Lisa Cuddy

I honestly don’t see the point in the schools staying open from yesterday onwards. If we’re protecting the vulnerable but not cancelling Christmas, surely it makes sense to cut the germ factories off at their source. Keeping them in to spread their ickiness among each other until a couple of days before the main event = “ok kids, let’s see if we can’t kill Granny this Christmas”.

Going to stick up for him here just a little bit. there are few things more annoying than trying to get your kids to remember to charge their phones, to get dressed, and all the other day to day things they need to do and then being told “but I don’t have…” “where is it?” “Left it at my dad’s”. Mine have things that stay at their dad’s house, their gran’s and at my house for this reason alone. No one’s trying to control, no one’s being petty, we just want to save the stress and irritation that comes with NOT having the essentials. It doesn’t help. My kids have 3 charging cables for phones and iPads each that I’ve bought that they’ve been instructed are to remain in their bedrooms at all times. f**k knows where any of them are now.

While I get where you’re coming from, and in spite of my feelings on what happened last year, it’s idealistic to believe discharging the elderly into community to be cared for by family just isn’t viable for many families for a number of reasons. Where it’s established someone needs care that can’t be provided at home, hospitals and care homes need to work together to reassure families that care homes are there to help. A huge challenge at the moment, granted, but just firing people into relatives homes is only going to cause further problems.

They called me from an 0800 number. When you log a positive result, I’m sure the page says it’ll be an 0800 number you’ll get called from.

I’m a nurse, rather than a carer, but the care staff in my first/current home and a handful in the other one are my heroes. I get to give out meds and do paperwork all day and get on the floor when I can or there’s an emergency to deal with. Those carers that walk in the door at 7.30 and are on their feet until 20.30, that seem to have this endless supply of enthusiasm and compassion, well I couldn’t overstate my appreciation for them. They’re incredible people. I couldn’t do my job without them.

It’s true that the homes that did so well have been completely ignored in the media. The drama Help that was on was brilliantly done for the most part. We were told that we would be taking new admissions throughout as we had to relieve pressure on hospitals. We were told testing was unnecessary as we’d be isolating them from admission. We were told 7 days initially and stuck to it where we could. In those with cognitive impairment that were independently mobile, that was fucking impossible. Then we were told 7 days wasn’t enough and it should be 14 - except those untested were out of isolation by then and it was too late. Our home DID have plenty of stocks of PPE so we had no issues on that score. But it was so early in the pandemic that advice was changing constantly and it was just so hard to keep up with guidance at times. There was plenty in that drama that was exactly that - drama - but there was much more that hit really hard for me. I thought I’d taken much of it in my stride - I didn’t go to pubs and out with others often anyway so that part of my life didn’t change at all. I went to work, where I’ve mostly done palliative care anywhere so death and dying wasn’t new to me. Watching Help though brought back so much of the early days of outbreak that I’d blanked out. The exhaustion, constant anxiety, working with the bear minimum of staffing, never being off the phone to scared relatives just desperate to know how their mum or dad were, not being able to get routine medicines, let alone specialist stuff. It was all just so fucking horrible. Anyone thinking of getting into therapy I’d recommend specialising in medical professionals, because in the next couple of years, Ooft.

I’ve worked in 2 care homes since the start of the outbreak- I’m back working in the original one now. I’ve worked through 2 outbreaks. First was April 2020. We were taking people from hospital that hadn’t been tested. Sure enough, in my unit alone we lost, I think, 12 people to suspected or confirmed COVID. One was apparently tested post mortem and confirmed positive - one of the untested that had arrived from hospital. Once we were able to start testing residents, we had a few confirmed but all asymptomatic. That’s not including cases in other units in the home. Out of 5 units, 2 have never had a single case of COVID. Staff wise, I couldn’t tell you how many tested positive, seemed to be new ones every day for ages. Two staff that I’m aware of were hospitalised. A handful of them are still suffering effects now - mostly changes to sense of smell. It does amuse me a bit that our fire marshall smells burning everywhere she goes now, though her partner died so we don’t mention that. We’ve had no other cases in residents since that outbreak. Moved to another home November 2020. Idiot staff weren’t taking precautions seriously. Going out drinking in each other’s homes, tinder dates, the gym. Just before Christmas we got a total of 22 positive tests returned among staff and residents in one day and they just kept coming. I worked 6 days from Christmas to new year. 3 died on Boxing Day alone, with more following in the days after. Again, no staff died but one was on oxygen in hospital. The less said about that home the better to be honest while the care inspectorate do their thing, but I no longer work there and I’ve moved back to the old place. I’ve had a PCR every week and minimum 2 LFTs since they were available and I’ve never had COVID.

Build a wall around it. Sorted.

I think you’ve been reading nonsense.

Right enough you’d save the dirtiest stuff for the end if you were doing it all at once, but if you’re constantly changing the water all the time it’s pointless.

Put it this way; it’s getting easier to empathise with them by the day.

Frail, elderly, palliative and dementia. So, you’re spot on, basically.

If you’re using fresh water for each category, why does the order matter? Nutter.

I managed to ignore Kilt’s so I think I’ll live this out.

I’ve never seen sexy bread before. Bring me some maternity trousers, I’m going in.

I think most have forgotten my existence as I’ve not had any. Twitter is a whole other story.

14.05

Literally only came back for the end of year awards and this is how you treat me? Shocking.

That’s a belter! I’m glad he’s back and in good health. @Jacksgranda good to see you fighting fit!

I thought I’d just come in and have a look, see what’s happening, maybe get some new interesting points of view on the events of the day. Of course, I really should have known better.

I didn’t realise Del Amitri had so many songs.

There’s some miserable old sods on here. That sounds like a good Christmas to me!

In theory, yes. In practice, you’ve just added more people to the NHS workload without the medical teams available to cover that. Don’t think that the teams covering private medicine on a full or part time basis would be enough to meet the needs of the service. They won’t be. I don’t like a two-tier system any more than you do, I don’t think it’s fair anyone should be waiting years for any treatment, but the NHS can’t do it all and private care goes some way to bolstering the system. Remove private healthcare and a lot of treatment that can’t be justified by the health service but actually does save and improve lives is gone. Certain types of therapy, cosmetic procedures, fertility services, for examples, will be drastically reduced while the focus switches elsewhere.

I’m inclined to disagree. It’s relieving pressure and saving already limited time and funding, freeing that space up for someone that can’t self-fund.

Then why has no one pushed these c***s off the edge?