I would not be able to comment on the general handling of the pandemic by the UK government, but what I can appreciate is even if it is true they have been shite handling the pandemic from the start (which I think there are plenty of truth to it), its more important now, what is going to happen moving forward. To me, since the reopening has been done for a month, while not perfect, the best indicator surely is deaths and serious illnesses and hospitalizations due to Covid. If that is dropping drastically, then we can conclude that the risk taken was one that pays off. Of course, nobody would know what is going to happen in the medium to long term because if I am not wrong, there is still a huge population of UK young people who are not vaccinated? And with variants that can now attack and make young people very sick compared to how the virus was in the beginning, this could be a concern if the vaccination roll out is not fast enough for this group of people. Yesterday, in Singapore, we announced a VTL - Vaccinated Travel Lane between Singapore and Germany - replacing quarantines with PCR tests. Honestly, personally I am more comfortable with Singapore’s phased reopening, observing, roll back if necessary, reopen in their approach to making Covid endemic. But still, I guess what is the best way of reopening is anyone’s guess and we can only hope that the governments are making educated and informed decisions (and I can appreciate that not many governments are doing this in the interest of the people).
That’s the problem, the numbers aren’t falling. They are still going up. Yes the numbers are lower than many other places but if people are happy with a level of over 30,000 infections per day and just shy of 100 deaths per day then what can I say?
Personally, I’m not happy with those figures but I do believe that these figures are largely the result of our previous response to this. People have become weary and vigilance has slipped. You cant blame them when the government has opened things up again either. Worth noting that a large proportion of those numbers on deaths and hospitalisation are in the unvaccinated population. I guess it’s nearing a point where you have to ask how far you’re willing to go to protect those that, for whatever reason are not vaccinated.
Worth noting there is a proportion of those people that simply cannot have the vaccine or it is not effective. Sadly not all people are in that position by choice.
As a side note I visited Chester zoo last Friday. I was in a position where I had the little’un in tow, I was forced into visiting that part of the world through work and had to find something to do.
Despite having to pre book that place was rammed, so no controlling of numbers at all. As far as people’s behavior was concerned the pandemic is over. I honestly hated the whole experience and felt extremely vulnerable. As vulnerable as climbing a 30m cliff with a hangover some years ago. This was no doubt partly to the previous years experience of lockdowns etc. but people’s behavior and attitude didn’t help either.
Well, thanks very much, we don’t want him. You could’ve put him on a flight to Kabul, let the Taliban deal with him.
Unrelated to your point and just interesting for me to note as I have not seen such a list before but something is missing there. Not a single African on Asian country in the top 20 deaths per million?
Saw a program on a few African countries where Covid is rampant, but the official number was negligible.
Deliberate suppressing of numbers, no testing or simply lack of reporting. They went to one village where there was 10x the amount of deaths than normal. Not one had tested but most of the deaths had been viral/pneumonia related.
Yes, as ismf notes, this is due to reporting inadequacies in many countries. The number of deaths in SA, for example, is estimated to be at least twice the official count.
Suspected as such. The health care/governmental systems in most of these are not as good as ours and we ourselves have been under the pump with more excess deaths than the official tallies of cases and deaths.
In France we now have a system called ‘pass sanintaire’. This employs un trained staff who don’t speak French and are incredibly impolite to scan a QR thingy. They are linked up to a system that bugs all the time. So you can not get into the supermarket to do your shopping.
Thes baffoons they employ grab every ones pass or telephone (there’s an app for it). spreading germs all over the place. A complete nonsense.
At least once you have insisted they scan your QR pass 5 times or more and get into said supermarket the supermarket is empty and well stocked.
@ISMF @Kopstar @wyld.at.hrt this has been the case in Bangladesh since the beginning.
I don’t know if it was by design or due to lack of resources, but we have very few tests, compared to our population, and it’s always been voluntary. So we never knew the true extent of the pandemic.
Population: 166 mil
Total Tests: 8.6 mil
Infections: 1.4 mil
Deaths: 25k
Looks like Australia is going to follow the UKs lead 
With only 44,000 cases across the entire pandemic and therefore no community immunity, this should turn out well against the Delta variant.
Yes plus with delta effecting those younger. It’s a recipie for disaster.
Can’t see the travel bubble with NZ opening again anytime in the near future.
is fully opening up still the right course of action?
Not convinced myself.
So, FDA grants full approval to the Pfizer vaccine (no longer just for Emergency use) and already to goal posts are shifting on reasons why not to get vaccinated.
Ah, it’s been a while since I took a peak at Naomi Wolf’s timeline of delusion…
Now reminded Twitter booted her, she was that bad. Even the Taliban are on Twitter.
Still, here she is…
CEO of a Tech Company 
Tell us more about those nonopatticles.
Sounds good to me.
First thing I’d do is probably put some proper studs in Gerrards boots before that game against Chelsea.
It appears the efficacy of the vaccines against the Delta variant is six months.