England’s ‘pingdemic’ is a convenient distraction from the real problem

[Northerner]

We’re now in the full looking-glass stage of the pandemic, where things seem entirely back to front and solutions are treated as problems. The “ping” of the NHS test-and-trace app has been widely criticised as the cause of disruption for businesses, workers and supply chains. But our problem isn’t a “pingdemic”. A ping simply tells you that you have been in contact with someone who is infected and allows you to do something about it. The problem is the high rate of infection that greatly increases the chances that you will have been in contact with someone who has tested positive – and therefore that you might have Covid too.

Right now we are at a point where one in 75 people in England is infected (up from one in 95 the week before) – even without accounting for the government decision to remove almost all measures on 19 July. While there are many factors are involved, meaning we can’t be sure how infection levels will progress, the health secretary, Sajid Javid, has blithely accepted that cases could rise to 100,000 a day, while some estimates suggest they could reach 200,000.

So, every time you sit on a bus, go to a supermarket or enter a bar, the odds are that someone around you will be carrying the virus. And even though some may now be deleting the app (especially workers who would have to rely on the UK’s paltry sick pay if they had to isolate), almost 27 million of us have downloaded it and are still doing so at a rate of more than 300,000 people per week. So it’s no wonder our towns are now alive with the sound of pinging. The only surprise is that anyone is shocked by what is now happening.

England’s 'pingdemic' is a convenient distraction from the real problem | Stephen Reicher

More people are being pinged because Covid infections are out of control, says behavioural scientist Stephen Reicher

www.theguardian.com

Time will tell, I suppose

 

[nonethewiser]

Someone other day phoned in to JV show radio 2, said they'd been booked in at restaurant but had to cancel due to family circumstances, still they got pinged as someone that night had covid.

Whole things seems one big mess, virus is reluctant to go away, something we will live with for long time to come.

 

[Leadinglights]

I think there is still a basic lack of understanding, probably not helped by the media. My neighbour who works in a shop said there was a mass walk out of staff as the manager had told somebody they could work when their daughter had tested positive because ' he had just isolated because his wife had tested positive and the manager said well it's the same virus so you are OK to work'

 

[Barfly]

In my humble opinion, it's something we are all just going to have to live with, just like 'flu and TB that is regularly brought in by air travellers from the third world. It is a bit more dangerous than 'flu for some people, but it is not going away any time in the foreseeable future. If the extra hygiene measures we have all been doing are continued, then really that is the best we can do as a society.

Do any of you seriously want to live the remainder of your lives in fear? That would be returning to the dark days of the black plague when strangers were met with fear and trepidation.
I personally want to live what's left of my life to the full, if I get covid, then that's my fate, I have done all I can to avoid it, double jabbed etc., but from now on I for one am going to carry on as I did pre-covid.

We need to get a sense of proportion about covid, sure it's nasty and it will still continue to take some of us, but not in the same horrific numbers as heretofore. Most of the really vulnerable who would get it badly have already got over it or have perished. Now the numbers are similar to a normal 'flu season, so let's look forward with hope and remember all those folks and loved ones who have died.
Tony

 

[mikeyB]

I’ve seen my granddaughter twice this week at our gaff. She sat on my lap and giggled at grandpa’s toes twitching, like kids do. I didn’t explain that CBD oil stops it. She tried to copy. She’ll be two years old come Christmas, and that is the first time she’s sat on my lap. Won’t be the last, either, I’ve made the same decision as @Barfly, I’ve been jabbed twice, so if she brings along a friendly dose of Covid from nursery, I might catch a bad cold.

I’ll still wear a mask in shops and anywhere crowded, like the Wine Shop, out of courtesy, but only for the next month or so, till the wave of infections in Blackburn dies down.

I’ve got Diabetes, Asthma, Chronic Pancreatitis, Ulcerative Colitis, PLS, and a severely arthritic left hip that nobody will replace because of the PLS (useless leg muscles). You think I’m worried about a bug that I’ve been immunised against? No, I’ve got better things to think about, like the start of the new football season. And I don’t worry about anything. Or at least apart from relegation, but even that’s only a passing thought. That’s what worry is - a thought. Worry has never fixed anything.

Boris doesn’t seem to worry about anything either. He’s untroubled by the mass slaughter he has caused because of his belated decisions on lockdowns, and welcomed in the Beta variant from India to kill more folk before belatedly banning flights. After the horse has bolted, you might say. He doesn’t worry because he is a sociopath, like Trump. He believes his own lies. He wouldn’t recognise the truth if it came and took a sh** on the Downing St back lawn. He even claims credit for the vaccine program, and says the success is because of Brexit. No it isn’t, it’s because two women scientists developed the first vaccine in Oxford, and the vaccination service was run by the NHS, not by Serco. He glosses over that, because the people might think they deserve a pay rise. And he hates women who are clearly brighter than he is.

Sorry about the rant. It’s because I’m not a sociopath.

 

[Eddy Edson]

I still don't get we-live-wth-flu-so-let-it-rip. I'd turn it around: we've learned that you don't have to live with flu, something which I'm not sure people really believed before this plague. So why shouldn't the take away be: we don't have to, and we shouldn't, put up with thousands of respiratory diease deaths every year, whether flu, COVID-19 or whatever.

I have a measure of contempt for medical authorities who do not emphasize this.