Wuhan coronavirus

[Herman 9,713]

This is where scrutiny comes in. Why has Johnson chosen an arbitrary 12 week figure? It's on all the front pages this morning and it could simply be giving false hope. 

[Van wink 2,994]

I’m not a BJ fan but with this one I think we could all do with a bit of hope, he did heavily qualify it by saying that it requires people to strictly adhere to government advice. When he said it he looked at the CMO to back him up but he had disappeared under a stone.Not great to have a leader who shoots from the hip but with this one on balance I think he did the right thing.

[Herman 9,713]

This is where his track record plays against him. Trying to get people like me to trust that he isn't making it up as he goes along is going to be an uphill struggle. 

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

8 hours ago, Barbe bleu said:

It's running at about the same as spain at the moment but certainly the proportions are high.   Too early to tell much from this I guess

That's true but I think Spain is the next worst after Italy, and the UK proportion is much higher than France, Germany, Austria, Swiss, Holland, Belgium and all the Scandanavians.

Its tempting to think that similar cultures have some effect in Italy and Spain being so high although that's sheer speculation at this stage, not so easy to see why we seem to be doing significantly worse than the countries we would normally compare ourselves with.

[T 190]

I think we all need some false hope sometimes. The reality does not help. Sometimes.I tell my clients and staff what they want to hear on long difficult projects to keep moral up while being honest on what actions need to be taken. I think that is all Boris is doing. Although given the UK public can’t grasp they are causing unnecessary problems by panic buying and the UK dismissive attitude to expert advice for their own good I question whether voluntary measures are suffecient. 
 

Epidemics do pass through naturally and  there is unprecedented global efforts my those much maligned international Experte to find solutions. It is going to get worse but it will get better.
 

And there is an opportunity to develop new routines  and do and learn things you never did before. Eg online fitness and learning courses. 

[Yellow Fever 3,746]

43 minutes ago, Van wink said:

I’m not a BJ fan but with this one I think we could all do with a bit of hope, he did heavily qualify it by saying that it requires people to strictly adhere to government advice. When he said it he looked at the CMO to back him up but he had disappeared under a stone.Not great to have a leader who shoots from the hip but with this one on balance I think he did the right thing.

 

3 minutes ago, Herman said:

This is where his track record plays against him. Trying to get people like me to trust that he isn't making it up as he goes along is going to be an uphill struggle. 

 

I'm agreeing with Herman here.

Johnson has no credibility. He's destroyed any hope of that of that over the previous few years twisting or misrepresenting facts into outright lies and engaging in double talk and fantasies & unicorns i.e NI Irish border checks. He doesn't care about the differences between fact and fiction if it suits him - or as is widely reported - 'a loose association with the truth'.

Now he needs the thinking to believe him - well would you ?

 

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

9 minutes ago, Herman said:

This is where his track record plays against him. Trying to get people like me to trust that he isn't making it up as he goes along is going to be an uphill struggle. 

A very steep uphill struggle, and one that he himself has already undermined several times on this very serious issue even though he's supposedly got his serious face on and is being 'guided by the science'.

Party politics do seem to have gone very much into the background at the moment, as they should, but the fact that we happen to have a PM with no credibility at all amongst a huge chunk of the population is a practical problem. If even the Daily Mail was laying into him the other day then it just show how little credibility he and the whole government has. Given that context I don't think Johnson being on telly every day is doing us (or him) any favours, would be better if he left it to some health professionals.

[Van wink 2,994]

42 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

 

 

I'm agreeing with Herman here.

Johnson has no credibility. He's destroyed any hope of that of that over the previous few years twisting or misrepresenting facts into outright lies and engaging in double talk and fantasies & unicorns i.e NI Irish border checks. He doesn't care about the differences between fact and fiction if it suits him - or as is widely reported - 'a loose association with the truth'.

Now he needs the thinking to believe him - well would you ?

 

I suspect the great unwashed will take some comfort. 

[sonyc 5,490]

Hope is one thing. It's good to try and raise morale. Having serious measures would support that. Our present strategy is less than stringent. People where I live are still congregating (arranging nights out etc....why because they have a right to earn, because it's s free country, because we are not told not to go out but it's a jolly good idea not to etc etc). We are not closing our borders (folk can come into the country at this moment....no tests or quarantine for them) yet wasn't this the reason we had Brexit - to be in charge of our borders. EU countries have controlled theirs. You couldn't make it up. Thousands of EU nationals have left the NHS and now we are imploring retirees to come back. We have emergency lorries travelling around the UK with PPE equipment for hospitals who have stated they are hours from running out. All very serious, urgent and practical matters. Yet we have someone with very limited range, depth and I would addto that now, urgency, given the catastrophic number increases we will see in only the next few days. Yet...breathe easy every one, we will have given this virus a damned good hiding within 12 weeks and turned the corner. My blood boils. I'm sorry. This is not party political once again. It is leadership. Having s good attempt at it is not good enough. The real heroes are the NHS staff, a lot of the British public who follow advice and often provide increasingly beautiful acts of kindness, the retail workers too. Many others. 

We (the government) must act with greater precision and stringency, with confidence to take bigger decisions. Or this pandemic will not have turned the corner but we will be up there with higher numbers than other countries proportionately. I keep praying that he comes good, quite honestly.

Rant over.

Edited March 20, 2020 by sonyc

[Van wink 2,994]

34 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

A very steep uphill struggle, and one that he himself has already undermined several times on this very serious issue even though he's supposedly got his serious face on and is being 'guided by the science'.

Party politics do seem to have gone very much into the background at the moment, as they should, but the fact that we happen to have a PM with no credibility at all amongst a huge chunk of the population is a practical problem. If even the Daily Mail was laying into him the other day then it just show how little credibility he and the whole government has. Given that context I don't think Johnson being on telly every day is doing us (or him) any favours, would be better if he left it to some health professionals.

If he didn’t appear he would be accused of hiding? He won a huge majority so you can be assured that many many people will be comforted by seeing him doing these press conferences, and those that are not would never have been. The best I’ve seen on TV so far was Andy Burnham last night, what might have been eh?

[Van wink 2,994]

2 minutes ago, sonyc said:

Hope is one thing. It's good to try and raise morale. Having serious measures would support that. Our present strategy is less than stringent. People where I live are still congregating (arranging nights out etc....why because they have a right to earn, because it's s free country, because we are not told not to go out but it's a jolly good idea not to etc etc). We are not closing our borders (folk can come into the country at this moment....no tests or quarantine for them) yet wasn't this the reason we had Brexit - to be in charge of our borders. EU countries have controlled theirs. You couldn't make it up. Thousands of EU nationals have left the NHS and now we are imploring retirees to come back. We have emergency lorries travelling around the UK with PPE equipment for hospitals who have stated they are hours from running out. All very serious, urgent and practical matters. Yet we have someone with very limited range, depth and I would addto that now, urgency, given the catastrophic number increases we will see in only the next few days. Yet...breathe easy every one, we will have given this virus a damned good hiding within 12 weeks and turned the corner. My blood boils. I'm sorry. This is not party political once again. It is leadership. Having s good attempt at it is not good enough. The real heroes are the NHS staff, a lot of the British public who follow advice and often provide increasingly beautiful acts of kindness, the retail workers too. Many others. 

We (the government) must act with greater precision and stringency, with confidence to take bigger decisions. Or this pandemic will not have turned the corner but we will be up there with higher numbers than other countries proportionately. I keep praying that he comes hood, quite honestly.

Rant over.

Can’t argue with that. When times get tough we begin to realise who really are the most important people in our community, and all of a sudden we recognise true value.

[Yellow Fever 3,746]

12 minutes ago, Van wink said:

I suspect the great unwashed will take some comfort. 

I doubt the great 'unwashed' take any notice at all and certainly not Johnson so far  -  panic buying, still out in the pubs etc.

[sonyc 5,490]

7 minutes ago, Van wink said:

If he didn’t appear he would be accused of hiding? He won a huge majority so you can be assured that many many people will be comforted by seeing him doing these press conferences, and those that are not would never have been. The best I’ve seen on TV so far was Andy Burnham last night, what might have been eh?

I watch the conferences every afternoon. I want to hear what we are doing, the actions being taken and what these are and why. I want to be told like a good citizen. I want to be educated (points 1, 2, 3, 4) like I'm being lectured to from an expert in his craft (who has done all the research and even has learned friends next to him). To hear vague waffle is appalling. And each time I turn on, I am wishing he might change. He doesn't. He is the wrong person at just the wrong time. He needs to be announcing stuff like a new bridge, a new billion pound building. He needs to be someone playing to a gallery not the nation about a deadly disease.  We need gravitas, seriousness, we need cold analysis right now.

Edited March 20, 2020 by sonyc

[Van wink 2,994]

Why do I keep getting things about funeral planning popping up, they should be preparing for panic buying!

[Van wink 2,994]

5 minutes ago, sonyc said:

I watch the conferences every afternoon. I want to hear what we are doing, the actions being taken and what these are and why. I want to be told like a good citizen. I want to be educated (points 1, 2, 3, 4) like I'm being lectured to from an expert in his craft (who has done all the research and even has learned friends next to him). To hear vague waffle is appalling. And each time I turn on, I am wishing he might change. He doesn't. He is the wrong person at just the wrong time. He needs to be announcing stuff like a new bridge, a new billion pound building. He needs to be someone playing to a gallery not the nation about a deadly disease.  We need gravitas, seriousness, we need cold analysis right now.

You do get it from the experts, he’s not stood there in his own. 

[Van wink 2,994]

7 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

I doubt the great 'unwashed' take any notice at all and certainly not Johnson so far  -  panic buying, still out in the pubs etc.

Great unwashed was probably the wrong term, but there will be many many older folks who voted from him and who are feeling pretty vulnerable at the moment, I hope at least they took a little comfort.

[ron obvious 1,499]

40 minutes ago, sonyc said:

I watch the conferences every afternoon. I want to hear what we are doing, the actions being taken and what these are and why. I want to be told like a good citizen. I want to be educated (points 1, 2, 3, 4) like I'm being lectured to from an expert in his craft (who has done all the research and even has learned friends next to him). To hear vague waffle is appalling. And each time I turn on, I am wishing he might change. He doesn't. He is the wrong person at just the wrong time. He needs to be announcing stuff like a new bridge, a new billion pound building. He needs to be someone playing to a gallery not the nation about a deadly disease.  We need gravitas, seriousness, we need cold analysis right now.

Which conferences are you watching? Ones I've see he normally has Chris Whitty or Patrick Vallance or both beside him. One yesterday consisted of 3 experts, no BoJo at all.

Edited March 20, 2020 by ron obvious

[ron obvious 1,499]

Talking to my son yesterday, he said somebody at work's dad is a vet, & coronavirus has been knocking about in horses for a while. I seem to remember it made the news a while back (probably to do with racing), but it shows that perhaps there are many diseases in animals which can evolve to make the species jump.

[sonyc 5,490]

12 minutes ago, ron obvious said:

Which conferences are you watching? Ones I've see he normally has Chris Whitty or Patrick Vallance or both beside him. One yesterday consisted of 3 experts, no BoJo at all.

The usual BBC one at 5pm. And his comments from it are all over the papers about his 12 week statement. Which is what my post was about. It's message.

Edited March 20, 2020 by sonyc

[Van wink 2,994]

10 minutes ago, sonyc said:

The usual BBC one at 5pm. And his comments from it are all over the papers about his 12 week statement. Which is what my post was about. It's message.

What is wrong with a message of hope?

[Yellow Fever 3,746]

4 minutes ago, Van wink said:

What is wrong with a message of hope?

Nothing at all providing it is delivered by somebody with honest credibility (i.e the experts either side) but not by somebody who is 'hopeless'. There is of course hope that the worse will be avoided - it will be tough but we will come through it, vaccines and treatments are being created, the NHS and industry and engineers and scientists will find the beds and ventilators. We are throwing the kitchen sink at it. 'All in'. However all of that then doesn't tally with not shutting the pubs and restaurants etc! Kind of undermines the message - not too serious - do what you want etc!

All in it was a trite vacuous 'pep talk'. If you have nothing of note to say say nothing.

 

[ron obvious 1,499]

24 minutes ago, sonyc said:

The usual BBC one at 5pm. And his comments from it are all over the papers about his 12 week statement. Which is what my post was about. It's message.

You must have a different BBC to me then.

[sonyc 5,490]

20 minutes ago, ron obvious said:

You must have a different BBC to me then.

Indeed I must. 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51966721

 

 

[Van wink 2,994]

22 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

Nothing at all providing it is delivered by somebody with honest credibility (i.e the experts either side) but not by somebody who is 'hopeless'. There is of course hope that the worse will be avoided - it will be tough but we will come through it, vaccines and treatments are being created, the NHS and industry and engineers and scientists will find the beds and ventilators. We are throwing the kitchen sink at it. 'All in'. However all of that then doesn't tally with not shutting the pubs and restaurants etc! Kind of undermines the message - not too serious - do what you want etc!

All in it was a trite vacuous 'pep talk'. If you have nothing of note to say say nothing.

 

To be honest I am beginning to get the impression that you are not a fan!

[sonyc 5,490]

36 minutes ago, Van wink said:

What is wrong with a message of hope?

See your response to my long post above VW. No harm in hope. You actually 'liked' it so maybe now you wish to retract (I'm okay with that because it wasn't my main point)

[Van wink 2,994]

17 minutes ago, sonyc said:

See your response to my long post above VW. No harm in hope. You actually 'liked' it so maybe now you wish to retract (I'm okay with that because it wasn't my main point)

I don’t think I did “like” it but I did agree with your points about who the real hero’s are, hence my comment about values, but don’t let’s get pedantic. My point was that there are a group of vulnerable people, my mum being one, who are self isolating and for whom any message of hope gives them a bit of a lift in what is an abundance of gloom, but having read the thoughts of others, including yourself, I am persuaded that his comments were probably not helpful in terms of a message to the population as a whole. 

[sonyc 5,490]

Yes the "like" did relate to your broad agreement VW. No pedantry from me. I'm not that kind. We need to be kind to each other (one poster on here tells me I have a different BBC and points it out publicly rather than check it for himself for example. An he is a Norwich fan too!).

Lots of worry about our loved ones. And it IS comforting to give hopeful words (even if not true). Worry never makes anything better. We all admire a good bedside manner in a doctor when we visit a surgery.

My points (perhaps I'm am not clear enough myself) were more about hope being fine but we need direction. It's that kind of thing that reassures me.

I have wondered about coming off this forum for a week or so because sometimes these kinds of things don't  bring out the best in some folk. I don't think I would be missed..... I often post to share my anxieties and annoyance which is possibly not such a good thing and will perhapst now process this in myself in future (sensitive soul as I can be! ...and that won't change VW). I will keep reading though. I've been here since 2004 and have tended to be a reader rather than a high number poster. I need to go back to just that.

[Rock The Boat 1,325]

Not much hope if you are an elderly Italian.

According to tweet from Nadine Dorries Italy has stopped all ventilation of all ICU patients over 60s. 

[Yellow Fever 3,746]

42 minutes ago, Van wink said:

To be honest I am beginning to get the impression that you are not a fan!

I keep 'hoping' VW but BJ seems incapable of leading - to tell people what they don't want to hear, to make 'tough' decisions without his hand being forced - to get ahead of the curve! It seems even the Californian President has more balls.

That's why he has the two experts either side - to try to give him some much needed and lacking credibility. Wouldn't be needed with almost any previous PM.

He got into power by telling people what they wanted to hear whether it was truthful or not. Sadly this leopard can not change his spots.

[Creative Midfielder 1,985]

1 hour ago, Van wink said:

If he didn’t appear he would be accused of hiding? He won a huge majority so you can be assured that many many people will be comforted by seeing him doing these press conferences, and those that are not would never have been. The best I’ve seen on TV so far was Andy Burnham last night, what might have been eh?

He certainly won a huge majority in Parliament but I'm sure you'll recall that our weird electoral system gave him that huge majority on the basis of 42.6% of the vote, and a good chunk of those were Labour voters holding their noses and voting for him (probably for the one and only time) purely because of Brexit.

Granted some people still seem to like him but the real enthusiasts must only be about a third of the population at best, whilst a high proportion of the rest of us absolutely loath him.

I would have thought that the total u-turn he performed a week ago would have unnerved even many of the enthusiasts, but whatever our individual opinions he clearly isn't someone who can unify and command the respect across the country that you would normally expect to be automatically the case for any British PM in a such crisis.

He was quite rightly accused of hiding earlier on but that was because hiding went hand in hand with a lack of action. Now that action is belatedly starting, IMO we (and he) would be better served by having regular briefings from the medical experts. I try and avoid watching him on a daily basis, but my wife usually does watch and says he looks and sounds uncertain on the details, incredibly uncomfortable and as though he wished was anywhere else - which hardly inspires confidence.

Didn't see the Andy Burnham interview, still find his decision to go for Mayor rather odd but I guess he must have felt he could achieve more there than in Parliament and the way things are going he may well be proven right!