French lockdown from tomorrow

[Suff]

Well I guess it had to happen.

So we are back to "attestation" forms. Every time we leave the house we'll have to fill one out and we will only be able to go to "authorised" places. I have to check with the local DIY store today as they were doing a 15% off on Saturday and we were holding off buying materials till then. It looks like these shops may be open but time will tell. So far it appears to be restaurants, bars and cafe's and attestation only.

More interestingly, Sky now thinks it's OK to say that No leader can claim to be in control in europe.

[Jaded sarcasm alert]

Really? I thought it was all a UK shitshow with a flipflopping mophead causing us pain. Perhaps setting a target of infections in other countries and then barring them if they hit that threshold, stopped the worst cases in the UK? Or perhaps that is yet to come. It is clear that this virus takes up to two months to build a momentum and when it has built the momentum, it ramps up very rapidly. What we are seeing today is a result of the open access during the holidays. The UK was one of the few countries barring holiday traffic from virus hotspots.

But, apparently, it's all a shitshow and nobody has a clue and economies are all being crippled everywhere and it just keeps on going on.

Perhaps if the press stopped casting doubt on a vaccine and put their weight behind an early release, things might actually get better. But they don't want it to get better do they? This year has been wonderful for them. Loads of "credible" people giving them ammunition to cause total mayhem. Minimum effort involved.

If you look at it without the press lens, France has had all year to create the equivalent of Nightingale hospitals and to staff them. Yet they did not. Now France is facing the overwhelming of intensive care within 2 weeks and cannot build out facilities in that time to fix the problem. So the economy and the people have to suffer. All over again. Such a responsible and credible effort to protect the people from a second wave. Of course it's all OK because the rest of the EU is going there too and so it was "inevitable".

I'm just waiting for the next article about how Mr Mophead screwed up the UK and forced us into a second lockdown country wide.

Such a credible and quality response in France and Germany and, especially, Belgium. Nothing like Mr Mophead.

[End of jaded sarcasm]

[Workingman]

(sarc)The most urgent need during this time of crisis is to ban the virus from reading the papers, watching TV, and listening to the radio; then tell it to "shoo". If we did that we could all go down "Spoons" for a pint and a few shots of the freely available vaccine and give each other big hugs coz it would all be over. Simples. (/sarc)

[cromwell]

It is an issue that shouldn't really have been politicised but in this country it was always going to be.

[Workingman]

I was being sarcastic, but the universal answer to the pandemic is.....?

I was all for a lockdown at the beginning and was critical that it was too light-touch, however, I did accept that it would buy us time if we stuck with it.

What we are now seeing is that the three tier system is not working as hoped. Most of what we once called Lancashire has been in T 3 for long enough for some reduction to take place, unfortunately it is not happening. Within days Leeds and W. Yorks will be in T 3 and not long after there will be a band of T 3 from coast to coast. Birmingham and the W. Midlands is also going into T 3 in the next week or so.

We are now in the position of acting in a way Einstein described as insanity - doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. We need a new approach, but nobody in authority dare mention what it is. We all secretly know, and I guess that many of us are prepared to accept it because we realise that it will eventually come about.

[medsec222]

And it doesn't help when the devolved governments are all doing their own thing. As I understand it, we are still the United Kingdom. I am beginning to have doubts about how well decision making at national/local level actually works out in times of crisis, such as we are experiencing with the pandemic. We should be pulling together and acting as one. Nicola Sturgeon is a prime example of following her own agenda and trying to wrong-foot the prime minister. The constant snipping by the press and television news programmes and the delight they seem to take when the government gets it wrong is starting to wear me down. We are all in a horrible situation and the daily dose of doom and gloom just makes it worse.

[Workingman]

Meds, you are in T 3 aren't you? How is it going? Is it a roaring success or is it the worst of the pits? If it's the latter would you feel more chipper if the media was telling you what a great time you were all having?

I agree that the media has over-egged a lot of the doom and gloom, but the government has made mistakes, and some of them have made things tougher than they should have been. The media is right to report them.

We cannot just pretend that all is fine and dandy to kid ourselves that life is good when it patently isn't.

[medsec222]

If we could 'get Brexit done' Frank, I might cheer up a bit

[Workingman]

Only 63 days to go...... then I can become really miserable.

[Suff]

As I understand it, we are still the United Kingdom.

After Blair and Devolved parliaments, one of the key things which changed was Health. We are no longer a United Kingdom for Health, each devolved assembly is responsible for their own health and their control of health epidemics.

Sturgeon is making the most of it!!!

[Suff]

We all secretly know, and I guess that many of us are prepared to accept it because we realise that it will eventually come about.

Not if the governments can blag it long enough to get one or two vaccines. All of this is simply a holding action to try and limp through to a vaccine. I wonder if a "vaccine dance" would work....

OK I'll get me coat....