How should Covid19 have been managed in the UK?

[BRX]

Moderator note: Split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/omicron-the-latest-variant-of-concern.225357

If we say that the response to Covid is entirely responsible for these knock-on problems then it suggests that there were alternative responses that could have avoided or reduced them. I'm interested to know what people think those alternative responses would have been.

 

[yorkie]

If we say that the response to Covid is entirely responsible for these knock-on problems then it suggests that there were alternative responses that could have avoided or reduced them. I'm interested to know what people think those alternative responses would have been.

As stated before, Sweden have done pretty well; they avoided harsh lockdowns and over time their outcomes has simply got better and better compared to other countries.

IN NUMBERS: Excess mortality in Sweden during pandemic now lower than most in Europe (thelocal.se)

Compared to most other European countries, the number of people being treated in hospital for Covid-19 in Sweden remains low, with only Austria, The Netherlands, and Norway reporting a lower per capita hospitalisation rate.

When it comes to the number of deaths with Covid-19 over the past seven days, Sweden is in an even better position. In the week running up to and including Friday 7 January, Sweden had the lowest number of confirmed deaths per million people in Europe.

[Sweden's] cumulative Covid-19 death rate over the pandemic is now lower than those of most countries in Europe.

When you look at total excess mortality — the cumulative difference between the reported number of deaths since 1 January 2020 and the projected number of deaths for the same period based on previous years — Sweden now has one of the lowest rates in Europe.

People who support the more authoritarian harsh lockdown measures implemented in the UK won't like this inconvenient truth.

 

[MikeWM]

My plan back in August 2020 was the following (reposted here for convenience). I'd have done this basically from the very start. I think it has held up fairly well in retrospect - many would no doubt disagree, but I think if we'd followed this plan we would have been through the pandemic rather more quickly and with significantly less damage.


- Repeal the Coronavirus Act and all the regulations made under the 1984 Public Health Act.

- Put in place proper mechanisms to allow the vulnerable to shield *if they choose to do so*. Guaranteed free deliveries (food, medicine, etc.) Full furlough scheme for all such people of working age. Proper community support so they don't feel abandoned.

- Protect care homes. No bank staff moving between homes. Proper financial support for staff who have symptoms so they don't have to force themselves into work.

- No mandated social distancing, masks, covid-compliance workplaces or anything else like that. Everything opens and is back to normal. Tell people to wash their hands, stay home if ill, and otherwise use their common sense.

- Massive media and political campaign to communicate the actual risks to each section of society.

- Supply Vitamin D supplements for the entire population - special attention for those who naturally have lower vitamin D levels (eg. the BAME community).

- For people with symptoms - or those living with them - prescribe HCQ, Zinc and the other thing that goes with them.

- For people who are deteriorating, get them proper oxygen etc. treatment *as quickly as possible* - don't wait until they are effectively at death's door before admitting them to hospital. Use the Nightingale hospitals or similar for these so that the regular hospitals can get back to operating as normally as possible. Ventilators should be an absolute last resort.

 

[yorkie]

My plan back in August 2020 was the following (reposted here for convenience). I'd have done this basically from the very start. I think it has held up fairly well in retrospect - many would no doubt disagree, but I think if we'd followed this plan we would have been through the pandemic rather more quickly and with significantly less damage.


- Repeal the Coronavirus Act and all the regulations made under the 1984 Public Health Act.

- Put in place proper mechanisms to allow the vulnerable to shield *if they choose to do so*. Guaranteed free deliveries (food, medicine, etc.) Full furlough scheme for all such people of working age. Proper community support so they don't feel abandoned.

- Protect care homes. No bank staff moving between homes. Proper financial support for staff who have symptoms so they don't have to force themselves into work.

- No mandated social distancing, masks, covid-compliance workplaces or anything else like that. Everything opens and is back to normal. Tell people to wash their hands, stay home if ill, and otherwise use their common sense.

- Massive media and political campaign to communicate the actual risks to each section of society.

- Supply Vitamin D supplements for the entire population - special attention for those who naturally have lower vitamin D levels (eg. the BAME community).

- For people with symptoms - or those living with them - prescribe HCQ, Zinc and the other thing that goes with them.

- For people who are deteriorating, get them proper oxygen etc. treatment *as quickly as possible* - don't wait until they are effectively at death's door before admitting them to hospital. Use the Nightingale hospitals or similar for these so that the regular hospitals can get back to operating as normally as possible. Ventilators should be an absolute last resort.

Another thing I'd add is: educate people on the effectiveness of different types of face covering; let people choose. That way vulnerable people could make the choice to wear highly effective tight-fitting FFP2/3 masks if they wish to do so, and to avoid any expectation that other people need to wear masks on the basis that "my mask doesn't protect me so I need you to wear yours" which never made any sense.

I also think it was wrong to close* schools, at least not for as long as they were closed for. (* Before anyone says "but they didn't close", getting an attendance of about 10 students out of 700+ doesn't count as open in my book!)

 

[MikeWM]

Another thing I'd add is: educate people on the effectiveness of different types of face covering; let people choose. That way vulnerable people could make the choice to wear highly effective tight-fitting FFP2/3 masks if they wish to do so, and to avoid any expectation that other people need to wear masks on the basis that "my mask doesn't protect me so I need you to wear yours" which never made any sense.

While I really don't want to go further down any dystopian roads, presumably goggles (or one of those otherwise silly face shields, perhaps?) would also be useful in that specific case, given many viruses enter the body through the eyes?

I also think it was wrong to close* schools, at least not for as long as they were closed for. (* Before anyone says "but they didn't close", getting an attendance of about 10 students out of 700+ doesn't count as open in my book!)

Schools should never have been closed in my opinion. I suppose that under my plan we may have needed some special arrangements for the small number of pupils who live with vulnerable people - not quite sure what that would be, but I'm sure we could have come up with something workable.

 

[nw1]

This is just opinion and not based on hard evidence but - it seemed to me as a layman that both lockdowns (2020 and 2021) went on too long, perhaps two months after we were over the worst of both peaks.

In 2020 (but not 2021) other countries seemed to 'open up' sooner than us, typically in early May; was it actually necessary to keep shops closed until mid June and pubs until early July? Could both steps have been made a month earlier?

Likewise in 2021 the restrictions seemed to carry on about a month longer than was necessary.

I do think too much panic was spread over Omicron, perhaps for political reasons.

Another comment I would make on the lockdowns is that they were too harsh. While I understand the 'avoid mixing with other people' part, I disliked the criminalisation of low-risk activity. For example, if someone wanted to go for a walk all day on their own in quiet countryside (not using public transport) what was the problem with that? Likewise, the criminalisation of drinking a coffee on your own in a park or nature area. All these seemed to be control for the sake of it and would have had negligible effect on controlling the virus.

Perhaps they should not have advised self-isolation for merely a cough (given a cough is a very generic symptom) in March 2020, and just restricted the instruction to high fever (more severe than typical for a bad cold) or loss of taste and smell. At that time, online ordering was very difficult, so people were screwed if they wanted to get essentials.

Acknowledge that lockdown has severe side-effects including severe mental health problems and job losses.

Drop the 'guilt-tripping'. For me personally, this made me on more than one occasion feel guilty about going to the supermarket when I sensed I might possibly have very mild cold-like symptoms (which in normal times I'd barely have noticed). This was in the days before readily available tests.

And finally, when Covid first arrived, they should have invested money on being able to make the health service cope with it. Instead we're stuck two years later with nothing having been done in this regard.

 

[BRX]

My post which was extracted from another thread and used as the OP for this thread is presented without the context of what it was responding to. I was responding to these comments:

As if more proof were needed that we are now starting to see the downside of lockdowns/restrictions, have just seen this article from The Guardian:

"Parents are being warned to look out for signs of a non-Covid virus that is “rife” in the UK amid a surge in reports of children struggling to breathe.
The British Lung Foundation (BLF) said Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) is staging a comeback this winter after lockdown last year meant there were fewer infections than would normally occur.
It is concerned that this year children will have “much lower immunity” at a time when the NHS is already under extreme pressure."
https://www.theguardian.com/society...ection-uk-rise-children-struggling-to-breathe

Another virus in the news, I hope no one starts calling for a similar response to this one.

Particularly as the response to covid is entirely to blame for this.

A few points to consider

- Sweden is also seeing problems with a rise in RSV cases:

Stockholm's RSV warning: 'Keep your children at home if they have baby siblings'

Stockholm health officials are urging parents of children younger than one to keep their older siblings home from preschool, amid an increase in the number of RSV infections.

www.thelocal.se

- Of course, Sweden is popular as an example, because it's managed an apparent lower covid death rate and excess death rate than many other European countries. However, its immediate neighbours, Norway and Denmark have done very significantly better on both counts, and hence we launch into discussions of what are meaningful comparisons between countries. I think we have to be very careful comparing countries on basic numbers like this, because there is no attempt to correct for other factors, things like demographics. The "excess deaths" number is attractive because it would seem to be free of things like differences in definitions of deaths "caused" by covid, for example. But it is still subject to effects relating from demographic differences. Here is a study that looked at excess deaths in Spain, Sweden and Germany, and attempted to correct for differences in age profile (including recent changes in age profile) for each country. Here is the graph of cumulative excess deaths that they present having applied corrections:



As you can see, Sweden now does worse than Germany. I am actually relatively open minded about the efficacy of Sweden's approach: I hope that once the pandemic is "over" there will be more studies trying to disentangle the data to try and get a better picture of how well it worked. I post the stuff above to illustrate that things are never as straightforward as they seem when looking at simplistic comparisons between countries.

 

[seagull]

The context makes no difference, to demand an alternative solution from those posting about the problems now being faced as a result of the lockdowns and restrictions is your prerogative, but it by no means follows that someone simply pointing out the problems automatically thinks there could or should have been a different initial response.
And incidentally none of the media outlets I've seen who have reported on rises in other diseases, like TB and now RSV, seem to feel they have a duty to suggest an alternative where this wouldn't have happened, either.
Hence my accusation of your being unnecessarily confrontational in your demands.

 

[brad465]

We should have had no Government mandating of anything, limited only to guidance in key areas, with exceptions maybe on mass gatherings over a certain number. Before the Government "got involved", businesses and the public generally were already taking steps to limit contact: the London Marathon was postponed, as was the Premier League, I know a few local events that were also, as well as some work meetings that would've involved staff travelling from multiple offices to gather. McDonalds were take-out only around 2 weeks before the Government ordered fast-food chains to do this. Okay, there were exceptions, chiefly Cheltenham, but otherwise a lot was already being done without Government intervention.

The Government's role should have been limited to PPE procurement, improving hospital capacity were possible (many Nightingale venues were not going to see alternative use during the pandemic anyway), vaccines, providing financial support to isolating workers and businesses struggling during covid peaks. Had we behaved like this I reckon not much activity would've happened in the spring, but the summer would have been very close to a normal summer, before maybe an autumn and winter similar to how people have behaving recently, maybe slightly more cautious.

 

[Dent]

It is a matter of fact that the response to COVID has caused problems, one of which an immunity deficit for other illnesses. I don't understand why anyone has a problem with that basic fact being acknowledged. What any other countries may have done does not change that basic fact.

The post which started this thread is doing nothing but create confrontation for no reason, and what other countries have done is a red herring.

 

[sjpowermac]

I also think it was wrong to close* schools, at least not for as long as they were closed for. (* Before anyone says "but they didn't close", getting an attendance of about 10 students out of 700+ doesn't count as open in my book!)

Agreed, it was wrong to close schools, I think they should have been open throughout, even in April 2020.

Remember though, they did remain fully open in the second lockdown (November 2020).

In addition, they were the first settings to re-open during the third lockdown, being open to all from 8th March 2021.

Your figure of 10 out of 700 seems to correspond with my own experience in April 2020. By late May though my school had about 10% of students in.

You forget too that Year 10 retuned to schools in June 2020, albeit in a limited fashion. In addition, during the third lockdown, my school had roughly 15% of students in school and I know of many others where there were well over 20%.

Add in that many teachers have learned how to deliver live lessons online through the use of Google Meets/Zoom and it hasn’t been an easy time to be a teacher. Your post completely fails to acknowledge the efforts that teachers have gone to.

For the avoidance of doubt, I worked full time and in person in school from May 2020 onwards.

 

[BRX]

The context makes no difference, to demand an alternative solution from those posting about the problems now being faced as a result of the lockdowns and restrictions is your prerogative, but it by no means follows that someone simply pointing out the problems automatically thinks there could or should have been a different initial response.
And incidentally none of the media outlets I've seen who have reported on rises in other diseases, like TB and now RSV, seem to feel they have a duty to suggest an alternative where this wouldn't have happened, either.
Hence my accusation of your being unnecessarily confrontational in your demands.

If you say that a response to a situation is "entirely to blame" for various knock-on effects, it suggests that it's the response that has caused the problems rather than the situation being responded to that has caused the problems.

If you are driving a car, are suddenly faced with someone coming the other way on the wrong side of the road, you swerve and crash, do you then say "the driver's choice to swerve is entirely to blame for the accident"?

No, unless there was a reasonable alternative. The other driver (or whatever caused them to be on the wrong side of the road) is to blame.

That's why I ask what the reasonable alternative was in the case of the Covid response - that would have prevented these knowck on effects such as an increase in RSV cases. If there wasn't any such alternative, then the response is not "entirely to blame". The situation has been caused by the covid pandemic, not the response to it.

 

[Cdd89]

For me, the fundamental issue was with the fact that the legislation could be summarised as “no person can leave their home without <reasonable excuse…>”.

If specific things are very high risk, and healthcare would otherwise go under, fine, ban them. I am even happy for guidance to minimise travel to be issued. But the way it was written (and interpreted by some police) meant that, by stepping foot outside your home, you are by default breaking the law unless you can prove a reasonable excuse.

This was verging on a police state with an inversion of the presumption of innocence, and resulted in profiling and discrimination. I was never questioned, but I saw other people receiving questioning, and had I been younger or looked different I am sure I would have been. I know people who were so terrified of being questioned that they just stayed at home, with deleterious mental health implications. The different elements of lockdowns need to be separated, not considered in totality; and this aspect undoubtedly killed people or ruined lives while having minimal impact on relieving pressure.

I was dismayed at how much support it received from those on the Left (who are also rightly against things like ‘Stop and Search’). I never again wish to live in such an environment, and I would hold this view even if the next virus to come along was Ebola.

 

[philosopher]

For me, the fundamental issue was with the fact that the legislation could be summarised as “no person can leave their home without <reasonable excuse…>”.

If specific things are very high risk, and healthcare would otherwise go under, fine, ban them. I am even happy for guidance to minimise travel to be issued. But the way it was written (and interpreted by some police) meant that, by stepping foot outside your home, you are by default breaking the law unless you can prove a reasonable excuse.

This was verging on a police state with an inversion of the presumption of innocence, and resulted in profiling and discrimination. I was never questioned, but I saw other people receiving questioning, and had I been younger or looked different I am sure I would have been. I know people who were so terrified of being questioned that they just stayed at home, with deleterious mental health implications. The different elements of lockdowns need to be separated, not considered in totality; and this aspect undoubtedly killed people or ruined lives while having minimal impact on relieving pressure.

I was dismayed at how much support it received from those on the Left (who are also rightly against things like ‘Stop and Search’). I never again wish to live in such an environment, and I would hold this view even if the next virus to come along was Ebola.

I think some restrictions were necessary, but lockdowns where you were banned from leaving your house without reasonable excuse or almost all non work social contact being banned was probably unnecessary and likely did more harm than good. Such restrictions violate basic human freedoms such as the right for a private and family life and therefore need an exceptionally good reasons to be implemented. An illness with a 1% or less mortality rate to me does not justify such measures.

Perhaps restrictions similar to those in June 2021, i.e rule of six indoors, social distancing, masks and WFH advice should have been place between mid March 2020 and the end of April 2021. If things got bad, perhaps people should have been adviced not to meet up indoors, but they should not have been banned from doing so. Schools, at least up until 6th form should have been open throughout.

 

[GS250]

I think hindsight will provide plenty of answers as to every government's response.

One thing is clear though, yet more restrictions won't go down well with the UK public (Downing Street fiasco or not). Like many, I enjoy a good debate on matters such as politics. I've had plenty of robust but civilised debates with work colleagues on matters such as Lab/Con, Brexit etc etc. Many a time we've agreed to disagree and left it at that. However, virtually all of us are unified on imposing further restrictions on the population. Its time to get back to normality asap.

 

[brad465]

What's interesting is today both Jacob Rees-Mogg and Lord Frost have spoken out somewhere against lockdowns/restrictions and/or their severity. JRM did so in Parliament in an attempt to justify/water down the party row (he claimed the rules were too tough at the time of the party), while Lord Frost did so in this Telegraph article:

Access Restricted

(Apologies due to paywall I can't copy text)

 

[GS250]

Agreed, it was wrong to close schools, I think they should have been open throughout, even in April 2020.

Remember though, they did remain fully open in the second lockdown (November 2020).

In addition, they were the first settings to re-open during the third lockdown, being open to all from 8th March 2021.

Your figure of 10 out of 700 seems to correspond with my own experience in April 2020. By late May though my school had about 10% of students in.

You forget too that Year 10 retuned to schools in June 2020, albeit in a limited fashion. In addition, during the third lockdown, my school had roughly 15% of students in school and I know of many others where there were well over 20%.

Add in that many teachers have learned how to deliver live lessons online through the use of Google Meets/Zoom and it hasn’t been an easy time to be a teacher. Your post completely fails to acknowledge the efforts that teachers have gone to.

For the avoidance of doubt, I worked full time and in person in school from May 2020 onwards.

I work full time in a (non teaching) School role and have done for some time. I disagree that Schools should have been kept open no matter what. I think we all accept that pupils aren't really at risk in any way. However, we also know that they are extremely effective at transmitting C19 between households. My guess is that had we kept schools open during the first and second wave, infections would have been far higher and the NHS would have almost certainly been overwhelmed. There was also the 'fear' factor that was developing amongst pupils during both waves. Parents were pulling their pupils out of school because they felt the numbers were getting out of hand. There were also staffing issues. Those who were vulnerable or lived with vulnerable people were simply not going to carry on working in that kind of environment. Not to mention those having to self isolate for whatever reasons.

I totally agree with you though, School staff were the unsung heroes of the pandemic. Those who set up the remote learning systems and those who administered them especially.

I fully supported both lockdowns for various reasons. However...there were some elements that I found absolutely unacceptable. Forcing solo dwellers to not be able to see friends or family was pretty appalling in my book.

However....no more restrictions given we now have the vaccine. I'd be looking at lifting everything completely by March at the latest.

 

[sjpowermac]

I work full time in a (non teaching) School role and have done for some time. I disagree that Schools should have been kept open no matter what. I think we all accept that pupils aren't really at risk in any way. However, we also know that they are extremely effective at transmitting C19 between households. My guess is that had we kept schools open during the first and second wave, infections would have been far higher and the NHS would have almost certainly been overwhelmed. There was also the 'fear' factor that was developing amongst pupils during both waves. Parents were pulling their pupils out of school because they felt the numbers were getting out of hand. There were also staffing issues. Those who were vulnerable or lived with vulnerable people were simply not going to carry on working in that kind of environment. Not to mention those having to self isolate for whatever reasons.

I totally agree with you though, School staff were the unsung heroes of the pandemic. Those who set up the remote learning systems and those who administered them especially.

I fully supported both lockdowns for various reasons. However...there were some elements that I found absolutely unacceptable. Forcing solo dwellers to not be able to see friends or family was pretty appalling in my book.

However....no more restrictions given we now have the vaccine. I'd be looking at lifting everything completely by March at the latest.

I refer you to the thread ‘Return to Education’ (linked below). There you will find plenty of posts where the consensus seems to be that schools either didn’t play any part in the spread of the virus or that if they did then they were no worse than other settings.

There were also staffing issues. Those who were vulnerable or lived with vulnerable people were simply not going to carry on working in that kind of environment. Not to mention those having to self isolate for whatever reasons.

Yes and no.

Some staff at my school were told to shield. All did so during the official shielding periods and some beyond due to individual circumstances.

The vast majority of my colleagues were really disappointed in March 2020 when schools ceased to be open to all students and even more so in January 2021.

I think it is true though that teachers and school staff in general have worked under conditions that many people would be quite surprised by.

Return to Education

From next month upon reopening of schools, colleges and universities, the transport system will have to cope with large numbers of students mixing with the regular passengers. There are numerous bus services throughout the country with infrequent timetables, built around the school term. As many...

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[greyman42]

I think some restrictions were necessary, but lockdowns where you were banned from leaving your house without reasonable excuse or almost all non work social contact being banned was probably unnecessary and likely did more harm than good. Such restrictions violate basic human freedoms such as the right for a private and family life and therefore need an exceptionally good reasons to be implemented. An illness with a 1% or less mortality rate to me does not justify such measures.

To be fair, i don't think the above restrictions were ever enforced. They certainly were not in York. Either that or the list of "reasonable excuses" was a very long one.

 

[Drogba11CFC]

I think hindsight will provide plenty of answers as to every government's response.

One thing is clear though, yet more restrictions won't go down well with the UK public (Downing Street fiasco or not). Like many, I enjoy a good debate on matters such as politics. I've had plenty of robust but civilised debates with work colleagues on matters such as Lab/Con, Brexit etc etc. Many a time we've agreed to disagree and left it at that. However, virtually all of us are unified on imposing further restrictions on the population. Its time to get back to normality asap.

You should see the Sports Interactive message board. A hive of restricitivism, locktivism and maskivism, with the ghastly Christina Pagel frequently wheeled out.

 

[MikeWM]

You should see the Sports Interactive message board. A hive of restricitivism, locktivism and maskivism, with the ghastly Christina Pagel frequently wheeled out.

The same Christina Pagel who wrote this gem in October? I think it is fair to say this hasn't aged terribly well

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/oct/07/england-vaccine-just-plus-europe-covid

Why is England doing worse against Covid than its European neighbours?
Instead of relying on vaccines alone, countries such as France and Germany are using extra measures to keep cases and deaths low

So why are our closest neighbours achieving much better health outcomes given that they, too, have their children back at school, their students back at university, and their business and leisure facilities open? The reason comes down to strategy.

(to save anyone reading the rest of the article, the 'other things' we should have been doing were, of course, wearing masks and using vaccine passports everywhere. If only we'd done that we could have had the sort of case rates and ICU occupancy currently seen in France, considerably worse than in England......!)