Pubs reopening...but

[Latchford Locks]

If as expected Boris opens up the pubs again what will the restrictions be?

What hours will they be open?

Are we to return to the chaos that was Bridge St after 11.30 at night and subject out frontline services to all the dangers and threats such a thing would inevitably bring?

Or will common sense prevail and hours be strictly 11.00-11.00 maximum permitted.

Has anybody in authority even considered this?

[Evil Sid]

They probably discussed it at the bar in Westminster.....🍾🍸

[Observer II]

Expediency rules.  😷

[Latchford Locks]

16 minutes ago, Observer II said:

Expediency rules.  😷

Lets hope not 🤨

[algy]

It has been said that no payment will be accepted over the bar and that drinks must be ordered via a mobile phone app also has the use of pub toilets been considered?, forget these jolly times!.

 

[Davy51]

I think i will not bother for a few weeks ,let the initial confusion & pandemonium die down. Beer at home is tasting just as good ,at a fraction of the price.

[Observer II]

Let them celebrate a few months of freedom until the cases kick off and we return to a lock down Winter.    😷

[Latchford Locks]

I don't know if anyone has had a good look round the pub scene(I haven't) but there seems to be precious little news on whether they are a success or failure I wonder how many drinkers are just watching how things go or are just to wary at the moment to venture inside.

I was a casual drinker in the last few years and so it didn't really disrupt my social life as it would have 10 years ago.

But my friends some of whom enjoyed a pint out during the week on a regular basis are all holding fire at the moment.

I don't want to see the demise of the British pub and would love a beer out with friends at a pub quiz but we all seem scared witless of this soddin plague 😧

Are we overreacting or not ?

[Confused52]

Are we over-reacting? Well probably yes and no. The trend for England and the North West are bad but Warrington is holding out for now. 

The reason it is not on the old thread is shown in the graph. London has overtaken Warrington for the first time since mid-April.

(As usual the case counts are 7-day rolling averages for a population of the size of Warrington taken from the named locations, thereby making the counts on the Y axis comparable.)

[asperity]

A scientific advisor to the government said, on the radio, that when we re-open the schools we should shut the pubs again as some sort of "trade off" (his words not mine) to balance out the risk. Have these people any more marbles they could possibly lose?

[Evil Sid]

I am surprised that nobody has yet come up with a rota for opening establishments.

hairdressers open all day sundays only.

Pubs open monday and friday.

schools open saturday , wednesday and half day thursday.

It would be the sort of thing some government department would spend time sorting out.

scientist are wonderful people who will spend hours on the most obscure research. Things like designing and fitting a camera small enough to be carried around by a beetle. Cannot remember why they did this but they did. they even designed it so they can pan the camera by remote.

 

[Davy51]

I watched a channel 4 programme about this virus last night & apparently a disease X has been expected for some time by scientists worldwide. A virus than can transmit from animals to humans & is a very aggressive strain of corona virus.

[Observer II]

It was a no brainer Dave,  which calls into question the judgement of our leaders in their lack of preparation and timely reaction.    😷

[Latchford Locks]

32 minutes ago, Observer II said:

It was a no brainer Dave,  which calls into question the judgement of our leaders in their lack of preparation and timely reaction.    😷

You can only fully prepare if you know the specific threat.

FMEA is the alternative

[Observer II]

No Latch, pandemics have been on the cards throughout human history; we recently had SARS and MERS.  Now while it may take time to analyse the specific pathogen and create a vaccine;  the basic procedures of locking down to isolate and contain spread apply in all cases.   This wasn't done in most cases as soon as the Chinese and WHO announced the pandemic, planes continued to fly around the world as if intent on spreading it, and Govs didn't close their borders or lock down immediately.     😷

[Latchford Locks]

I suppose you have a point

But without knowing your enemy inside out you can only surmise on the final outcome of any actions you take.

[Davy51]

I think ,in all fairness, no government in the world actually expected that the time had come for virus X to arrive with such ferocity. It is perhaps with hindsight that scientists can now say they were expecting virus X at more or less some time in the future.

All governments can do is follow the science but perhaps it's a case of too many scientists  muddying the test tube.

[Observer II]

If you look at the history,  whilst they may have lacked scientific knowledge,  past societies had the basics right -  contain, isolate and quarantine.     The Venicians  had  an island set aside for all visiting traders to quarantine before entering the City;   18C sailing ships with sickness onboard, had to fly a yellow flag and stand off in harbour for a quarantine period.   In the days when most people never travelled more than 50 miles from their home village,  it still didn't stop the "black death" from spreading from China to the rest of the world.  The American natives were basically wiped out by diseases such as smallpox and STDs spread by Europeans.   The big difference now, is that with international flights and global travel, spread is that much faster, so making  rapid isolation and lock downs essential.   The other aspect to this is "cause" -  the careless assembly and lack of hygene in animal markets, allows inter-species transfer of viruses, ultimately to humans;  which requires higher standards of inspection and supervision, including regulation on imported foods.  Time Governments got rid of their "unsinkable Titanic mentality" and got a grip.       😷

[Confused52]

In my mind the key problem was the early insistence that there was no Human to Human transmission by the Chinese authorities in Wuhan and by the WHO. WHO also said borders should not be closed. That led to a delay in action which coincided with the return on direct flights to Milan a large number of garment workers in Wuhan for Chinese New Year. The planning recognised that China would be the source but we were blind sided by the indirection through Italy. Norther Italy is a winter holiday destination for the whole of Europe and the Tyrol has notoriously porous borders with the locals often considering themselves more Tyrolean than Italian, Austrian or German.

Thus it was that rather than a single point of infection entry we have scientific evidence that the virus reaching us on over 1300 initial instances from abroad but only a tiny handful direct from China. That meant that the infection load was way more dispersed and numerous than anything that they have had to cope with before and the testing capacity could not deal with the volume or dispersion in time.

In essence I suspect that the timing, initial location, time of year (twice - Chinese New Year and Winter Holidays) caused the mess we are in. In risk assessments you look at impact and likelihood for each threat and the likelihood of the combination that actually happened will have been very low indeed.

However the actual factor that caused the likelihood to grow was the lack of an appropriate response in China and in particular stopping Domestic travel but not International departures. I would guess that history will show that to have been a stupid and dangerous mistake by an administration that did not act in a responsible or acceptable way. 

The point Obs makes about animal markets is germane but I would like an explanation of why ANYBODY should be allowed into large populations of Bats which are know to be the endemic source of every coronavirus we know when we have research that proved those types of virus were capable of enormous infection rates based on joint research by China, Australia and the USA. The US involvement was, I understand, championed by none other that THE Dr Fauci himself.

[Observer II]

The "original" source was Wuhan, China;  the problem was, instead of locking down immediately, the Chinese Gov tried to hide or even ignore the initial outbreak, which I think we will find, occured months before the WHO alert.   In terms of subsequent spread, your correct, insofar of the spread being more complex than directly from China. However, the point is, it should never have been allowed to leave China in the first place, and the International Community should have locked down  all travel from China much earlier. You will note, that HMG was evacuating ex-pats from Wuhan, the first plane load were quarantined in a hotel in the Wirral; but that seemed to be abandoned with subsequent flights, where passengers were just told to self isolate at home, and none were tested.  I think that was the point where HMG considered the notion of allowing herd immunity, until the deaths started to rocket and the Hospitals swamped.  As I pointed out in my topic "a perfect storm", it was Chinese New Year, which involves the mass global movement of Chinese, including University students from the UK.    As for "the bats", they exist in nature and can fly free to infect other animals;   for all it's claims to modernisation,  China would appear to have a primitive if not none existent live animal inspection organisation, and cultural habits of eating wild animals doesn't help either.   The sad fact is, everyone has been behind the curve from the beginning. 😷

[Evil Sid]

Hindsight is a wonderful thing.

Treating it as just another flu variant was a natural reaction by the medical profession. It presents as flu like symptoms up until the complications kick in. Until the complications kicked in it was assumed to be just the next annul strain of flu.it was only when it turned out to be so virulent and deadly that people started to take notice, by which time the infection was already widespread.

The annual flu season always manages to see off a few every year,despite inoculations and medication. This particular strain is just more efficient at it.

[Observer II]

Not hindsight at all,   the signs of a pandemic were coming out of Wuhan as early as March if not earlier (follow the topics), the Chinese imposed a draconian lock down on over 4 million people; we were still flying Brits out of Wuhan and elsewhere to the UK, without enforced or supervised quarantine. Flights were arriving in the UK,  without passengers being subjected to any testing and allowed to travel on public transport en route to so-called self isolation at their homes.  😷  We now have the school debate,  with teachers naturally just as terrified as GPs and with the impossibility of ensuring social distancing within normal class sizes and school buildings.   So you either provide additional building space or reduce class sizes to smaller bubbles, with some kind of shift system in place, to provide adequate room for social distancing.   The result of pub openings has provided evidence of local surges in cases.   The current testing a tracing infrastructure is inadequate,  and will no doubt be placed under considerable strain as we move into the Winter Flu season. 😷  The only safe course for at risk groups, is to continue with shielding.   😷

[asperity]

Do you have evidence of local surges being linked to pub openings Obs, or is this just conjecture?

[Observer II]

Only the same news as everyone else - one case was highlighted by Ms Krankie,  which made her want to cry apparently.    😷

[Davy51]

There must be plenty of office/warehouse space where temporary classrooms can be opened up to provide necessary social distancing for pupils & teachers to operate safely. HMG managed to get moving on providing pop up hospitals for the viral surge. Even portakabins in the playground. A bit of thought & application would go a long way.