actually cannot find a workaround to going to the shops, then accommodating them could be managed more safely.
I'm pretty new on here and I've been reading some threads on Purgatory wondering whether I should jump in to one of the 'big' discussions, and feeling a tad nervous about doing so! But I thought I would go for it anyway because I wasn't sure I agreed with this summary of the situation so far. Here goes (yikes!) ...
Welcome, and thanks for jumping in. We don't bite (too much!)
I am not sure how you conclude that the government was 'too late to introduce lockdown'? For example, Northern Ireland at the moment is experiencing a resurgence in Covid infections. When lockdown was introduced - the full lockdown on 23 March rather than the invitational version a week earlier (which lots of people, including myself, responded to) - Northern Ireland had confirmed it's first case just the day before. So lockdown was introduced extremely early for them.
The UK wide lockdown may have been at the right time for some regions, but was certainly late for others. The government could have decided on different lockdowns for different regions, but instead went for a national response (which has the advantage of providing less confusion for the public) - though devolved governments in Scotland and Wales had options for their own responses, as could NI if the Stormont government was functional. The current situation isn't relevant, the question is how infection rates responded to the lockdown over the few weeks afterwards. In the case of NI, deaths were exceeding 100 per week early in April, and therefore the virus was circulating in the community at least two weeks before then, at least a week before the 23rd March lockdown. Given that it was clear that the virus was already circulating within the community in other European nations late in February, with Italy already putting emergency measures in place to control the outbreak there, there was no particular reason not to lockdown at least two weeks before the 23rd March. In Scotland the first confirmed community transmission was 11th March, that should have triggered a lockdown but the Scottish government delayed four days before advising people to work at home where possible, and another 5 days before closing schools.
According to (I think it was) Cambridge University genome project, the UK was hit by 1,300 patient zeros within a month from February to March, mostly British citizens returning from holidays in Spain, France and Italy. Therefore, unlike other European countries, the virus in the UK was seeded fairly evenly throughout the country but it was seeded over a period of one month, making it harder to time the lockdown to maximum effect for the whole country.
One simple measure would be when community transmission has set in. If all cases can be readily tracked to individual "patient zero"s then you have an infection under control, get all those affected (those infected plus those who have had significant contact with them) isolated and you break that chain of transmission. When that's no longer possible, the only control method is a general lockdown. In Scotland that would have been 11th March, earlier than that in England. With hindsight, the UK should have instigated general quarantine for all people entering the country, especially as it became clear the virus was circulating freely in Italy and other European nations (and other European nations started to introduce such measures).
On the original track and trace ... we didn't have the numbers of staff to track and trace once the virus had taken hold here. Whereas the NHS didn't become overwhelmed our track and trace system did. It was good that we built it up to the extent that we did, albeit late in the day, and it is good now that local authorities are being given dedicated teams of extra contact tracers. That is appropriate for this stage of the pandemic when we are trying to get on top of local outbreaks. If we can keep that up, assuming local authorities get to grips with local outbreaks in their areas, then we should be able to live a half decent life in the hope of finding a vaccine.
Agree that the pandemic was allowed to get out of control, beyond any reasonable expectation of track and trace. In the early stages of the pandemic, up to about the middle of March, the system was working quite well. It's odd that the UK government then ignored that infrastructure as the number of infections fell and decided to develop a custom phone app, and when that failed to hurriedly give their chums in SERCO a contract to set up a call centre to phone people which was unrelated to the existing local resources (and, initially at least failed to communicate with the local people who needed to respond). In Scotland, the government decided instead to simply provide the local resources that had already shown themselves to be effective additional resources to cope with higher numbers - a system that has shown itself capable of responding more rapidly (the delays in local lockdown seen in, say, Leicester haven't happened here) and with higher rates of response from those contacted.
Based on what I've read regarding PPE: first of all we had plenty of PPE in the pandemic stock. However, it was stock for a flu pandemic which meant we did not have enough of the right face masks or gowns. Unfortunately for us, we reached peak pandemic when China was still in lockdown and China is where we (and the rest of Europe, if not the world) had been getting most of our PPE from. I hope we have learned from this that we need a robust home based PPE supply chain. I'm sure this is a lesson for every country given that most if not all countries have had a PPE crisis at some point in their pandemic experience so far.
Most EU nations haven't had as large problems with sourcing PPE, but the EU organised a scheme to procure the PPE needed in February, a scheme the UK government decided not to join in with due to their irrational desire to distance the UK from the rest of Europe. Bloody Brexit finds another way to damage the UK. There have been plenty of stories about companies that already supply the NHS acquiring stocks of suitable PPE which the government refused to buy, instead of preferring the equivalent of Trotters Independent Traders to supply inappropriate items procured at great expense from Turkey, and ending up selling their supplies to other European nations.
I am not entirely sure that public trust in the government's message has been destroyed as you suggest. If that had been the case then people would not have responded in Leicester, for example (and they have a mayor, still in position, who did not follow the Covid rules), and subsequently brought down the rate of infection; most people would not be wearing masks now, etc.
Trust in the government has never been great. But, though there were initially some instances of people disregarding the lockdown requirements there was a great knock in these when Dominic Cummings totally disregarded the rules - why should people think the UK government was introducing restrictions for their own good when senior government advisers can simply throw the rule book out of the window; it looks very much like rules to benefit government toffs with ordinary people taking the hit on their freedoms and lifestyles. I admit to never having had much respect for the government, but what little I had left in regard to handling the coronavirus pandemic (they were, afterall, the government in charge during a very difficult time and some mistakes could be expected) evaporated with Cummings drive up to see his mum against all the rules - and his "eye test" drive.
Shops don't need any powers beyond their normal, legal right to refuse service. That most will not exercise that right is a matter for USDAW (in the UK) to take up with employers.
Last night I ate at a restaurant (outside patio, people! sheesh ) where they had a freaking big sign up telling everybody that they had to wear masks inside because it was the LAW (strong implication: don't blame us, don't fight with us, take it up with the country exec). I think that is a good thing. Workers have enough to worry about without using their "moral authority" to enforce hygiene. Give them someone to blame--the local legislative will never feel the pain.
Oh sure, I support mask wearing being compulsory for all who can, but I was responding to the claim that shops needed specific powers to enforce it. Shops have the right to refuse service and ultimately it's up to staff working there whether they think the risks associated with challenging the maskless are worse than not doing so.
But the normal weighing of risks in retail is: will they shop here or not? Not, will my doorguard get physically assaulted?
Tell that to my sister when she worked nights at McDonalds.
What does that have to do with decisions made by the restaurant owner, unless perhaps not to open nights?
Your reply didn't have anything to do with the point I was making, why should mine with yours?
Shops don't need any powers beyond their normal, legal right to refuse service.
There isn't an unconditional right to refuse service, and you can be prosecuted under Discrimination Legislation (I can't give chapter and verse) for refusing service to a minority group, such as those exempt from the need to wear masks.
Under the United States Civil Rights Laws you cannot refuse service based on race, color, nationality, creed, or sex (interpreted by the courts to include gender identification). However, you can refuse to provide service say if the person is disruptive, refusing to wear minimum proper attire (usually shirt and shoes), or is inebriated. Since wearing a mask is mandatory in certain states or locales, the owner has the obligation to make sure those entering the store are compliant to state requirements. The only exception to that is if the person is physically incapable of wearing a mask, but, as pointed out above, that is usually very rare.
You only need to mask the carrier's, if we knew in advance we could mask (or better isolate) them. Or to quote Jesus "if we knew when the burgler was coming..."
If we knew which people had Covid-19, we would forcibly quarantine the lot of them, and this whole disaster would be over in a month.
Unfortunately, people who have Covid-19 and are either asymptomatic or not yet symptomatic don't look any different from healthy people.
Yes, I absolutely think that people who can't wear a mask should stay home, just like unvaccinated kids are sent home during a measles epidemic. It's the same thing. If you're an adult living on your own who can't tolerate wearing a mask, then I think we (society) should work out a way for you to get your basic needs met without you putting other people at risk. Which, for shopping, I think means someone does a weekly shop for you.
If you've got medical needs and need healthcare services, perhaps you can convince your healthcare team that you're being safe enough, or perhaps they mask up in N-95 and stuff, and treat you as if you have Covid.
Good news, the US Food and Drug Administration has approved a new saliva test that has been proven by the National Basketball Association. This will mean the results will be within hours, not days.
Neighbor reported he went to get himself and us a donut this morning. He was masked inside of the small shop when a man walked in without a mask. Owner shouted no mask no donut. He said it reminded him of the "The Soup Nazi".
Is anyone else wondering about how the NBA are qualified to prove a virus test?
Same way as any large institution, by bankrolling a bunch of researchers. For fairness it should be noted that the research was backed not just by the NBA but by the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA), the labor union representing NBA players. Both these entities are very motivated to have quick-turnaround tests at their disposal.
Yale administered the saliva test to a group that included NBA players and staff in the lead-up to the league's return to play and compared results to the nasal swab tests the same group took. The results almost universally matched, according to published research that has not yet been peer-reviewed.
The virus seems to like the cold, which doesn’t bode well for the winter.
This link takes you to a BBC report. Traces of the coronavirus were reportedly found on packaging in China recently, on consignments of frozen shrimp and frozen chicken wings from South America.
This has again raised questions about whether coronavirus can be transmitted via food packaging.
I generally let packages and non-perishable items sit in an out-of-the-way place for a couple of days to give the virus a chance to deactivate. (Not the proper word.) There are varying estimates of how long it can remain infectious on a surface.
While I've got only one nose (my grandkids call me "Grandpa BigNose"), I've got TWO elbow crooks ... So, where should I aim preferentially ... ??? ... Oh the tangled web of modern decisions ... !!!
I notice that right wing pundits are saying that we have got to zero deaths in England, therefore let's go back to normal. However, this assumes that the virus has "burned out". But you can argue of course, that we have got to zero through the lockdown, and relaxing it too much will cause new spikes. Isn't this happening in Europe, e.g., France has 5000 new cases?
An argument also going on about zero covid, advocated by some, greeted with horror by the right. However, this does not mean eradication. But I don't know how you get there, except closing borders.
An argument also going on about zero covid, advocated by some, greeted with horror by the right. However, this does not mean eradication. But I don't know how you get there, except closing borders.
It appears likely that this virus will be hiding/infecting/lurking somewhere in the human population essentially forever ... UNLESS ... we can gin up an eradication program akin to the elimination of smallpox ...
Given that it was clear that the virus was already circulating within the community in other European nations late in February, with Italy already putting emergency measures in place to control the outbreak there, there was no particular reason not to lockdown at least two weeks before the 23rd March. In Scotland the first confirmed community transmission was 11th March, that should have triggered a lockdown but the Scottish government delayed four days before advising people to work at home where possible, and another 5 days before closing schools.
I wonder ... do you not think we are all suffering a bit from wisdom in hindsight? I can certainly agree that instead of inviting us to stay home a week earlier, the government probably should have locked us down at that point although I can understand their reticence. A lot of the offices around mine closed the minute the government invited them to. Referring back to that genome study I mentioned, and remembering how we were advised early on that we were 'a few weeks' behind Italy etc, I wonder now whether we were actually much closer in time to Italy than we thought back then given that our citizens were returning from February half term with Covid in tow? Italy was able to determine its patient zero - from Wuhan - whereas we got 1,300 of them in the space of a month. Did we have much chance of avoiding a viral storm? Either way it will be interesting (on an intellectual level obviously) to learn what else the scientists discover over time which may help clarify things.
With hindsight, the UK should have instigated general quarantine for all people entering the country, especially as it became clear the virus was circulating freely in Italy and other European nations (and other European nations started to introduce such measures).
We did quarantine those coming back from Wuhan and from the cruise ships but how would we have quarantined all our travellers? There were hundreds of thousands of them. Even if we'd taken the approach we are taking at the moment - ie, not sending them off to a quarantine hotel or something - how would we have checked on so many all at once? We probably struggle with the numbers we have now. I do agree though that it would have been a good idea but I can understand why we didn't go down that route at the time given its practical challenges.
Closing our borders would have been the most obvious way of minimising the impact of course but then we would have done what New Zealand did and had to abandon our citizens across the planet. A family from New Zealand were interviewed on TV a couple of weeks ago. They had been over here visiting the father's parents (English) when New Zealand locked down and wouldn't let anyone in, including their own citizens at that point. They have ever since been living in his parents' summer house and have had five flights cancelled as they try to return to the country they call home. Should we have done that to our citizens? Being an island nation means that shutting borders is our best defence but somehow the idea that we abandon our citizens is something I found difficult to accept at the start and find it just as difficult now.
Agree that the pandemic was allowed to get out of control, beyond any reasonable expectation of track and trace. In the early stages of the pandemic, up to about the middle of March, the system was working quite well. It's odd that the UK government then ignored that infrastructure as the number of infections fell and decided to develop a custom phone app, and when that failed to hurriedly give their chums in SERCO a contract to set up a call centre to phone people which was unrelated to the existing local resources (and, initially at least failed to communicate with the local people who needed to respond).
I have never understood the enthusiasm for a track and trace app! Countries worldwide have adopted an app and pretty much all of them have had varying degrees of failure with them. I'm not averse to SERCO being involved as they have the ability to move at pace in a way that PHE does not, either on a local or national level, but clearly getting big numbers wasn't the solution in the end and letting 6,000 of the phone based staff go is a good indication that the government has come to the same conclusion! But now I believe the remaining call centre staff are being organised into teams to support local authorities and it's clear from how the recent outbreaks are being handled that central and local government are working together to tackle upticks in infection. So I suppose we are back to where we started in that respect. Let's hope all concerned have learned the necessary lessons and we keep on top of things from now on!
Most EU nations haven't had as large problems with sourcing PPE, but the EU organised a scheme to procure the PPE needed in February, a scheme the UK government decided not to join in with due to their irrational desire to distance the UK from the rest of Europe. Bloody Brexit finds another way to damage the UK. There have been plenty of stories about companies that already supply the NHS acquiring stocks of suitable PPE which the government refused to buy, instead of preferring the equivalent of Trotters Independent Traders to supply inappropriate items procured at great expense from Turkey, and ending up selling their supplies to other European nations.
First of all I will declare myself a committed Brexiteer, just so we are clear. (I have been one all my adult life, since way before it was A Thing btw) Having got that out of the way, I will say that I disagree with you on the matter of PPE. I remember Italy having a terrible problem sourcing PPE: the nurses in bin bags was a story during their peak just as it was during ours. Spain's medics threatened strike action during their peak because they were having to reuse PPE. France's medics weren't too happy either. Granted, they were hardest hit but then it's easy for a country with few cases to handle the situation. The real test of supply chains comes with a massive surge. China was closed when Europe was peak pandemic and the whole region was left horribly exposed. I also remember Germany refusing to help Italy when the pandemic first hit the country (Merkel later apologised) but that might have been with ventilators rather than PPE? Ironically, we helped China with PPE when they were in the midst of it. We can be so wonderful and then it comes back to bite us! (Btw, did the EU scheme ever deliver?)
[Sorry for chopping up your quotes - the system told me the 'body' was too long so I had to chop up your quotes and my responses!]
An argument also going on about zero covid, advocated by some, greeted with horror by the right. However, this does not mean eradication. But I don't know how you get there, except closing borders.
Not even New Zealand has been able to achieve that even though they thought they had. As far as I'm aware, the authorities there haven't yet established how the family which was the source of the new outbreak became infected.
I hadn't followed this thread for a while while visiting hospital and following all the rules re palliative care.
Nothing about this virus is about anyone's right except to be protected by your own mask and the masks of others. If you can't wear or won't wear a mask, please stay away and don't come in. You will need to find another way to get the groceries or whatever else you seek. No one cares that you feel you have rights which are being violated. Just saying.
It appears likely that this virus will be hiding/infecting/lurking somewhere in the human population essentially forever ... UNLESS ... we can gin up an eradication program akin to the elimination of smallpox ...
My understanding is that eradication is only possible for viruses that are found only in humans. Any virus that can be found in animal populations in the wild, like the coronavirus, cannot be eradicated.
It appears likely that this virus will be hiding/infecting/lurking somewhere in the human population essentially forever ... UNLESS ... we can gin up an eradication program akin to the elimination of smallpox ...
My understanding is that eradication is only possible for viruses that are found only in humans. Any virus that can be found in animal populations in the wild, like the coronavirus, cannot be eradicated.
Though, in this case we're talking about a disease that is caused by one of a large number of similar coronaviruses, with this particular version having crossed from (it appears) bats where several similar strains of coronavirus are endemic, via an intermediary species (probably pangolin illegally hunted for food or traditional medicine, although several other animals have bee suggested), to a single patient zero. We're not talking about a virus that's easily transferred from a wild reservoir to humans (unlike, for example, ebola carried by fruit bats), but one where such a transfer is a very unusual event very unlikely to be repeated (though, there are enough different viruses in animal reservoirs for a different virus to make such a jump leading to a highly contagious human disease about once a decade). There has been some evidence of SARS-CoV-2 infecting other animals, if it becomes established among domestic cats (for example) and from there can reinfect people then that would create a new transmission route that will make eradication very much harder.
Point of information: the smallpox virus may have come from an African rodent virus some 68,000 years ago. I remember seeing this in a Science Magazine article some years ago.
The point is, it also crossed over into the human population from another animal. And we have eradicated it. It may take a while, though. Hopefully not 68,000 years, through.
The best we can do is achieve something close to herd immunity. We will have outbreaks from time to time, but if we can mitigate its spread, so much the better.
And we will think it's over many times before it really is (as witness New Zealand).
Those of us in NZ who listened to the Director General of Health and the Prime Minister didn't think it was over, as they repeatedly said we had eliminated it for now but that didn't mean it was eradicated, and that there was a high likelihood of more cases. (though everyone hoped they were wrong). We had 102 days without any new cases caused by community transmission, then four people in a family tested positive. This has led to people in churches and school testing positive and Auckland (the largest city) going back into level 3 Alert and the rest of the country going back to level 2.
There are theories that the infection could have come from the cool store where the father of the family worked or that it may have come from an isolation facility. (Everyone coming into the country goes into managed isolation for 14 days, and is tested on days 3 and 12. If they develop COVID they are sent to stricter isolation with ongoing medical support.
Also there was a stuff up in that it was found that people working at the isolation facilities were not themselves being tested. That has been changed.
In New Zealand your government takes strong action in response to a handful of new cases. In the UK with a 1000 new cases a day we are told we are strengthening our testing tracking and tracing system. In the US with 50 thousand new cases a day, take your pick on which opinion suits your prejudices.
No one cares that you feel you have rights which are being violated.
I think quite a lot of people care over whether people's rights are being violated. I certainly hope so.
Now of course, you don't say nobody cares about violations of rights that they agree with, but rather about cases where people feel their rights are being violated. But I'm not sure this adds anything. Persecuted Muslims will likely feel they have a right to express there faith by outward signs (be it wearing veils or having long beards). So what in your view is the defining difference between somebody feeling they have a right and somebody actually having a right? Is it any more than your opinion?
Maybe it's the law, in which case the Muslims would not have a right in China, and it is probably true that few care in that country outside the actual persecuted group. In the UK people who self-certify as having a valid reason for not wearing a face mask are protected by the law, and therefore do have a legal right. Which presumably you do not care about.
I understand that some people really do believe that non mask-wearers are really threatening their health. I think that's a neurotic over-reaction except in cases where people are clearly toast if they get the virus. And I think if that's the case, they should remain isolated, since face masks even if you admit a significant reduction are not a full protection by any means. Anyway, I agree that my valuation of this counts for nothing.
The only area where I agree with you is that people, like me, who dislike masks can relatively easily organise their lives to avoid them and should cope with the situation in this way. Since the mandate I have worn one for about a total of ~5 mins without causing any problem. You just have to avoid certain situations.
I am in good health so very unlikely to "be toast" if I catch Covid. However, if an infected I Don't Need No Mask type infects me, then I might be ill for a couple of weeks and then take months to fully recover, as many have reported, or even have permanent lung damage.
I might give it to MrsLB. She works in a hospital enabling discharge of often vulnerable people. She could pass it to them either before she develops symptoms, or she may even be an asymptomatic spreader. They may well 'be toast'.
I wasn’t toast when I caught it in March but it has taken 5 months to shake off the worse symptom of my post-viral syndrome, that of postural tachycardia and fatigue, but I still have the slightly dysfunctional breathing and the tingling face (my post-viral syndrome is clearly affecting my autonomic nervous system). No prior medical problems and previously fit and well. I’m probably one of the lucky ones as I appear to be recovering.
Oh, and the second week of chest symptoms were very scary, despite having a moderate case which did not need hospital care. I’m a ex-nurse with a robust healthy attitude to disease and I found it very disturbing.
I wasn’t toast when I caught it in March but it has taken 5 months to shake off the worse symptom of my post-viral syndrome, that of postural tachycardia and fatigue, but I still have the slightly dysfunctional breathing and the tingling face (my post-viral syndrome is clearly affecting my autonomic nervous system). No prior medical problems and previously fit and well. I’m probably one of the lucky ones as I appear to be recovering.
Oh, and the second week of chest symptoms were very scary, despite having a moderate case which did not need hospital care. I’m a ex-nurse with a robust healthy attitude to disease and I found it very disturbing.
Comments
This is a very nasty disease. I listened to the science programme on Radio 5 live this morning (well worth a listen on catch up).
A lot of people are getting the disease, not hospitalised and not overly severe symptoms. They are mainly in their 30s and 40s. Then they are getting an awful post viral syndrome which affects everyone differently but brings severe fatigue and inflammation of the lungs, heart and (sometimes) brain. It lasts for months. They are calling themselves the ‘long haulers’ and life is very hard for them.
Those people you cite who *should* be allowed to go about with no masks would suffer terribly from months of such symptoms - compare that to learning to wear a mask.
In the state of Baden-Württemberg in Germany and in most other states too. Where my son lives their current virus rate is zero for the whole area.
Obviously, you may remove your face covering while eating and drinking. You put it back on as soon as you are done with your meal and when entering and moving about the restaurant/cafe/anywhere indoors.
Why are their coronavirus numbers so low? Because they have strict laws on what people can and can’t do. Collective responsibility is strong and makes everyone safer.
Why are the UKs numbers so terrible? Because of fudge and more fudge. Our govt has knee jerk reactions which are both sudden and far too late. Wishy washy laws where no-one is sure what we can and can’t do.
It’s madness. I dread the winter when the virus will thrive here. (It likes the cold and it spreads well indoors).
You only need to mask the carrier's, if we knew in advance we could mask (or better isolate) them. Or to quote Jesus "if we knew when the burgler was coming..."
So you do get all the benefit in 99% of cases. And even when the maskless is patient zero, at least the masked part of the herd won't pass it on, even if the immediate herd is are unprotected. So if trauma is involved, there probably is something.
I did see two people with visor and one unmasked today (I don't know why).
I am not sure how you conclude that the government was 'too late to introduce lockdown'? For example, Northern Ireland at the moment is experiencing a resurgence in Covid infections. When lockdown was introduced - the full lockdown on 23 March rather than the invitational version a week earlier (which lots of people, including myself, responded to) - Northern Ireland had confirmed it's first case just the day before. So lockdown was introduced extremely early for them. Yet I think at present their rate of increase is higher than in England. But in England alone, by the time lockdown was introduced (on 23 March), London had already past its peak in infections (not known at the time, but can now be seen in retrospect) while here in the north west of England we were still some time away from that, and so it could be said that in England the government was too late in locking down for London but just in time for the north west of England. According to (I think it was) Cambridge University genome project, the UK was hit by 1,300 patient zeros within a month from February to March, mostly British citizens returning from holidays in Spain, France and Italy. Therefore, unlike other European countries, the virus in the UK was seeded fairly evenly throughout the country but it was seeded over a period of one month, making it harder to time the lockdown to maximum effect for the whole country.
On the original track and trace ... we didn't have the numbers of staff to track and trace once the virus had taken hold here. Whereas the NHS didn't become overwhelmed our track and trace system did. It was good that we built it up to the extent that we did, albeit late in the day, and it is good now that local authorities are being given dedicated teams of extra contact tracers. That is appropriate for this stage of the pandemic when we are trying to get on top of local outbreaks. If we can keep that up, assuming local authorities get to grips with local outbreaks in their areas, then we should be able to live a half decent life in the hope of finding a vaccine.
Based on what I've read regarding PPE: first of all we had plenty of PPE in the pandemic stock. However, it was stock for a flu pandemic which meant we did not have enough of the right face masks or gowns. Unfortunately for us, we reached peak pandemic when China was still in lockdown and China is where we (and the rest of Europe, if not the world) had been getting most of our PPE from. I hope we have learned from this that we need a robust home based PPE supply chain. I'm sure this is a lesson for every country given that most if not all countries have had a PPE crisis at some point in their pandemic experience so far.
I am not entirely sure that public trust in the government's message has been destroyed as you suggest. If that had been the case then people would not have responded in Leicester, for example (and they have a mayor, still in position, who did not follow the Covid rules), and subsequently brought down the rate of infection; most people would not be wearing masks now, etc. While the government's Covid policies could be clearer in some respects - for example I think mask wearing should be backed up by doctor's letters for those exempt and should apply to staff as well as customers - releasing lockdown was always going to be a more difficult enterprise because to just release everything all at once in the manner we had closed everything all at once really would have been disastrous for the infection rate. Thus far I can see the point of the choices made given that it is all a balancing act between health and the economy even though sometimes (as with the point above) I don't think the government has been forceful or distinct enough.
If (in the UK) you want to discriminate against disabled people (and most of those unable to wear a mask would qualify, so barring the unmasked would count as indirect discrimination) you have to show that what you're doing is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. The aim here would be the safety of your staff and other customers, and I think (probably barring shops selling essential goods) you could make a good case for it being proportionate.
A full lockdown was not placed on the UK until March 23, lagging behind other European nations. I was in Germany at the end of February and they were already shielding bus drivers with tape, not allowing passengers near them. Many bus drivers lives would have been saved if we’d done the same. They were already limiting the number of people in shops and enforcing distancing.
Two weeks before lockdown here I could see how things were going. I started hand sanitising and distancing (elbow bumps instead of handshakes etc). People - two or three at Church - poo pood my attitude.
In those two weeks there was Cheltenham races, a Liverpool football match and other events which, if they hadn’t happened, would have prevented 1000s of people from becoming infected and infectious.
Professor Ferguson said “The epidemic was doubling every three to four days before lockdown interventions were introduced. Had we introduced lockdown measures a week earlier, we would have then reduced the final death toll by at least a half."
(Epidemiologist Neil Ferguson is a professor at Imperial College in London.)
In the U.S., specifically St. Louis County. And duh, they let you take it off when actually eating, but the sign was ON THE DOOR directed at people waiting to be seated, picking up deliveries, paying, and the like. Why should the staff have to put up with unmasked people who are not actually eating or drinking?
My point (which seems to have gotten lost in the shuffle) is that it is safer and easier for a shop or restaurant attendant to deflect customer anger over masks by redirecting it to the legal powers-that-be. If you simply say to them, "No masks, no service," you risk a punch in the mouth or worse from various covidiots. So it's a safety issue.
It's not so difficult to grasp, esp. if you have been a parent. Surely every parent has given their child permission to "blame me" when their friends want to do something dangerous and the kid doesn't feel up to simply refusing on his own personal authority?
The UK wide lockdown may have been at the right time for some regions, but was certainly late for others. The government could have decided on different lockdowns for different regions, but instead went for a national response (which has the advantage of providing less confusion for the public) - though devolved governments in Scotland and Wales had options for their own responses, as could NI if the Stormont government was functional. The current situation isn't relevant, the question is how infection rates responded to the lockdown over the few weeks afterwards. In the case of NI, deaths were exceeding 100 per week early in April, and therefore the virus was circulating in the community at least two weeks before then, at least a week before the 23rd March lockdown. Given that it was clear that the virus was already circulating within the community in other European nations late in February, with Italy already putting emergency measures in place to control the outbreak there, there was no particular reason not to lockdown at least two weeks before the 23rd March. In Scotland the first confirmed community transmission was 11th March, that should have triggered a lockdown but the Scottish government delayed four days before advising people to work at home where possible, and another 5 days before closing schools.
One simple measure would be when community transmission has set in. If all cases can be readily tracked to individual "patient zero"s then you have an infection under control, get all those affected (those infected plus those who have had significant contact with them) isolated and you break that chain of transmission. When that's no longer possible, the only control method is a general lockdown. In Scotland that would have been 11th March, earlier than that in England. With hindsight, the UK should have instigated general quarantine for all people entering the country, especially as it became clear the virus was circulating freely in Italy and other European nations (and other European nations started to introduce such measures).
Agree that the pandemic was allowed to get out of control, beyond any reasonable expectation of track and trace. In the early stages of the pandemic, up to about the middle of March, the system was working quite well. It's odd that the UK government then ignored that infrastructure as the number of infections fell and decided to develop a custom phone app, and when that failed to hurriedly give their chums in SERCO a contract to set up a call centre to phone people which was unrelated to the existing local resources (and, initially at least failed to communicate with the local people who needed to respond). In Scotland, the government decided instead to simply provide the local resources that had already shown themselves to be effective additional resources to cope with higher numbers - a system that has shown itself capable of responding more rapidly (the delays in local lockdown seen in, say, Leicester haven't happened here) and with higher rates of response from those contacted.
Most EU nations haven't had as large problems with sourcing PPE, but the EU organised a scheme to procure the PPE needed in February, a scheme the UK government decided not to join in with due to their irrational desire to distance the UK from the rest of Europe. Bloody Brexit finds another way to damage the UK. There have been plenty of stories about companies that already supply the NHS acquiring stocks of suitable PPE which the government refused to buy, instead of preferring the equivalent of Trotters Independent Traders to supply inappropriate items procured at great expense from Turkey, and ending up selling their supplies to other European nations.
Trust in the government has never been great. But, though there were initially some instances of people disregarding the lockdown requirements there was a great knock in these when Dominic Cummings totally disregarded the rules - why should people think the UK government was introducing restrictions for their own good when senior government advisers can simply throw the rule book out of the window; it looks very much like rules to benefit government toffs with ordinary people taking the hit on their freedoms and lifestyles. I admit to never having had much respect for the government, but what little I had left in regard to handling the coronavirus pandemic (they were, afterall, the government in charge during a very difficult time and some mistakes could be expected) evaporated with Cummings drive up to see his mum against all the rules - and his "eye test" drive.
Boy if that isn't passive aggressive.
Under the United States Civil Rights Laws you cannot refuse service based on race, color, nationality, creed, or sex (interpreted by the courts to include gender identification). However, you can refuse to provide service say if the person is disruptive, refusing to wear minimum proper attire (usually shirt and shoes), or is inebriated. Since wearing a mask is mandatory in certain states or locales, the owner has the obligation to make sure those entering the store are compliant to state requirements. The only exception to that is if the person is physically incapable of wearing a mask, but, as pointed out above, that is usually very rare.
If we knew which people had Covid-19, we would forcibly quarantine the lot of them, and this whole disaster would be over in a month.
Unfortunately, people who have Covid-19 and are either asymptomatic or not yet symptomatic don't look any different from healthy people.
Yes, I absolutely think that people who can't wear a mask should stay home, just like unvaccinated kids are sent home during a measles epidemic. It's the same thing. If you're an adult living on your own who can't tolerate wearing a mask, then I think we (society) should work out a way for you to get your basic needs met without you putting other people at risk. Which, for shopping, I think means someone does a weekly shop for you.
If you've got medical needs and need healthcare services, perhaps you can convince your healthcare team that you're being safe enough, or perhaps they mask up in N-95 and stuff, and treat you as if you have Covid.
They are good at wishful thinking?
Or perhaps it's that the players from the NBA were the test subjects...
Nah - this is modern America. We don't believe in science, but one whiff of a celebrity endorsement, and ...
Same way as any large institution, by bankrolling a bunch of researchers. For fairness it should be noted that the research was backed not just by the NBA but by the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA), the labor union representing NBA players. Both these entities are very motivated to have quick-turnaround tests at their disposal.
This link takes you to a BBC report. Traces of the coronavirus were reportedly found on packaging in China recently, on consignments of frozen shrimp and frozen chicken wings from South America.
This has again raised questions about whether coronavirus can be transmitted via food packaging.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/explainers-53783890
🤔
Works for me too ... But ...
While I've got only one nose (my grandkids call me "Grandpa BigNose"), I've got TWO elbow crooks ... So, where should I aim preferentially ... ??? ... Oh the tangled web of modern decisions ... !!!
It appears likely that this virus will be hiding/infecting/lurking somewhere in the human population essentially forever ... UNLESS ... we can gin up an eradication program akin to the elimination of smallpox ...
We did quarantine those coming back from Wuhan and from the cruise ships but how would we have quarantined all our travellers? There were hundreds of thousands of them. Even if we'd taken the approach we are taking at the moment - ie, not sending them off to a quarantine hotel or something - how would we have checked on so many all at once? We probably struggle with the numbers we have now. I do agree though that it would have been a good idea but I can understand why we didn't go down that route at the time given its practical challenges.
Closing our borders would have been the most obvious way of minimising the impact of course but then we would have done what New Zealand did and had to abandon our citizens across the planet. A family from New Zealand were interviewed on TV a couple of weeks ago. They had been over here visiting the father's parents (English) when New Zealand locked down and wouldn't let anyone in, including their own citizens at that point. They have ever since been living in his parents' summer house and have had five flights cancelled as they try to return to the country they call home. Should we have done that to our citizens? Being an island nation means that shutting borders is our best defence but somehow the idea that we abandon our citizens is something I found difficult to accept at the start and find it just as difficult now.
I have never understood the enthusiasm for a track and trace app! Countries worldwide have adopted an app and pretty much all of them have had varying degrees of failure with them. I'm not averse to SERCO being involved as they have the ability to move at pace in a way that PHE does not, either on a local or national level, but clearly getting big numbers wasn't the solution in the end and letting 6,000 of the phone based staff go is a good indication that the government has come to the same conclusion! But now I believe the remaining call centre staff are being organised into teams to support local authorities and it's clear from how the recent outbreaks are being handled that central and local government are working together to tackle upticks in infection. So I suppose we are back to where we started in that respect. Let's hope all concerned have learned the necessary lessons and we keep on top of things from now on!
First of all I will declare myself a committed Brexiteer, just so we are clear.
[Sorry for chopping up your quotes - the system told me the 'body' was too long so I had to chop up your quotes and my responses!]
And we will think it's over many times before it really is (as witness New Zealand).
Nothing about this virus is about anyone's right except to be protected by your own mask and the masks of others. If you can't wear or won't wear a mask, please stay away and don't come in. You will need to find another way to get the groceries or whatever else you seek. No one cares that you feel you have rights which are being violated. Just saying.
My understanding is that eradication is only possible for viruses that are found only in humans. Any virus that can be found in animal populations in the wild, like the coronavirus, cannot be eradicated.
"We shall see ... " -- Reb. Saunders to Reuven Malter, in "The Chosen" ...
The point is, it also crossed over into the human population from another animal. And we have eradicated it. It may take a while, though. Hopefully not 68,000 years, through.
The best we can do is achieve something close to herd immunity. We will have outbreaks from time to time, but if we can mitigate its spread, so much the better.
Those of us in NZ who listened to the Director General of Health and the Prime Minister didn't think it was over, as they repeatedly said we had eliminated it for now but that didn't mean it was eradicated, and that there was a high likelihood of more cases. (though everyone hoped they were wrong). We had 102 days without any new cases caused by community transmission, then four people in a family tested positive. This has led to people in churches and school testing positive and Auckland (the largest city) going back into level 3 Alert and the rest of the country going back to level 2.
There are theories that the infection could have come from the cool store where the father of the family worked or that it may have come from an isolation facility. (Everyone coming into the country goes into managed isolation for 14 days, and is tested on days 3 and 12. If they develop COVID they are sent to stricter isolation with ongoing medical support.
Also there was a stuff up in that it was found that people working at the isolation facilities were not themselves being tested. That has been changed.
Now of course, you don't say nobody cares about violations of rights that they agree with, but rather about cases where people feel their rights are being violated. But I'm not sure this adds anything. Persecuted Muslims will likely feel they have a right to express there faith by outward signs (be it wearing veils or having long beards). So what in your view is the defining difference between somebody feeling they have a right and somebody actually having a right? Is it any more than your opinion?
Maybe it's the law, in which case the Muslims would not have a right in China, and it is probably true that few care in that country outside the actual persecuted group. In the UK people who self-certify as having a valid reason for not wearing a face mask are protected by the law, and therefore do have a legal right. Which presumably you do not care about.
I understand that some people really do believe that non mask-wearers are really threatening their health. I think that's a neurotic over-reaction except in cases where people are clearly toast if they get the virus. And I think if that's the case, they should remain isolated, since face masks even if you admit a significant reduction are not a full protection by any means. Anyway, I agree that my valuation of this counts for nothing.
The only area where I agree with you is that people, like me, who dislike masks can relatively easily organise their lives to avoid them and should cope with the situation in this way. Since the mandate I have worn one for about a total of ~5 mins without causing any problem. You just have to avoid certain situations.
I am in good health so very unlikely to "be toast" if I catch Covid. However, if an infected I Don't Need No Mask type infects me, then I might be ill for a couple of weeks and then take months to fully recover, as many have reported, or even have permanent lung damage.
I might give it to MrsLB. She works in a hospital enabling discharge of often vulnerable people. She could pass it to them either before she develops symptoms, or she may even be an asymptomatic spreader. They may well 'be toast'.
It's not just about the people you breathe on.
That's my neurotic over-reaction.
Oh, and the second week of chest symptoms were very scary, despite having a moderate case which did not need hospital care. I’m a ex-nurse with a robust healthy attitude to disease and I found it very disturbing.
He thinks "we're testing too much ..." ... It "makes us look bad ..."
*shudder*